Duitsland: Biografie van een natie

by Neil MacGregor, Pon Ruiter (Translator)

De geschiedenis van de laatste 150 jaar is in hoge mate bepaald door één natie: Duitsland. Aanstichter van twee wereldoorlogen. Twee keer vernietigend verslagen. Verantwoordelijk voor de grootste genocide in de geschiedenis van de mensheid. Tot op de grond toe afgebroken. Tot twee keer toe herrezen uit de puinhopen van haar eigen geweld. Verdeeld, verkaveld, maar opnieuw uitgegroeid tot de dominante macht in Europa.
Wat weten we eigenlijk van de bewogen geschiedenis van Duitsland? En hoe kijken de Duitsers naar zichzelf en hun eigen historie? Vijfentwintig jaar na de vorming van het nieuwe, herenigde Duitsland, op 3 oktober 1990, peilt Neil MacGregor, directeur van het British Museum, ziel en wezen van Duitsland en de Duitsers. In dertig briljante, rijk geïllustreerde beschouwingen beschrijft hij 600 jaar Duitse geschiedenis.
Wat maakt Duitsland tot Duitsland? MacGregor vertelt het verhaal aan de hand van honderden mensen, voorwerpen, plaatsen, kunstwerken, gebouwen, geschriften. Het gaat over worst, bier, porselein, over schrijvers, schilders en politici, over Goethe, Dürer en Bismarck, over Kant en Gutenberg, over wetenschap, filosofie, muziek, literatuur, kunst, architectuur, industrie. Over de drukpers en de Volkswagen Kever. Over Bauhaus en Buchenwald. Over de betekenis van de Rijn en over de taal van Luther, Heinrich Heine, Thomas Mann en de gebroeders Grimm. Over de etsen van Dürer en de cantates van Bach. Over speelgoed, glaswerk, schilderijen en de oorlogsmonumenten van Ernst Barlach. En over 'Made in Germany'.
Neil MacGregors Duitsland is cultuurgeschiedenis op zijn allerbest - een boek zoals nooit eerder over Duitsland geschreven is.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Germany, Art, European History, Politics, Historical

404 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 6, 2014

About the author

Neil MacGregor was born in Glasgow to two doctors, Alexander and Anna MacGregor. At the age of nine, he first saw Salvador Dalí's Christ of Saint John of the Cross, newly acquired by Glasgow's Kelvingrove Art Gallery, which had a profound effect on him and sparked his lifelong interest in art. MacGregor was educated at Glasgow Academy and then read modern languages at New College, Oxford, where he is now an honorary fellow. The period that followed was spent studying philosophy at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris (coinciding with the events of May 1968), and as a law student at Edinburgh University, where he received the Green Prize. Despite being called to the bar in 1972, MacGregor next decided to take an art history degree. The following year, on a Courtauld Institute (University of London) summer school in Bavaria, the Courtauld's director Anthony Blunt spotted MacGregor and persuaded him to take a master's degree under his supervision. Blunt later considered MacGregor "the most brilliant pupil he ever taught".

From 1975 to 1981, MacGregor taught History of Art and Architecture at the University of Reading. He left to assume the editorship of The Burlington Magazine. He oversaw the transfer of the magazine from the Thomson Corporation to an independent and charitable status.

In 1987 MacGregor became a highly successful director of the National Gallery in London. There he was dubbed "Saint Neil", partly because of his popularity at that institution and partly because of his devout Christianity, and the nickname stuck after his departure from the Gallery. During his directorship, MacGregor presented three BBC television series on art: Painting the World in 1995, Making Masterpieces, a behind-the-scenes tour of the National Gallery, in 1997 and Seeing Salvation, on the representation of Jesus in western art, in 2000. He declined the offer of a knighthood in 1999, the first director of the National Gallery to do so.

MacGregor was made director of the British Museum in August 2002, at a time when that institution was £5 million in deficit. He has been lauded for his "diplomatic" approach to the post, though MacGregor rejects this description, stating that "diplomat is conventionally taken to mean the promotion of the interests of a particular state and that is not what we are about at all". He has vowed never to return the Parthenon Marbles to Greece, saying that it is the museum's duty to "preserve the universality of the marbles, and to protect them from being appropriated as a nationalistic political symbol". He did agree to discuss a loan of the marbles on the condition that Athens rejects all claims of ownership to them.

In January 2008, MacGregor was appointed chairman of the World Collections programme, for training international curators at British museums. The exhibition The First Emperor, focussing on Qin Shi Huang and including a small number of his Terracotta Warriors, was mounted in 2008 in the British Museum Reading Room. That year MacGregor was invited to succeed Philippe de Montebello as the Director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. He declined the offer as the Metropolitan charges its visitors for entry and is thus "not a public institution". In 2010, MacGregor presented a series on BBC Radio 4 and the World Service entitled A History of the World in 100 Objects, based on objects from the British Museum's collection. From September 2010 to January 2011 the British Museum lent the ancient Persian Cyrus Cylinder to an exhibition in Tehran. This was seen by at least a million visitors by the Museum's estimation, more than any loan exhibition to the United Kingdom had attracted since the Treasures of Tutankhamun exhibition in 1972. On 4 November 2010 MacGregor was appointed to the Order of Merit by Queen Elizabeth II.

In July 2011, MacGregor spoke at TEDGlobal in Edinburgh about the Cyrus Cylinder and provided a concise summary of the role the artefact has played in Middle East pol

Reviews

[Ilse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every moment spent reading this, was worthwhile. The thematic approach of MacGregor is highly entertaining and his lucid and witty prose is a delight to read. Instead of attempting comprehensiveness, Macgregor stitches a colorful patchwork quilt out of 30 intriguing and incisive miniature essays, illustrating masterfully Germany’s complex and fraught cultural history.

The book is a remarkable encomium to modern Germany and the sensible way it gets on with his troubling past, contextualizing and cross-connecting brilliantly typically German matters like sausages with highlights of German culture by idiosyncratically chosen (sometimes apparently trivial) objects, artefacts, monuments. and key figures like Luther and Goethe. MacGregor convincingly demonstrates his point that there is more to Germany than the wars and the obscene Nazi horror, without sweeping its encumbered past under the carpet.

