Best of
Germany

2016

Forty Autumns: A Family's Story of Courage and Survival on Both Sides of the Berlin Wall


Nina Willner - 2016
    At twenty, Hanna escaped from East to West Germany. But the price of freedom—leaving behind her parents, eight siblings, and family home—was heartbreaking. Uprooted, Hanna eventually moved to America, where she settled down with her husband and had children of her own.Growing up near Washington, D.C., Hanna’s daughter, Nina Willner became the first female Army Intelligence Officer to lead sensitive intelligence operations in East Berlin at the height of the Cold War. Though only a few miles separated American Nina and her German relatives—grandmother Oma, Aunt Heidi, and cousin, Cordula, a member of the East German Olympic training team—a bitter political war kept them apart.In Forty Autumns, Nina recounts her family’s story—five ordinary lives buffeted by circumstances beyond their control. She takes us deep into the tumultuous and terrifying world of East Germany under Communist rule, revealing both the cruel reality her relatives endured and her own experiences as an intelligence officer, running secret operations behind the Berlin Wall that put her life at risk.A personal look at a tenuous era that divided a city and a nation, and continues to haunt us, Forty Autumns is an intimate and beautifully written story of courage, resilience, and love—of five women whose spirits could not be broken, and who fought to preserve what matters most: family.Forty Autumns is illustrated with dozens of black-and-white and color photographs.

Anywhere But Home


Daniel Speck - 2016
    Julia, a young and brilliant German designer, is about to launch the fashion show that could bring the breakthrough success she has sacrificed so much to achieve. All her dreams for the future are on the brink of reality—until an unknown past comes to find her. A grandfather she never knew existed approaches her with an astonishing claim. Julia’s father, believed dead for decades, is still alive. As a great lie is revealed, Julia embarks on a journey to uncover the lost pieces of her past. It takes her on a tour through Italy—from Milan to Naples to Sicily, back three generations to an immigrant heritage that struggled to build new roots in Germany after the war, and to secrets that have remained hidden for sixty years.Milan, 1954. Vincent, a handsome German engineer for BMW, arrives with the task of testing the Isetta, a revolutionary Italian car. His interpreter is the talented and enigmatic Giulietta, and the two soon fall passionately in love. Giulietta is full of life and dreams—she loves to design and sew clothes—but is held back by her family, who emigrated from Sicily, and by a promise that already binds her to another man. She will find herself forced to choose between love and duty, freedom and tradition—it is a choice that will mark the fate of generations to come.A saga of love and loss between two people and two countries, Anywhere But Home is a heartbreakingly beautiful story of forging new lives across foreign landscapes and cultures, of old wounds and forgiveness, and of the enduring bonds of family.

D DAY Through German Eyes: Book One and Book Two


Holger Eckhertz - 2016
    Almost all accounts of D Day are told from the Allied perspective. But what was it like to be a German soldier in the bunkers of the Normandy coast, facing the onslaught of the mightiest invasion in history? What motivated the German defenders, what were their thought processes - and how did they fight from one strong point to another, among the dunes and fields, on that first cataclysmic day? This book sheds fascinating light on these questions, bringing together statements made by German survivors after the war, when time had allowed them to reflect on their state of mind, their actions and their choices of June 6th. We see a perspective of D Day which deserves to be added to the historical record, in which ordinary German troops struggled to make sense of what was facing them, and emerged stunned at the weaponry and sheer determination of the Allied troops. Above all, we now have the unheard human voices of the individual German soldiers - the men who are so often portrayed as a faceless mass.

Breakout at Stalingrad


Heinrich Gerlach - 2016
    The original version of the classic novel of the epic World War II battle, confiscated by the Russian secret services in 1949, and now rediscovered in the Russian archives.

The Constant Soldier


William Ryan - 2016
    Paul Brandt, a soldier in the German army, returns wounded and ashamed from the bloody chaos of the Eastern front to find his village home much changed and existing in the dark shadow of an SS rest hut - a luxurious retreat for those who manage the concentration camps, run with the help of a small group of female prisoners who - against all odds - have so far survived the war.When, by chance, Brandt glimpses one of these prisoners, he realizes that he must find a way to access the hut. For inside is the woman to whom his fate has been tied since their arrest five years before, and now he must do all he can to protect her.But as the Russian offensive moves ever closer, the days of this rest hut and its SS inhabitants are numbered. And while hope - for Brandt and the female prisoners - grows tantalizingly close, the danger too is now greater than ever.And, in a forest to the east, a young female Soviet tank driver awaits her orders to advance . . .

