I'm currently on the second semester of (contemporary) European history and will have to present and defend a paper for this course. I plan on doing an analysis of a biography of one of the prominent figure of the space/arms race, ideally a person who's neither American nor Russian by birth.
But given the vast array of biographies on Von Braun alone (not to mention others of his no less brilliant contemporary) I'm thoroughly lost as to whom to chose and which book to read. And as much as I wish I could read them all, I regrettably have deadlines to contend with.
So you (yes: YOU!) who has already finished their degree in modern/contemporary European History: what do you recommend. Is Von Braun overdone? Should I go for the Ukrainians or is there not enough translations of it? Should I have chosen a course with better employment perspectives?
Thank you any help you can provide!
Von Braun is kind of overdone — you're not going to find anything too new or interesting. If it were me, I would seek out other, often-overlooked, plenty interesting figures. Theodore von Karman comes to mind. Qian Xuesen is also an interesting case (though not European...). There were Germans who were taken to the USSR as well — their cases make for interesting contrasts with the ones who were taken to the USA. If you are willing to avoid rockets, and look to atoms instead, the case of Nikolaus Riehl is quite interesting and there is a translated autobiography available. Gernot Zippe is another interesting figure, and one that gets you into many other countries (he is the one who "exported" the gas centrifuge to many European countries in the later Cold War).