I admit my inadequate knowledge on Germany is a hotchpotch of shattered fragments and outlines, for the greater part limited to the 19th and 20th century (most of the time I was asleep at school, until our history lessons reached the 19th century). The book didn’t help much to clear that perennial chaos. MacGregor is a great storyteller, but like Germany’s history itself, his book does not supply a coherent framework. Given the complexity of German history however, It would not be fair or reasonable to expect that reading a single book would suffice.

Obviously one could discuss MacGregor’s choices, e.g. that he is treating the apexes of the German cultural heritage, music, literature (apart from Goethe) and philosophy, as a Cinderella. Whatever, what is the point of deploring the apparent omissions and grumping on the topics an author did not include in a book? Our illusive longing for the ultimate, comprehensive book that makes all other redundant? By the way, let’s take another promising book on the subject, Frits Boterman’s doorstopper Cultuur als macht: Cultuurgeschiedenis van Duitsland, 1800-heden which is - unlike Macgregor’s - elaborately annotated (with Germanophone sources too): it largely skips music likewise (according to my partner who has just read it).

Most captivating and poignant are MacGregor’s observations on the profound and disconcerting self-reflectiveness of German art and literature regarding the suffering brought by the world wars and the Third Reich. The meditative work of Käthe Kollwitz mourning her fallen son, the paintings of Anselm Kiefer inspired by Paul Celan’s Death Fugue, the Hovering Angel by Ernst Barlach are all immensely powerful works of art inspired by and echoing the darkest pages in Germany’s history, perhaps even better than words can.



MacGregor’s reflections on the impact of Luther on the German language, the third official language of my country are insightful too:

For 500 years, all great German writers –Goethe, Nietzsche, Brecht, Mann, - have honed their language on, and against, Luther’s. Luther didn’t just catch the way ordinary German people spoke, he also shaped the way they would speak. In the hands of story tellers over the following centuries, and in the pages of Goethe, Luther’s German became one of the great literary languages of the world.

.
Also the tale about the communist Bauhaus artist Franz Ehrlich and the subversive touch he smuggled into the well-known Jedem das Seine (“To each what they are due”) motto he had to design for the gate into the hell of Buchenwald where he was imprisoned, is memorable and recalls the eternal questions on the problematic juxtaposition of Germany’s traditional high cultural and humanistic standards, symbolized by Goethe’s and Schiller’s Weimar, and Nazi barbarism. This Janus-faced Germany, Germany as “Jekyll & Hyde” (Sebastian Haffner) which continues to fascinate is not really discussed thoroughly in this book, but of course there is plenty of other literature that does. I bear in mind the intricate connection Jorge Semprún, the Spanish former communist and minister of culture, revealed between Goethe and the Buchenwald horror in his autobiographical account on his internment in Buchenwald Quel beau dimanche !, intermingling fictionalized conversations with a Goethe observing the death camp with the ones noted down by Eckermann.



As MacGregor implicitly traces back the origins of the derailment of German nationalism to the French and of course Napoleon, I was wondering if this is a typical British reflex (Napoleon, that villain!). Probably, Christopher Clark’s Iron Kingdom: The Rise and Downfall of Prussia, 1600–1947 would be a great next read.

Ruminating on my personal lengthy journey of coming closer to Germany, I cannot discern if this book, with its palpable admiration for German culture and optimistic, positive attitude towards the present country, could affect one’s opinion and attitude on Germany fundamentally, or could merely reach its goal when it can reinforce some constructive seeds on the idea of Germany already present in the reader. I can imagine there still is a sense of sensitivity on all things German to some Europeans, particularly those living in the countries that were occupied, still feeling somewhat uncomfortable and ambivalent with Germany and its past nowadays, due to war memories.

For me neither, it was a coup de foudre with Germany. Frankly, it took a long time to surmount my petty and immature preconceptions on German culture. At the end of primary school, I had this period of fanatically reading on the wars and the Holocaust. In my rebellious teens, apart from a fascination for the Berlin underground scene, bands like Einstürzende Neubauten and the book and film about Christiane F. ,Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo (largely inspired by friends who swore I could act as her lookalike), the idea of Germany was not very appealing – it stood for terror in the past and insipidness in the present (The heavy food. The schmalzy songs on the German television. The syrupy Christmas songs by Roy Black my mother played).

Generally, I happen to fall in love with a country by reading its literature. The first “serious” German author I attempted to read at 17, was Gunter Grass, which killed my appetite for German literature for a long time. This was a false start. Getting older, I even more associated German culture with highly hermetic thinking and artistic expression, recalling getting an exhausting headache coming home from work by listening courteously to my spouse who was in the mood for talking about Heidegger or playing –aargh- a Mahler Symphony while cooking (at home, mixed with all the household noises, Mahler’s symphonies sound to me like a stampede by a herd of elephants - alright, I was and probably still am an ignorant philistine, at least in some respects; however, one of my philosophy professors spoke about Mahler’s music as ‘convoluted moaning’ :-)).

A second and more rewarding entrance to the country went through art, visiting Documenta in Kassel, the Sculpture Project in Münster, which is held every 10 years, and Berlin’s museums. However, this artistic trip being highly internationally orientated, I could barely allege I have tasted some of the essence of Germany then. Anyway, encountering this fascinating visage of modern Germany broadened my awareness - I was very happy to get in touch with German expressionist painting. At last I came to read and greatly appreciate Mann, and postwar German literature like Sebald, Wolf, and Böll. Recently, I embarked on Döblin, Kästner and Fallada, and was enthralled. I became a Bach and Beethoven aficionada and attended some Wagner opera’s, even named our daughter Senta after the heroine in The Flying Dutchman. So very slowly Germany’s allure grew, essentially through literature and music. Matters can change!

Praiseworthy food for thought, stimulating further reading and helpful to understand current events in Germany, like Dresden buying back a Kirchner painting seized by the Nazis as ‘degenerated art’, on the news only a few days ago.


January 28, 2016

[Jan-Maat]

Years ago when yet another hour of Hitler programming chugged on to the TV screen I'd wonder if perhaps we could have a documentary on Biedermeier era furniture just to suggest that there could be something else German that might interest the wider world than just the Third Reich. MacGregor's radio series, is in a similar style as his earlier History of the World in a Hundred Objects, making objects the starting point of a wider enquiry, may be part of a tentative thawing in the British conception of Germany, one of several signs that the pendulum is swinging back towards the mid nineteenth century view of Germany as the home of positive inspiration, even if it is not given over to Biedermeier design but more generally to a series of topics from German cultural history.

