Book review essay. The free world: from Cold War art and thought to the return of History: The free world: art and thought in the Cold War, by Louis Menand, London, Harper Collins Publishers, 2021, 880 pp., £30.00/$39.00 (Hardback), ISBN 9780007126873; £14.99 (Paperback), ISBN 9780007126880; £17.99 (eBook), ISBN 9780008489311; £26.99 (Audio-book), ISBN 9780008489328; World politics since 1989, by Jonathan Holslag, Polity Press,Cambridge, UK, and Medford, MA, USA,2021, reprinted 2022, 416 pp., £21.35/$28.85 (Hardback), ISBN 9781509546725;$24.00 (eBook), ISBN 9781509546749