A GUIDE TO COMMUNIST BULGARIA MEANDERS THROUGH THE ARCHITECTURAL, ARTISTIC AND MATERIAL HERITAGE OF THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF BULGARIA, AND PUTS IT IN CONTEXT. THE BOOK FEATURES THE MUST-VISIT LOCATIONS AND MONUMENTS FOR ANYONE WITH AN INTEREST IN THE TRIUMPHS AND FAILURES OF BULGARIA'S RECENT PAST: FROM BUZLUDZHA AND DIMITROVGRAD TO STALINIST SOFIA, THE MONUMENTS OF COMMUNIST GUERRILLA FIGHTERS AND SOVIET SOLDIERS, THE ABANDONED MILITARY BARRACKS AND CINEMA THEATRES, THE FAILED MEGAPROJECTS AND THE NOSTALGIA FOR THE IDEALISED COMMUNIST PAST AND ITS FUNNY STREET SIGNS.
Communist ideology permeated the living space. It materialised through it and it turned itself into daily life. This process disciplined the urban environment so that just inhabiting it was supposed to make you a faithful Communist subject.
Georgi Lozanov, philosopher
A Guide to Communist Bulgaria is also a guide to the transition to democracy and to our present... It is also a diagnosis of the Bulgarian society at the beginning of the 21st century.
Mihail Gruev, historian