The radio series
http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/... has now been decanted into book form. I'm still dubious about it as a book. At first glance each chapter looked to be a word for word transcriptions of the radio series, but looking again, there definitely has been some has been some editing. Each fifteen minute radio episode has been transformed into a correspondingly short chapter. The book is lavishly illustrated, with each of the thirty chapter given over to a different theme ranging from Bauhaus to Walhalla not to be confused with Valhalla, the home of the Norse gods, which remains closed to the visiting public via renaissance lime wood sculpture (for the complete list see the spoiler above).

I found that reading the chapters of this book, each as brief as the radio programmes, was less satisfactory than listening to them. I don't know if this is because MacGregor's language and presentation is really better suited to radio than to writing, or if I am simply more critical of the written word and accepting of speech, or if I am in a more critical state of mind at present. But why be narrow minded about it - all these things and more can be true.

Some reviewers have given this book a five star rating. I think bearing in mind the breath of the selection of topics a case can be made for this. In terms of scope it would be hard to beat this as a one volume set of essays on German cultural history. At the same time the thirty topics selected are idiosyncratic, I suspected given the chapter on coins of the Holy Roman Empire that what MacGregor could lay his hands on for the exhibition at the British museum was the decisive issue. There is nothing for example on music, Goethe is the only writer to get in, while artists are better served (Durer, Kollwitz, Bauhaus, Barlach).

MacGregor's book isn't a work of original scholarship - in this it reminds me very strongly of Freakonomics in which the authors essentially presented titbits from sociology journals with a bit of editorial comment. This was great in that most of us don't have access to libraries full of academic journals, but the authors' spin on the original story was not always worth while. Similarly MacGregor here, possibly in a hang over from the radio format, rounds off every chapter to a neat conclusion but these can sound trite and don't always reflect the richness of the discussion in the chapter.

The bibliography tells it's own story about this book some student practises live on, apparently even after the degree is confirmed . All of the books listed are in English, very few of them are in translation. So MacGregor is apparently largely basing his knowledge of Germany on Anglophone writers. The bibliographies for some chapters name two or even only one book. The snippets we are being fed, as tasty as they are, can have but a single source(or sauce) in some cases. This could be an intellectually respectable Reader's Digest that you can dip in and out of. It could pleasantly flavour a trip to Germany, or inform some other German related reading or music listening, or theatre visiting without ruining your appetite or consuming all your time. Maybe this is the literary equivalent of a street corner sausage and in the German context that is not necessarily a bad thing.

Memories of a Nation is messy and perhaps embracing messiness is the best thing to do in a cultural history of Germany. The first problem is one of definition - what is and what is not Germany: Strasbourg, Kalingrad (Königsberg) and Prague are in this book while Vienna and Zurich are out.

Also whose memories are these? A nation does not have a memory while the collective memory within a nation can be contested. There might be dominant narratives and forgotten voices. The stories we tell about ourselves change. One of the themes here is the multitude of different people's memories and impressions. Things are remembered for different reasons by different groups, or deliberately not memorialised as in the case of the refugee handcart.

Implicitly the sense I get is of the diversity of memories and of acts, occasionally intentional, that create a sense of nation. These can overlap, reinforcing each other, or feed off each other - a curious example is that the nineteenth century in Germany was apparently a great age of reforestation the other example of a re-enforcing feedback loop that slops into consciousness is beer - Tacitus wrote that the Germans drank beer, therefore drinking beer is German and Germanness can be displayed through bierhalls and tankards and brew-culture. Fluidity extends beyond any boundaries that MacGregor tries to impose upon himself in other ways too, the relentless editing and altering that the Brothers Grimm imposed on the stories they collected - changing mothers into step-mothers and stripping out references to pregnancy as well as to pre-marital sexuality since in the world of Victorian values no true mother desires the death of her children and despite the existence of many of us apparently life consists of only two states: chastity and wedlock shows as much as competing Franco-German claims over Charlemagne that culture has its own boundaries that happily ignores the lines drawn on maps.

Overall the book is the inverse of a mosaic. Each tiny piece is a complete and colourful picture that doesn't come together into a coherent whole, instead forming a massy blob made up of Bismarck, Luther, Bavarian beer brewing regulations and Volkswagen Beatles. In the context of British awareness of Germany this is a significant book, but Macgregor doesn't display here the skill necessary to make this a significant contribution to cultural history outside of that context.

[Anthony · Rating 4 out of 5]

Physical Germany

If you want to learn about the soul of Germany then Neil MacGregor’s book if for you. Taking a thematic approach MacGregor gives a biography of the heart of Europe through, art, culture, objects, buildings and movements. All of which have had a profound effect on shaping the country and people we know today. There hasn’t always been a notion of German nation, though. For nearly a thousand years it fell under the yoke of the Holy Roman Empire, a collection of principalities, counties, bishoprics and free cities. All competing and pushing against one another. Then Napoleon came and in 1806 abolish the Reich. Following the Wars of Liberation against him, an idea of a Germany was born and then solidified in the Revolutions of 1848. But the Germany that was forged, was not the one idealised in the liberal minds of the revolutions. It was Bismarck’s creation, forged in ‘blood and iron’ as he famously said. After a humiliating defeat in the First World War, German went on a dark path to Nazism and then destruction. It was split in two, only to be joined again at the end of the Cold War. Now one of the richest and most successful European states once again.

MacGregor tells this story and looks at what makes German’s German. He shows how Marin Luther created this sense of identity through language, as he wrote the first bible in German language that the masses could understand. Others such as Goethe whose high mind created literature, which is to Germany as Shakespeare is to the English. National landmarks such as the Reichstag and Brandenburg Gate are discussed, where so much has been made, alongside important movements like Bauhaus and huge brands such as Volkswagen. Forests play so much in the story of Germany, The Brothers Grimm fairytales are often set in them, and it was here that famously Germany retained independence from the Roman Empire by destroying three legions in the Teutoburg Forest in 9AD. Interestingly there are sone surprising admissions, such as Beethoven or Frederick the Great, who both take sideshows. However, this does not take away from the information there is to tell in this book. Supplemented with a vast catalogue of photographs, exhibits and prints, the reader can really understand what MacGregor is talking about, the things he is describing and why they are significant.

Overall this is a good book and I would recommend it to anyone as it has a lot to offer. I believe that even most German’s would learn from the content of this book. Of course it is limited with size and artefacts to back up chapters and as such in sure there are many who will point out important cultural movements, people, landmarks and events which have been missed out. It would be good to see this for other countries too, as it has provided me with areas of interest for future reading.

