A masterwork of W. G. Sebald, now with a gorgeous new cover by the famed designer Peter Mendelsund The four long narratives in The Emigrants appear at first to be the straightforward biographies of four Germans in exile. Sebald reconstructs the lives of a painter, a doctor, an elementary-school teacher, and Great Uncle Ambrose. Following (literally) in their footsteps, the narrator retraces routes of exile which lead from Lithuania to London, from Munich to Manchester, from the South German provinces to Switzerland, France, New York, Constantinople, and Jerusalem. Along with memories, documents, and diaries of the Holocaust, he collects photographs—the enigmatic snapshots which stud The Emigrants and bring to mind family photo albums. Sebald combines precise documentary with fictional motifs, and as he puts the question to realism, the four stories merge into one unfathomable requiem.

The second book in Moberg's classic Emigrant Novels series.

Explains the reasons for the large Irish emigration, and examines the problems they faced adjusting to new lives in the United States.

Two centuries of Irish emigration to the U.S. are portrayed through rare photos and the letters of emigrants writing of their New World experiences.

Between 1880 and 1915, thirteen million Italians left their homeland, launching the largest emigration from any country in recorded world history. As the young Italian state struggled to adapt to the exodus, it pioneered the establishment of a “global nation”—an Italy abroad cemented by ties of culture, religion, ethnicity, and economics. In this wide-ranging work, Mark Choate examines the relationship between the Italian emigrants, their new communities, and their home country. The state maintained that emigrants were linked to Italy and to one another through a shared culture. Officials established a variety of programs to coordinate Italian communities worldwide. They fostered identity through schools, athletic groups, the Dante Alighieri Society, the Italian Geographic Society, the Catholic Church, Chambers of Commerce, and special banks to handle emigrant remittances. But the projects aimed at binding Italians together also raised intense debates over priorities and the emigrants’ best interests. Did encouraging loyalty to Italy make the emigrants less successful at integrating? Were funds better spent on supporting the home nation rather than sustaining overseas connections? In its probing discussion of immigrant culture, transnational identities, and international politics, this fascinating book not only narrates the grand story of Italian emigration but also provides important background to immigration debates that continue to this day.

What do governments do when much of their population simply gets up and walks away? In Mexico and other migrant-sending countries, mass emigration prompts governments to negotiate a new social contract with their citizens abroad. After decades of failed efforts to control outflow, the Mexican state now emphasizes voluntary ties, dual nationality, and rights over obligations. In this groundbreaking book, David Fitzgerald examines a region of Mexico whose citizens have been migrating to the United States for more than a century. He finds that emigrant citizenship does not signal the decline of the nation-state but does lead to a new form of citizenship, and that bureaucratic efforts to manage emigration and its effects are based on the membership model of the Catholic Church.

A compelling and intricate novel of emigration and the effects of colonialism on a people

This important play from one of Poland's most prominent playwrights has had successful stagings in San Francisco, Minneapolis, Washington, D.C., and New York. It takes place on a New Year's Eve in an unnamed country in the home of two immigrants. One is a political exile, an intellectual who gets his money from a mysterious source. The other is a ditch digger who is saving money to bring over his family.

From his earliest years, Gamal Rahman was a troublemaker. By the time The Devil: an Interview is published, Gamal is living in exile in England. Publicly damned and burned by incensed Muslims in the Yorkshire city of Bruddersford, his book generates communal upheaval. Racial tensions erupt. Muslim girls, inspired by the fourteen-year-old Fatima, embark on a bitter strike to defend their right to wear the scarf of modesty in school. While the claims of women fuel the flames, young men embrace the Sons of Allah, dedicated to the execution of the apostate author Gamal Rahman. What should a writer owe to himself, and what to society?