The Oxford-based Central and East European Publishing Project was a remarkable initiative to support embattled Central and East European publishers and journals, and to punch holes through the cultural iron curtain by encouraging translations and a 'common market of the mind' between East and West.

The nine years of its existence straddle the largest watershed in European history since 1945, and the Project's history - told here by some of its leading participants - illuminates the nature of the recent changes in Central and Eastern Europe.

In a vivid personal account, Timothy Garton Ash recalls the work of the Project, ranging from smuggling in subsidies to underground journals and samizdat publishers in the pre-1989 period to supporting high-quality translations and East-West workshops in the period after 1989.

Also included are an Introduction in which Ralf Dahrendorf, Chairman of the Project, reflects on the importance of both publishing and foundations for a healthy civil society; an annotated catalogue of the Project's work, prepared by Elizabeth Winter; and a detailed and original report by Richard Davy on the state of publishing in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary, with suggestions for further Western help.