[David Gustafson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nation's culture molds every citizen's inward soul whether or not they agree with what it expresses. Like it or not, those various ingredients of culture also fashion a nation's outward history.

Neil MacGregor, the director of the British Museum since 2002, has loaded his painter's brush from the broad palette of German culture with vivid colors from Charles the Great (Charlemagne) to Chancellor Angela Merkel, blending together an almost cubist portrait of the German soul under the title, "Germany - Memories of a Nation."

Some may argue MacGregor's omissions, but he has thrown together enough eccentric pigments from literature, theatre, art, music, architecture, beer, sausages, the Gutenberg printing press to Volkswagens and and the graphic art of emergency currency notes, splashing them across a broad canvas of time, to captivate most any discerning audience.

This is a breezy, informative, compelling read. Just when I thought it was going to take a wrong turn with the chapter on Bismark and devolve into an historical tract cobbled together by a rank outsider, Mr. MacGregor dragged me back inside the interior soul of Germany with the very next chapter on the artist, Käthe Kollwitz.

Käthe Kollwitz is probably best known for her sculpture of two grieving parents in the military cemetery at Roggevelde, Belgian. They are separate sculptures of a mother and father kneeling in grief next to, but oblivious to, one another. Each is too consumed with their own personal agony to be aware of anyone or anything else.

Her other well-known work is a Pietà located in the Neue Wache. It is the National Memorial to the Victims of War and Dictatorship. In contrast to Michaelangelo's masterpiece, Kollwitz's humble mother seems to be protecting the corpse of her dead son from any further assault by drawing it closer towards herself.

I have stood before Michaelangleo's Pietà, appropriately, after the conclusion of an Easter Mass. It did not speak to me with anything near the brute force of Kollwitz's Pietà.

Käthe Kollwitz was reaching deep inside her own wounded heart with this moving sculpture. Her son was too young to enlist during WWI without parental permission. Käthe pleaded with her husband until he agreed to give the boy consent to enlist. He was killed a few months later.

Although I may complain about the omission of Weimar giants such as George Grosz and Otto Dix, the chapter on Käthe Kollwitz alone, is worth the price of admission.

I especially recommend this book as an intellectual guidebook for any Americans making their first trip to Germany.

[E. G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Introduction: Monuments and memories

--Germany: Memories of a Nation

Illustrations and Photographic Credits
Bibliography
Acknowledgements
Index

[Lyn Elliott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reread and enjoyed again before a trip to Germany in May 2025

This wonderful book is the end result of an exhibition held in the British Museum under Neil MacGregor's directorship.
The research that went into the exhibition appeared as 12 programs on BBC 4 and finally emerged in book form, which I've had to read electronically but will keep searching for a hard copy. Kindle is hopeless for this - it is richly illustrated in colour and poor little kindle doesn't cope with that. But the kindle app on iPad meant I could at least see the images properly, and this is essential as the book's origins lay in an exhibition. How I wish I could have seen it.
MacGregor explains that 'the exhibition set out to look at Germany's challenging history from the standpoint of the new Germany created after the fall of the Berlin Walll'. It starts out with a discussion of memorials and memories, has many fascinating chapters on arts (exemplified by eg Goethe, Durer), crafts and technology (printing, porcelain, metal work, industrial processes) and intelligently manages the political shifts and emerging nationalism of the nineteenth century to the much more familiar horrors of mid twentieth century political brutalities.
Again to quote MacGregor, 'One of the central arguments of this book has been that history in Germany is concerned not only with the past but, unlike other European countries, looks forward'. So it ends with discussion of two artworks which reflect on the past and the future - Paul Klee's 'Angelus Novus' and an enigmatic portrait by Gerhard Richter of his daughter Betty.
Thank you Karen for recommending it.

[Jamie Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book works better as history than as psychology or sociology. The short chapters, which were originally a radio series, are interesting and well written, with many facts that the average reader would not know. For instance, when the Weimar Republic introduced the new Rentenmark in 1924 to rein in hyperinflation, the exchange rate was set at one new mark for one trillion of the old. There are also some statements that made me consider things in a new way, such as, “The true inheritor of the Bauhaus is Ikea. Ikea is everything that the Bauhaus dreamed of, mass production of simple, well-designed things, made inexpensively for a mass audience. All the great furniture designed at the Bauhaus is on sale today, and it looks just as modern now as it did in the Twenties.”

The book’s thirty chapters attempt to find important people and formative experiences which, when taken together, give insight into the German soul. Some of them I agree with, such as Martin Luther, the Thirty Years War, Bismark, Nazism, the World Wars, and the divided Germany of the Cold War. Others I might be able to be talked into, such as Gutenberg, whose impact was worldwide, not just in Germany, and Käthe Kollwitz. Others just made me roll my eyes. What insights into the psyche can you get from the fact that Germans make lots of different kinds of beer and sausages, excel at making cuckoo clocks, discovered how to imitate Chinese porcelain, and sold 21 million Volkswagen Beetles?

If you want to understand how Germany’s history informs and shapes its present, you can get a better idea of it in this quote from Robert Kaplan’s Revenge of Geography:

What could be a more central fact of European history than that Germany is a continental power and Great Britain an island? Germany faces both east and west with no mountain ranges to protect it, providing it with pathologies from militarism to nascent pacifism, so as to cope with its dangerous location. Britain, on the other hand, secure in its borders, with an oceanic orientation, could develop a democratic system ahead of its neighbors, and forge a special transatlantic relationship with the United States, with which it shares a common language.

I also thought the author failed to depict communist East Germany with appropriate gravity. He mentions in passing people killed attempting to escape, and describes the surveillance state in almost comical terms, but he never touches on the dark heart of the GDR government, with its prisons and torturers and extrajudicial murders (nor does he discuss the new united Germany’s reluctance to investigate its own ties to the East, where a number of leading government and military figures had been spying for the communists). A good book to explore this part of German history is Anna Funder’s Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall.

Nevertheless, the book works well as history, describing a number of incidents which were to have significant social and political impacts. Why was Luther allowed to survive, much less flourish, and spread his ideas across the world? In most places the Church would have leaned on the state and that would have been the end of him, but Germany was a patchwork of minor principalities, free cities, and ecclesiastical sees with very little central oversight. As late as 1871, the country consisted of 200 principalities, 63 ecclesiastical states ruled by Roman Catholic archbishops, bishops, or abbots; and 51 “free cities.”

