Divided Memory – The Nazi Past in the Two Germanys - Hardcover

Herf, Jeffrey

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0674213033 ISBN 13: 9780674213036

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 1997

Synopsis

What has Germany made of its Nazi past? This book explores the legacy of the Nazi regime, exposing the workings of past beliefs and political interests and how differently the two Germanys have recalled the crimes of Nazism, from the anti-Nazi emigration of the 1930s through the establishment of a day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism in 1996. The author asks why would German politicians raise the spectre of the Holocaust at all, in view of the considerable depth of support its instigators and their agenda had found in Nazi Germany. Why did the public memory of Nazi anti-Jewish persecution and the Holocaust emerge, if selectively, in West Germany, yet was repressed and marginalized in "anti-fascist" East Germany? The book aims to answer this question and more, revealing the relationship between how the crimes of Nazism were publicly recalled and how East and West Germany separately evolved a Communist dictatorship and a liberal democracy. The author uses private and public papers and statements of key German figures to explore the subject and to place it within its historical context and the ideologies and experiences of pre-1945 German and European history to the Cold War.

About this title

Review

"Divides Memory" demonstrates how German politicians at the highest levels have dealt with the legacy of Nazi Germany since 1945. One of the book's many unique contributions is the manner in which it both weaves together, and draws clear distinctions between, the approaches taken by such disparate politicians as Konrad Adenauer, Walter Ulbricht, Paul Merker, and Theodor Heuss, to mention just a few...["Divided Memory"] is a classic: clearly and engagingly written, based on wide-ranging research and the author's sure sense of the political winds of post-1945 Germany, "Divided Memory" lays bare the bewildering task of reconciling memory and politics in Germany, or anywhere else, for that matter.--Daniel E. Rogers "German Studies Review "

About the Author

Jeffrey Herf is Professor of History at the University of Maryland. Among his books is Reactionary Modernism: Technology, Culture and Politics in Weimar and the Third Reich.

Edition details

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0674213033
• ISBN 13: 9780674213036
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 534