Germany in the Modern World: A New History
Language: English
Pages: 316
ISBN: 1442265132
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
With a careful blend of concision and rich detail, Sam A. Mustafa's readable and lively text traces German history from Roman times to the present, placing particular emphasis on the past three centuries. Balanced and clearly written, the book guides readers expertly through the complex tangle of Germany's past. Mustafa provides a judicious mix of narrative history and historiography, tracing the influential individuals and broad social currents, myths and legends, and political and cultural elements that have shaped the country. In addition, the book is unique in bringing the story fully to the present with a chapter on the past twenty-five years that explores the nation's reunification and its struggles with history and memory. Generously illustrated with photos, artwork, and maps, the book also includes text boxes to allow readers to pause and consider key concepts in greater detail. Each chapter offers a list of further suggested readings, with a mixture of classic and recent scholarship, to provide a range of coverage of important issues.
of German intellectual and cultural life in the small Thuringian city. They jointly sponsored the creation of what became the National Theatre, and their statues stand, arm-in-arm, in front of the famous building to this day. Schiller kept returning to the theme of heroism: the courage to stand up against the odds. His greatest plays feature lonely heroes who lead by example. In William Tell, his last major work before his premature death from tuberculosis in 1805, the hero leads a rebellion of
Confederation in 1848. Note that the Confederation encompasses all of the “Third Germany,” but only part of Prussia and Austria. fitful and difficult. Media coverage of the event was intense, and the highly literate German population followed the debates with increasing frustration. Average people, with no experience of the democratic or legislative process, often found it all laughable and pathetic and began to lose faith that it would amount to much. The revolutionary activity didn’t stop when
the years since the Napoleonic Wars, the Prussian military had conducted an intensive series of exercises, developed new tactics, and studied communications, logistics, and the new mobility options created by technologies like the railroad and telegraph. While the Austrians had been absorbed by internal conflicts, Prussia had honed its military forces to a remarkable level of efficiency. When William I came to the throne, this was enhanced by fact that the king himself had a military background
many other countries, began to go on strike regularly in 1917. Their grievances were not simply about hard times, but also had to do with the ugly realization that not all sectors of society were being forced to sacrifice equally, an unfairness dramatically illustrated by the growing black market. Middle-class people were also no longer willing to accept the lack of democracy or participatory government, particularly when the war was being financed primarily from their savings accounts in the
conservatives. His path to dictatorship was a combination of deliberately planned escalations and astute opportunism. Shortly after taking office, Hitler succeeded in placing his friend and loyal deputy Hermann Goering at the head of the Interior Ministry of Prussia. Goering thus controlled the state police and security forces of by far the largest state within the Reich, and he immediately began a rampage against the Communists and Social Democrats. He was assisted by a remarkable stroke of