“The political fragmentation of the Holy Roman Empire guaranteed a remarkable level of freedom. So when...Luther printed his attack on the sale of Indulgences (those very Indulgence forms which, as well as enriching the Pope, had financed Gutenberg), he found in Germany not only printers to publish it, but—unlike in centralized states such as France or England—printers who could not be stopped.”

Sometimes the author comes up with exactly the right words to describe a situation, such as, “In 1871, when the German Empire was proclaimed in Versailles, Germany took over France’s traditional role as Europe’s difficult neighbour too big for its borders.”

This book doesn’t really achieve its goal of illuminating the Germany soul, but the stories it tells are interesting and occasionally insightful, and I enjoyed most of it.

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

...Volkswagen, Adidas, Puma, Mercedes, Lufthansa. logo itself is a German invention, Albrecht Durer (defining artist of Germany), porcelain factory in Dresden, metal craftsmanship, Nuremberg opera and master singers, clock-watches, Black Forest cuckoo clocks, daimler and benz first working motor cars, Hall of Mirors at Versailles, Kaiser Wilhelm I, Chancellor of the German Empire...Bismarck, sculptor...Kathe Kollwitz, First World War, Hitler, Nazi regime, purging the degenerate, racial purity (Aryan or Nordic), cultural anarchy, artistic Bolshevism; Marxist propaganda, Jewish-Bolshevik distortions, as models: idiots, cretins, paralytics, Goebbels, Buchenwald, Hitler's Final Solution, 'To Each What They Are Due', Elie Wiesel (Nobel Laureate), citizens from Weimar to see what had been done in their name at Buchenwald, total ethical collapse lead to murder of millions, forced migration, return of land to Poland, western border of Germany disputed, 1945 eight million Germans had been killed, priority: clear the streets (all women between 15 and 50 years of age to participate in post-war clean up), today Germany has the fastest growing Jewish population in Western Europe, now numbering several hundred thousand, most are immigrants.

"From the Brandenburg Gate to the Reichstag, seat of the German Parliament. These two extraordinary buildings carry in their very stones the political history of the country."

Favorites

[Steffi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Zu Ende gelesen kann man kaum sagen, denn dieses Buch erobert man sich blätternd: So groß ist die Fülle der Reproduktionen. Und so blättere ich schon seit Tagen hier ein bisschen, da ein wenig und lese mich gelgentlich fest. In ganz leicht zu lesendem Plauderton entwickelt sich zwischen diesen ganzen Dokumenten, Fotos, Gemälden und Skizzen eine Geschichte der Deutschen, deren Reiz auch darin besteht, dass ein Blick von außen darauf geworfen wird. Wer kann als Deutscher schon die roten Linien, die entscheidenden Punkte benennen, bei all dem von Kindesbeinen angehäuften Wissen, Halbwissen und den immer reichlich vorhandenen weißen Flecken über die Geschichte der eigenen Nation? Beziehungsweise fehlt bei dem reichlichen Faktenwissen die Struktur oder der Abstand um die Besonderheiten zu erkennen. Da vertraut man sich gerne dem britischen Kunsthistoriker und Deutschlandkenner Neil MacGregor an, der mit fachmännischem Blick diese Geschichte ordnet.

Gerade dieser Blick von außen interessiert mich und diese Perspektive spiegelt sich auch im Titel der Ausstellung wider, so wie sie jetzt in Berlin zu sehen ist („Der Britische Blick“; gezeigt wurde sie zunächst im British Museum in London) – und heute habe ich mir die Ausstellung angeschaut. Und ich tendiere dazu, das Buch mehr zu mögen.

Aber erst das Positive: Auch wenn mir die Ausstellung etwas altbacken erschien (keine mediale Überinszenierung, keine Verwandlung der Räume in Kulissen – was ich entspannend finde; aber auch keine wirklichen Alltagsgegenstände, sondern Gemälde und Objekte in Glaskästen), so werden die Verbindungen verschiedener Aspekte deutlich: Unter dem Stichpunkt Befreiung erscheinen sowohl Luther als auch Napoleon. Unter dem Stichwort „Weimar und das Bauhaus“ sieht man erst einmal wenig Bauhaus, aber eine riesige Reproduktion eines bekannten Goethe-Porträts. Es gibt viele Verknüpfungen über Zeiten hinweg und die machen die Ausstellung spannend.
(Eine weitere Verbindung, die sich dem Besucher hier aufdrängt: Die Ausstellung findet im Martin-Gropius-Bau statt, einem Gebäude, das also der Großonkel von Walter Gropius (dem Bauhaus-Gründer) erbaute.)

Auch der Einstieg war interessant: Um erst einmal ganz früh anzufangen und die Schwierigkeit zu illustrieren, was zu einem bestimmten Zeitpunkt deutsch war, werden im ersten Ausstellungsraum in früherer Zeit „deutsche“ Städte vorgestellt: Königsberg (aus dem Käthe Kollwitz stammte), Prag (Kafka), Breslau, Strasbourg, Basel. Einem deutschen Kurator/Historiker hätte das Feuilleton das vielleicht übelgenommen, bei einem Briten ist das völlig unverdächtig.

Aber die Schwierigkeit besteht wohl doch darin, anhand nur weniger Objekte (also deutlich weniger als die im Buch vorgestellten) eine Geschichte zu erzählen. Schmerzlich vermisst habe ich beispielsweise die Rolle der Grimmschen Märchen. Da wird zwar in dem Raum, der vage der Findung einer nationalen Identität während der Romantik gewidmet ist, ein Exemplar der Hausmärchen ausgestellt – aber ohne Herstellung des Kontextes (allerdings habe ich auf den Audioguide verzichtet, vielleicht war das ein Fehler). Aber ich bezweifle, dass ein Audioguide die Verbindungen, die MacGregor in dem Kapitel „Schneewittchen gegen Napoleon“ herstellt, auch nur im geringsten auffangen würde. Die Assoziationskette reicht über nationales Selbstbewusstsein vs. napoleonische Herrschaft, Märchen, Wald, Teutoburger Wald, Arminius, Landschaft bei Caspar David Friedrich, Eiche, Eichblatt auf deutschen Münzen...

Fazit: Die Ausstellung ist durchaus sehenswert, aber das Buch dagegen sollte man unbedingt zum Schmökern und Nachlesen besitzen!

