[Philippe Sands'] essay makes for a sober and solid balance to Wittlin's more skittish approach, and completes the book perfectly -- John Self * Asylum *
Congratulations to Pushkin Press for bringing lovely, haunted Lviv to a new audience * TLS *
A walk down memory lane, a meditation on time, politics and remembrance * Dublin Review of Books *
Beautiful and disturbing songs in prose * Kazimierz Wierzynski *
The combined effect of the two pieces collected here is to paint a wonderfully evocative picture of Lvov now and then... a timely and excellent release by Pushkin Press. Highly recommended * Kaggy's Bookish Ramblings (blog) *
A detailed tour... well-illustrated * East-West Review *
Brief, plangent, and utterly delectable... What a pleasure this voyage is... Wittlin's book is so sensuous, so pungent, so delightful that the main question it prompts is: Why don't we have a whole library of such guides? * LA Review of Books *
A loving, sensuous, but also gently ironic reconstruction of a lost city * LA Review of Books *

Józef Wittlin (born 1896) was a major Polish poet, novelist, essayist and translator. He studied in Vienna, where he met Joseph Roth and Rainer Maria Rilke, before serving in the Austro-Hungarian army in the First World War. He published one novel and numerous collections of poetry, many of which were characterised by their strong pacifist sentiments. With the outbreak of WWII he fled to France and then to New York, where he died in 1976. Philippe Sands is a professor of Law at University College London. He specialises in International Law and International disputes. He has also published many books, including East West Street and The Ratline.