The Draper's Daughter


Ellin Carsta - 2016
    While Elisabeth is inspired by the family business, absorbing everything her father shows her about the cloth trade, Stephen enjoys a leisurely life and pays little attention to their father’s teachings. Elisabeth recognizes her true vocation as a tradeswoman, and though the odds are stacked against her, she pursues her passion.When the twins’ father suffers a tragic stroke, the tables turn. Suddenly Stephen is interested in running the draper’s shop his father left behind, and he takes the lead in managing the family business. But Elisabeth can’t sit idly by and watch as he makes bad decisions and accumulates debts. Stephen pushes her to marry as soon as possible, even proposing a suitor, but Elisabeth has her own ideas about matters of the heart. Are her talents in the art of negotiation enough to win her both the job of her dreams and the man she truly loves?

The Whaler


Ines Thorn - 2016
    Most families must rely on arranged marriage just to survive. But free-spirited Maren Luersen doesn’t care for riches—her heart belongs to handsome but poor Thies Heinen. He may not have prospects or fortune to offer, but Maren knows their intense love can overcome any obstacle, and she is determined to be his bride.The wealthy and mysterious Captain Rune Boyse has other plans. He shocks Maren with a startling marriage proposal, and even though he can give her family a better life, her love for Thies is too powerful to deny. But when tragedy strikes, she finds herself in debt to the captain and must set sail with him on a dangerous whale hunt—with no promise of a safe return.If Maren survives, will life be the same back on shore? Or will her heart change course somewhere over the icy swells of the Arctic Sea?

Cloud and Wallfish


Anne Nesbet - 2016
    And he can’t even ask them why — not because of his Astonishing Stutter, but because asking questions is against the newly instated rules. (Rule Number Two: Don’t talk about serious things indoors, because Rule Number One: They will always be listening). As Noah—now "Jonah Brown"—and his parents head behind the Iron Curtain into East Berlin, the rules and secrets begin to pile up so quickly that he can hardly keep track of the questions bubbling up inside him: Who, exactly, is listening — and why? When did his mother become fluent in so many languages? And what really happened to the parents of his only friend, Cloud-Claudia, the lonely girl who lives downstairs?

Paralian - Not just transgender


Liam Klenk - 2016
    There I was. Stranded in a body not quite my own, soon to be taken away from her to be handed over to a young couple who were just as lost in this world.It was the beginning of an incredible journey, which brought me to the surging rivers of my childhood in Germany and later to the deep, glacial lakes of Switzerland. Then, one day, on the shores of Lake Zurich, an epiphany amidst bags of aromatic popcorn helped me to grasp the entire truth about my gender identity.Still searching for a place to truly call home and longing for a deeper understanding of the world and myself, my quest continued. I explored different cultures and oceans through work and travel, continuously fascinated by the inspiring individuals I encountered along the way. Several years of refreshing yet challenging Maldivian island life led me to the Philippine jungle and onward to the South China Sea, to Macau and the largest aquatic show in the world. It was there inspiration struck like never before but passion also brought me to the very limits of my endurance…Paralian: Not Just Transgender is about living life authentically, about independence, compassion, and the beauty of our often-troubled existence. Written with profound honesty and a fine sense of humor, Paralian hopes to touch your heart while leaving you slightly breathless all at the same time.

The Prophetic Queen: The Tumultuous Life of Matilde of Ringelheim


Mirella Sichirollo Patzer - 2016
     "I WAS BORN with the ability to prophesize the future. The destinies I dream about are impossible to alter, despite my many attempts to do so...nightly visions forewarn me of good fortune, but also of despair, discord, and death--always death." Matilde of Ringelheim, a paragon of virtue and achievement, a legendary woman of passion, beloved 10th-century queen, and saint of the Germanic states, was one of the most influential and charitable women in European medieval history. Her story of love, family discord, betrayal, prophetic dreams, and political intrigue is an epic account of her history. As the virtuous daughter of a noble family educated in an abbey, young Matilde faces a promising future, but she keeps a secret. Through her dreams, she can predict the future. When Duke Heinrich of Thuringia arrives unannounced at the abbey and wishes to marry Matilde, her childhood is over. At fourteen, she weds the young, enigmatic duke. She must leave everything behind and learn to navigate the intricacies and intrigues of her new life as a duchess, and later as queen. Beset by great political intrigues, a ravaged people, fraught relationships, and yet inspired to a greater calling, Matilde sees what her future could hold if she could seize the moment—if her husband will believe in and act upon her prophetic dreams.