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written by Neil MacGregor once the Director of the British Museum who happens to know a lot about Germany. Perhaps the book would be better called Monuments and Museums of Germany. Quirky composition of Germany’s history examined largely through arts and objects.

Surprisingly good prose and eclectic topics such as lost capitals.

We learn that Konigsberg was once a historic German city famous as the birthplace of Emmanuel Kant. The city and its surrounding enclave lie some 300 miles from Berlin and more than 300 miles from Russia.

After Konigsberg was virtually destroyed by RAF bombing in WWII and then Germany lost the war, the area was taken over by the Soviet Union and renamed as Kaliningrad. Kaliningrad, largely because of its access to the Baltic Sea, is still part of Russia today despite its odd geographical isolation from Russia.

Some of my other favorite topics were, in no particular order, as follows:

1. Judengasse , the centuries old Jewish street in Frankfurt
2. Trummerfrau, the rubble women of Dresden and elsewhere who helped rebuild Germany after WWII
3. Buchenwald Gate
4. Bauhaus Artistry movement
5. Walhalla and the Hall of Heroes overlooking the Danube
6. Strausburg the floating city on the Rhine
7. Prague (once part of Germany) and a brief history of Kafka

4.5 stars. Highly recommended.

[Osiris Brackhaus · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating view on German history from a British point of view. McGregor's focus on items as touchstones for his narrative is priceless - even though the facts were mostly known to me, he managed to shed an entirely new light on events, suggesting connections that I would have never seen. A brilliant read.
Some of the first chapters did read a little too positive at first, at least to me. But then again, I am German, raised in Germany, and trained to see our history in rather negative terms.
Now that I have read the whole book and set it aside for a few days, I think McGregor did right to remind us (me) of the good things that happened here. How else could he possibly create a balanced image overall when he had to include the crimes of the Nazi Regime?

So even if I do not agree with all his points and sometimes rather far-fetched connections, it was a truly thought-provoking, enriching and on top of all that a surprisingly pleasant read.

[Bagus · Rating 4 out of 5]

As an art historian, Neil MacGregor has a unique way of presenting the socio-cultural history of Germany in this book. Instead of following a chronological narrative, Neil demonstrates that there is no singular, linear way to recount Germany's history, unlike the more straightforward narratives of nation-states like France and Britain. Instead, Germany's history resembles a captivating mosaic, a rich tapestry intricately woven from the threads of countless states, princedoms, and regions, each with its distinctive identity. Prior to Germany's unification in 1871, it resembled a patchwork quilt of diversity, and Neil adeptly guides us through this labyrinthine history, allowing us to understand how it all coalesced to form a nation with a profound sense of identity.

A striking example of this historical fluidity is Königsberg, once the home of the eminent German philosopher Immanuel Kant, which now resides as Kaliningrad within Russian territory. These transformations underscore the dynamic nature of Germany's historical landscape. Similarly, the city of Strasbourg, where Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Germany's preeminent writer, discovered the distinctiveness of his nation's art and history, is now nestled within the borders of France. These geographical shifts reflect the region's historical flux, where borders and identities have evolved over centuries.

Neil's approach in the book is particularly noteworthy for its emphasis on objects and ideas, as well as the people and places that continue to resonate in modern Germany. By focusing on cultural touchstones such as Johannes Gutenberg's revolutionary printing press, the enchanting fairy tales immortalised by the Brothers Grimm, and the exquisite Meissen porcelain, Neil provides readers with a tangible and relatable entry point into the heart of Germany's historical identity. These cultural artefacts serve as conduits to explore the nation's heritage, revealing the enduring impact of these treasures on contemporary German society.

The journey commences at the iconic Brandenburg Gate, a monument that has borne witness to the ebb and flow of German history. From there, Neil guides us through the nation's defining moments, triumphs, and darkest hours. He does not shy away from the weight of history, especially the burden of the Third Reich. Instead, he explores how Germans grapple with this painful legacy, emphasising the importance of collective responsibility in the process of healing and remembrance.

In his book, Neil does not merely recount a story; he immerses us in the very essence of Germany. He reminds us that history is not simply a sequence of events; it is a living, breathing narrative that shapes a nation's identity. What sets this book apart is Neil's use of visual storytelling. He paints a vivid picture of Germany's past, present, and future through a carefully curated selection of images, photographs, and art objects. It is as if he invites us into a gallery where history comes alive through the brushstrokes of the past. Whether it's the haunting gaze of a medieval sculpture, the sombre stillness of a wartime photograph, or the vibrant colours of contemporary art, each piece speaks volumes about Germany's collective memory.

[Radiantflux · Rating 5 out of 5]

19th book for 2024.

What a wonderful deep/shallow history of Germany.

Highly recommended for anyone who wants to get a broader sense of this country.

5-stars.

[Kaarel Aadli · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uaaau, see oli tõesti üks mõnusamaid, lennukamaid, soojemaid teoseid viimasest ajast. Kogu aeg oli tunne, et kättevõtmine on nagu ühe tõeliselt hea magustoidu lürpimine. Nagu kisselliga buberti lürpimine. Ahhhhhhhh, kui hea! Ja Saksa ajaloost sai ka midagi teada.

Ei, tegelikult oli äärmiselt asjalik, nii põhjapõhjalikult uuritud ja puuritud, kui tohutult hea keelega kirjutatud poolpildiraamat (iga teise lehekülje peal oli illustratsioon), mis tõesti andis sügavalt sügava põhjenduse, miks sakslased on nagu nad on ja kuidas selline institutsioon nagu Saksamaa üldse olema sai. Ai, kui hää.

[Cornelia Funke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading a chapter for breakfast each day- morning treat! Hurrah for Neil McGregor. He enlightened me so many times by now with his books, made me see familiar things through a different lense... First world history, next Shakespeare now my home country. His thought make me so much more aware of the thoughts/ beliefs/ associations I grew up with. Thought provoking and inspiring as always- though I may differ on his thoughts about Faust:)

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

From BBC Radio 4:
Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum, begins his series examining 600 years of German history through objects, with a reflection on Germany's floating frontiers.

Even if this series will continue I won't be able to follow it in the next weeks.

