Weimar: Life on the Edge of Catastrophe

by Katja Hoyer

Hardcover

About the author

Katja Hoyer (born 1985) is a German-British historian, journalist and writer.

Hoyer was born in Wilhelm-Pieck-Stadt Guben, Bezirk Cottbus, German Democratic Republic (GDR), where her mother was a teacher and her father an officer of the National People's Army. She received a Master's degree from the University of Jena and moved to the United Kingdom in about 2010.

Hoyer is a visiting research fellow at King's College London and has published three books about the history of Germany. She is also a journalist for The Spectator, The Washington Post, Times Literary Supplement, UnHerd, and Die Welt.

Hoyer is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Reviews

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an outstanding book which focuses on how one German town experienced the upheavals of 20th century Germany from the outbreak of the Great War to the devastating defeat of 1945. However, not just any town but one associated with giants of German literature and philosophy, Goethe, Schiller and Nietzsche, the home town of leading Nazi, Baldur von Schirach and the one after which the 1919-34 German Republic is usually (erroneously) named.
Rather than a simple retelling of German history between the wars, Katya Hoyer has uncovered the personal recollections of several Weimar citizens which she uses to describe their differing experiences of the 1918 defeat, the peace settlement, hyperinflation and the Great Depression. However, the majority of the book focuses on the rise of the Nazis and the subsequent impact of their policies on the town following Hitler's accession to power in 1933. This is most effectively illustrated through the copious diary entries of Carl Weirich in which a fundamentally decent man is initially enthusiastic about the dynamism of the Nazi party before gradually realizing the monstrous truth about Hitler's regime. The fate of his son, Wilhelm, is particularly tragic and illustrative of the dangers posed by all authoritarian regimes.
The precarious fate of the town's Jewish citizens , particularly that of Rosa Schmidt, is also powerfully told by Hoyer and reinforces the damaging impact of racism and authoritarianism on the lives of ordinary people.
The final line of the book clearly refers to the emergence of authoritarianism in Trumpian America (and the risks from Faragism and the extreme right in the UK)and the book can be read as a warning about what can happen to a civilized society when ordinary people ignore the obvious creeping signs of fascism yet wave them off as nothing to be concerned about.
Very highly recommended!

[Tuff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best history book covering this era by far. Tells the fascinating history of the time through the eyes of Weimar and its inhabitants.