Wearing the Letter P: Polish Women as Forced Laborers in Nazi Germany, 1939-1945


Sophie Hodorowicz Knab - 2016
    As mothers, wives, daughters, and sisters, female Polish forced laborers faced a unique set of challenges and often unspeakable conditions because of their gender. Compelled to learn more about her own mother's experience as a forced laborer, Sophie Hodorowicz Knab embarked on a personal quest to uncover details about this overlooked aspect of World War II history. She conducted extensive research in archives in the U.S., London, and Warsaw for over 14 years to piece together facts and individual stories.Knab explains how it all happened, from the beginning of Nazi occupation in Poland to liberation: the roundups; the horrors of transit camps; the living and working conditions of Polish women in agriculture and industry; and the anguish of sexual exploitation and forced abortions--all under the constant threat of concentration camps. Knab draws from documents, government and family records, rare photos, and most importantly, numerous victim accounts and diaries, letters and trial testimonies, finally giving these women a voice and bringing to light the atrocities that they endured.

The Essential Goethe


Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - 2016
    It provides English-language readers easier access than ever before to the widest range of work by one of the greatest writers in world history. Goethe's work as playwright, poet, novelist, and autobiographer is fully represented. In addition to the works for which he is most famous, including "Faust Part I "and the lyric poems, the volume features important literary works that are rarely published in English--including the dramas "Egmont," "Iphigenia in Tauris," and" Torquato Tasso" and the bildungsroman "Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship," a foundational work in the history of the novel. The volume also offers a selection of Goethe's essays on the arts, philosophy, and science, which give access to the thought of a polymath unrivalled in the modern world. Primarily drawn from Princeton's authoritative twelve-volume Goethe edition, the translations are highly readable and reliable modern versions by scholars of Goethe. The volume also features an extensive introduction to Goethe's life and works by volume editor Matthew Bell.Includes: Selected poemsFour complete dramas: "Faust Part I, Egmont, Iphigenia in Tauris," " "and" Torquato Tasso"The complete novel" Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship"A selection from the travel journal" Italian Journey"Selected essays on art and literatureSelected essays on philosophy and scienceAn extensive introduction to Goethe's life and worksA chronology of Goethe's life and timesA note on the texts and translations

Simon Stephens: A Working Diary


Simon Stephens - 2016
    In addition to these major projects, Stephens continued his role as a mentor of young writers, actors and directors, and continued to be one of the most frequent, outspoken and fiercely intelligent voices of the playwriting scene.In an exceptionally honest account, Simon Stephens opens up to us, through daily diary entries, his working practices, his inner-most thoughts, his philosophy on theatre, the arts and politics, and his feelings and reactions to specific projects he has worked on. Through this, we are given unprecedented access to the mind of one of the most important playwrights of the twenty-first century.

Diaries


Eva Hesse - 2016
    Her diaries and journals, which she kept for the entirety of her life, convey her anxieties, her feelings about family and friends, her quest to be an artist, and the complexities of living in the world.   Hesse’s biography is well known: her family fled Nazi Germany, her mother committed suicide when Hesse was ten years old, her marriage ended in divorce, and she died at the age of thirty-four from a brain tumor. The diaries featured in this publication begin in 1955 and describe Hesse's time at Yale University, followed by a sojourn in Germany with her husband, Tom Doyle, and her return to New York and a circle of friends that included Sol LeWitt, Mel Bochner, Lucy Lippard, Robert Mangold and Sylvia Plimack Mangold, Robert Ryman, Mike Todd, and Paul Thek.     Poignant, personal, and full of emotion, these diaries convey Hesse’s struggle with the quotidian while striving to become an artist.