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating and engrossing view on the history of my fatherland from an “outsider”. Very readable; recommended for history buffs as well as art lovers. Full review to follow…

[Gordon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ostensibly a history of Germany, this book has a curious origin story, being part of a three-pronged project: an exhibition at the British Museum, a BBC radio series, and the book itself. I think these three strands are probably all mutually reinforcing. Certainly the book has a very strong visual element, being lavishly illustrated in a way that is strongly complementary to the book's message, which I am sure was greatly aided by the museum exhibition. Similarly, the radio facet of the project probably contributes to the episodic, story-telling nature of the book whose narrative approach makes it highly readable.

The book is definitely not your conventional history, rolling chronologically down through all the centuries of Germany's many wars, kingdoms, empires, religious schisms, nationalist movements, and all the rest. It is about all those things, but it's also about art, music, language, and all the other facets of German culture. In fact, the single chapter about the art and life story of Kathe Kollwitz, a leftist German artist who fled Nazi Germany for England in the 1930's, and who lost a son in WW I and a grandson in WW II, and is today memorialized by statues throughout the country, is good enough to justify the entire book.

I have visited Germany many times over the decades, studied the German language (without much to show for it), and have long been fascinated by the story of Germany's rise, fall, rise, fall and rise again -- and that story is just the last 150 years, let alone all that went before. Yet I learned a great deal from this book, and would highly recommend it to anyone with even a passing interest in understanding the country.

[Ray · Rating 5 out of 5]

An immensely powerful book where the author uses art to illustrate themes in a personal history of Germany. It is a wonderful way of leading the reader through a complex and tragic journey.

[achen · Rating 5 out of 5]

1.這本書不難讀，內容深入淺出，惟必須對德國歷史有一定基礎知識，才能讀得更透徹（我粗暴惡補後只是大略看懂，往後還需瞭解更多，然後回頭再看這本書）。

2.全書分爲六個部分，以建築、語言、人物、飲食、物件等形塑德意志的民族記憶。個人最喜歡第二部〈想望德國〉、第四部〈德國製造〉及第六部〈與歷史一起生活〉。

3.〈想望德國〉的談論角度很有趣，首章敘述了格林童話及其使用的語言文字所象徵的德國人身份；最後一章通過德國啤酒和香腸，點出了德國的多樣性——不同區域的文化歷史，造就了風味各異的啤酒和香腸。

4.〈德國製造〉記敘了古騰堡印刷術、發明logo的德國藝術家杜勒、成功複製中國製瓷技術的麥森瓷器、大衆汽車、包浩斯等。德國製造所代表的品質保證（以及德國人嚴謹認真的特質），是我對德國最早的認知。世上大概也只有德國公司，會因爲堅持品質，而遭致虧損倒閉（笑）。

5.〈與歷史一起生活〉從德國人戰後被驅趕的苦難遭遇說起，接着是重建國家的歷程：參與廢墟清理工作的「瓦礫女」、爲了擺脫惡性通膨困境而在1948年推出的貨幣改革，使德國經濟轉彎邁向奇蹟；其後是猶太人與德國的關係。縱使德國納粹曾經迫害數千萬的猶太人，但來到現在，德國卻是西歐猶太人口成長最快的國家。不少猶太人在戰爭結束後，選擇前往相較中東而言更爲熟悉，又願意接納他們（以贖罪）的德國定居。

6.對於德國民族和歷史的複雜性，書中有一段敘述讓我印象深刻：「……當一個國家做錯了那多事情之後，我們應該如何看待其公民爲此所承受的苦難呢？如果我們一定要宣稱有『集體罪責』的話，那麼我們是否仍然可以向單獨個人表示同情呢？ 」

[Mark Hartzer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like many Americans of German descent, learning one’s past is an oft challenging and frustrating experience, but one that often reveals sudden and unexpected treasures. Although 3 of my 4 grandparents spoke fluent German, my mother and father knew only a few phrases. In the desire to become fully American, the old language was jettisoned. At first, I was put off by MacGregor’s title. “Memories of a Nation”? What exactly was he trying to say here? I’m still not exactly certain that the title works effectively, but let me tell you; for the better part of 50 years I’ve been trying to understand what exactly is ‘Germany’. This is the single best book to cover ‘what is Germany?’ than anything else I’ve ever come across.

Instead of a recitation of the various wars and revolutions, Mr. MacGregor mercifully skirts all that by using a similar method as his excellent “History of the World in 100 Objects”. Typical of these chapters is one called “Snow White v. Napoleon.” (p. 117) “In other words, Grimms’ fairy tales were part of a German political and social renaissance, evidence that in their language and their folk tales the Germans had an identity which no foreign invader could eradicate.” (p. 124) “Friedrich and the Grimms were re-establishing an identity for German speaking people who had been dislocated when Napoleon destroyed the old Holy Roman Empire and the political structures that depended on it.”

In the chapter titled “Two Paths from 1848" I learned that the 3 colors of the German tricolor (black, red & gold) originally derive from a group of volunteers from Prussia who wore black uniforms with red buttons and gold trim and dates prior to 1830. “It could not be flown publically. It was illegal, a challenge to the various German governments because it implied that there was both a nation and a popular sovereignty which was set above individual monarchs. It was very humiliating to the Prussian authorities.” The German tricolor stands for liberty every bit as much as the American stars and bars.

The rest of the book contains a plethora of similar insights and documentation. It is a fabulous series of vignettes that is simply too comprehensive for me to summarize effectively. For me, the definitive statement in the book is found near the very end on page 507 and worth quoting in its entirety:

“From the time of Charlemagne onwards, German identity was for almost a millennium defined in the wider context of Europe through the Holy Roman Empire and her place in it; as time passed, an increasingly dominant place. The Empire had acted as a security network both for Europe and for Germans within it. By the eighteenth century the kings of Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Prussia, Hungary and Britain were all represented in the Imperial Diet in Regensburg, and so in some measure guarantors of stability in Europe. It was an equilibrium that could not survive the aggression first of Napoleon and then of the militarized Prussian state.

So there was a historical appropriateness that it should be France and Germany which set out in 1952 to re-create that security network through what ultimately would become the European Union. The wheel has come full circle in that the EU is, in a sense, a new edition of the Holy Roman Empire; economic and secular, not religious; pan-European, not Roman; binding most of the continent into a framwork of security and joint consultation, with France and Germany jostling for seniority. It is an old pattern. Is this long historical precedent part of the reason why Germany has so few problems with the idea of a confederal supranational EU? And why the UK, with its very different history, has so many?”

This is a key insight in my opinion. Prior to 1871, there really was no central German State.

Anyway, highly recommended to anyone interested in history and especially to Americans of German descent. Essential reading.

[Karellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Or a history of Germany in 25 objects. Follows the same formula as the authors history of the world. But this one is more lavishly illustrated indeed tis is a thing of rare beauty. Terribly interesting topic for one such as I who studied German history for A level. Some lesser known facts emerge - that it was mostly women who literally rebuilt Germany after the Allies had reduced it to rubble. After the German men had fucked things up.
Fascinating comparison between the German attitude to Europe which apparently derives from their familiarity with the Holy Roman Empire. Contrast that with the narrow mindedness that currently seeks to isolate the UK.
It was poignant that I finished this book in the same week that saw the death of Gunter Grass. Yet sadly he doesn't feature despite being their most relevant post war writer.
One is left with the feeling that the Germans are determined not to repeat the past. It's surely no accident that they are among the most Eco friendly nations. Yes they were monsters back then but having met many of today's Germans i concur with many of the authors conclusions. I dedicate this review to them : to Sonja Kristina Ralf Thomas Felix Suzanne Nathalie and the other young Germans I met and liked. The future belongs to them.

[Peter Beck · Rating 5 out of 5]

When "Germany" arrived, I was taken aback by its girth, but the captivating images and accessible text instantly pushed it to the top of my long reading list.

What does it mean to be German? I thought this would have a straight-forward answer until MacGregor explained (with the help of wonderful maps) the patchwork of principalities and city-states that were melded into Germany less than 150 years ago. I consider myself "German-American," but most Germans came to the U.S. before Germany was actually a country. I didn't realize that Germany is as much an "imagined community" (Benedict Anderson) as the Southeast Asian nations created by Europe in the 1800s. Of course the German identity that emerged after 1871 was shattered by two devastating wars.

Instead of being the German sequel to "A History of the World in 100 Objects," MacGregor explores German identity, focusing on the key buildings/monuments, objects and quintessential artists. Even though MacGregor cannot go into great detail about individual examples, I still learned new information about even the most familiar objects. My first car was a VW Bug, but I didn't know the first ones were made by the British.

[Christine · Rating 4 out of 5]

At times a bit dry, but still wonderful.

[Michael Huang · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is another masterpiece by the former curator of the British museum Neil MacGregor. His book “A history of the world in 100 objects” is one of the those proverbial “books that I would take to a deserted island”. This book is similar in style. It’s not a systematic history, but more of a series of perspectives to help you deepen your understanding of the German nation. There are 30 chapters, each often tied to some objects (many high-quality pictures throughout the book), occasionally from the collection of the British museum. (I guess you can call it shameless plug. But as a die-hard fan of the museum, I gave him a pass.) Here are two examples.

Ch 6. A language for all Germans
The 95 theses by Luther were originally in Latin. Friends translated and printed them so they spread very quickly. Luther was condemned by church and emperor. But in a decentralized Holy Roman Empire, electors can decide to ignore the command by the church and emperor. One of them did and hid him. Luther then used his now plenty time to translate New Testament. At that time, German is split into what is called high and low German. English, Dutch, and the dialect of North Germany are low German. The dialects of South Germany and Switzerland are high German. In the translation, Luther used a compromise language that could be more or less understood everywhere and thus created “standard” German. The vocabulary was aggressively simple, which allows it to spread quickly and understood even by peasant. A combination of factors made it possible for this revolution to happen: the printing press, the stage of development, the revolution of the Reformation.

Ch 14: Iron nation
In Prussia, especially in the 19th century, iron had become the material of choice for jewelry with a new purpose, not demonstration of wealth, but of patriotism, a symbol of resistance to the French invader. Often inscribed with ”I gave gold for iron”, a necklace is a public attestation of self denying loyalty and patriotism. The iron cross was to be awarded to men of all ranks not just officers, a brilliant PR stroke. Frederick William declared that the decoration was made of iron, because it is a particular kind of austerity and the identity of Prussia. The notion that wives of Junkers would make their own dresses created the mythical memory of what Prussia was: an insistence upon simplicity and modesty.

[Jarvo · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is a lot of talk about the 'cultural turn' in history, and about how we might come to a different understanding of the past if we become least logocentric, if we spent less attention to words and more to images and objects. This book is probably the best example of this that you could wish to meet. It doesn't set out to be a narrative history, instead it picks 30 or so themes each of which illuminates critical things about Germany and its past. The book is extensively illustrated, and the images and words work in perfect harmony: the pictures aren't just there to illustrate the words, and the words don't just explain the images. Each is adding something the other can't. Subjects discussed range from Kant to Kafka, and include the Hanseatic league, sausages and the ethnic cleansing of Germans from Eastern Europe at the end of the second world war. Images discussed include Druer etchings, VW Beetles, objects for drinking beer from and the Buchenwald gates. Any book on German history has a singular challenge: how is it going to deal with the Holocaust? The danger is that you interpret the whole of German history as tending towards this event, or you don't say enough about it. This book may be in the latter category, but what is does offer is unfamiliar.

[Alexandru Tudorica · Rating 5 out of 5]

A cultural, artistic and historic narrative of the German nation, from Hermann the defeater of the Roman Empire up to the present day. I have especially enjoyed the interpretation of various symbols and learned a lot about the roots of religious and political tolerance during the Holy Roman Empire period (or rather, how the lack of a powerful central authority made consistent persecution of "dangerous ideas" impossible). The Thirty Years War, the failed political reforms around 1848 and the two massively destructive World Wars have left very deep scars in the German psyche, which are very much definitory today. I haven't been able to identify with my adoptive nation as a citizen would, but it certainly was a deep emotional experience.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent history of Germany, beautifully illustrated, engagingly written, and intelligently themed. Anyone who looks at a general bookshop's history of Germany shelves will know that most of the space is taken up by the Third Reich. There is more to German history than that, and this book certainly goes to prove it. Relying quite heavily on art, architecture and objects, the book focusses on the idea of Germany, rather than a straightforward chronology, and the way that Germans perceive their country and their past. Fascinating and enlightening.

[Gisela Hafezparast · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent and entertaining read. Learned a lot both about German history, politics past and present, culture and art. Most of which I should have learned at school in the 70s and 80s. However, as I born in 1966, history lessons at that stage was all about German guilt with regard to the 1st and 2nd world war. This book actually deals with this as well in a really excellent way. Know now why I had to go to England to learn about the great Germans!

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

GoodReads needs a 3.5 star option.