Book Review: Casanova’s Lottery: The History of a Revolutionary Game of Chance by Stephen M. Stigler

Abstract

Catholic and Protestant) and radical nationalism, which in the period under study held out the promise for many clerics and laymen of an effective struggle against Bolshevism as the common enemy of both religious conservatives and fascists. These expectations also enabled many critical Christians to hold what Spicer calls a ‘dualistic view of antisemitism’ (188, fn 38), that is, to come to terms with the aporias arising from rejecting ‘pagan’ racist antisemitism while simultaneously demonizing ‘Judeo-Bolshevism’ and proclaiming the need for a ‘solution to the Jewish question’. This tension, which weaves through many chapters of the monograph reviewed here, deserves special emphasis and examination, for it is a phenomenon that is typical not only of modern Catholic antisemitism: its consideration would certainly allow for a more critical look at, for example, the personality and work of Ukrainian Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky (see Andriy Mykhaleyko, Metropolitan Andrey Graf Sheptytskyj und das NS-Regime. Zwischen christlichem Ideal und politischer Realität [2020]). Moreover, such an approach could help create a better understanding of the dynamics of the ethnicization of religion, which took different forms and conditions for radicalization in different national contexts. It is to be hoped that future researchwill take these issues into account. One will find more than enough stimulus in the monograph reviewed here.