DK Eyewitness Travel Guide: Germany


D.K. Publishing - 2016
    Experience Oktoberfest in Munich, ski down the Alps, and cruise or hike along the Rhine to see romantic castles and vineyards.Discover DK Eyewitness Travel Guide: Germany .+ Detailed itineraries and "don't-miss" destination highlights at a glance. + Illustrated cutaway 3-D drawings of important sights. + Floor plans and guided visitor information for major museums. + Guided walking tours, local drink and dining specialties to try, things to do, and places to eat, drink, and shop by area. + Area maps marked with sights. + Detailed city maps of Berlin and Munich include street finder indexes for easy navigation. + Insights into history and culture to help you understand the stories behind the sights. + Hotel and restaurant listings highlight DK Choice special recommendations.With hundreds of full-color photographs, hand-drawn illustrations, and custom maps that illuminate every page, DK Eyewitness Travel Guide: Germany truly shows you this country as no one else can.Recommended: For a pocket guidebook to Berlin, check out DK Eyewitness Travel Guide: Top 10 Berlin , which is packed with dozens of top 10 lists, ensuring you make the most of your time in the city.Series Overview: For more than two decades, DK Eyewitness Travel Guides have helped travelers experience the world through the history, art, architecture, and culture of their destinations. Expert travel writers and researchers provide independent editorial advice, recommendations, and reviews. With guidebooks to hundreds of places around the globe available in print and digital formats, DK Eyewitness Travel Guides show travelers how they can discover more.DK Eyewitness Travel Guides: the most maps, photographs, and illustrations of any guide.Awards:Wanderlust Travel Awards 2009 - 2015Reviews:"Known... for its four-color maps, photos and illustrations, the [DK] Eyewitness Guides are extremely user-friendly for travelers who want their information delivered in a concise, visual way." - Chicago Tribune"The best option... Color photos, maps, and diagrams bring the place to life." - The Philadelphia Inquirer

MITT BRENNENDER SORGE On the Church and the German Reich


Pope Pius XI - 2016
    Hence, despite many and grave misgivings, We then decided not to withhold Our consent for We wished to spare the Faithful of Germany, as far as it was humanly possible, the trials and difficulties they would have had to face, given the circumstances, had the negotiations fallen through. It was by acts that We wished to make it plain, Christ's interests being Our sole object, that the pacific and maternal hand of the Church would be extended to anyone who did not actually refuse it. 4. If, then, the tree of peace, which we planted on German soil with the purest intention, has not brought forth the fruit, which in the interest of your people, We had fondly hoped, no one in the world who has eyes to see and ears to hear will be able to lay the blame on the Church and on her Head. The experiences of these last years have fixed responsibilities and laid bare intrigues, which from the outset only aimed at a war of extermination. In the furrows, where We tried to sow the seed of a sincere peace, other men - the "enemy" of Holy Scripture - oversowed the cockle of distrust, unrest, hatred, defamation, of a determined hostility overt or veiled, fed from many sources and wielding many tools, against Christ and His Church. They, and they alone with their accomplices, silent or vociferous, are today responsible, should the storm of religious war, instead of the rainbow of peace, blacken the German skies. 5. We have never ceased, Venerable Brethren, to represent to the responsible rulers of your country's destiny, the consequences which would inevitably follow the protection and even the favor, extended to such a policy. We have done everything in Our power to defend the sacred pledge of the given word of honor against theories and practices, which it officially endorsed, would wreck every faith in treaties and make every signature worthless. Should the day ever come to place before the world the account of Our efforts, every honest mind will see on which side are to be found the promoters of peace, and on which side its disturbers. Whoever had left in his soul an atom of love for truth, and in his heart a shadow of a sense of justice, must admit that, in the course of these anxious and trying years following upon the conclusion of the concordat, every one of Our words, every one of Our acts, has been inspired by the binding law of treaties. At the same time, anyone must acknowledge, not without surprise and reprobation, how the other contracting party emasculated the terms of the treaty, distorted their meaning, and eventually considered its more or less official violation as a normal policy.

German Easy Reader: Super 500


Brian Smith - 2016
    Knowing these will enable you to understand 80% of average German texts. The original German text is side by side with an English translation. All new words are introduced with an English translation in the text. Numerous pictures illustrate new words. Many verb tables show you how to conjugate new verbs correctly. MP3 recording of the German text in each unit is available for FREE as download. 13 simple stories to practise and learn in an easy and fun way. This book is for beginners. If you are more advanced check out 'German Pre-Intermediate Reader Super 1000' by the same author. www.briansmith.de

The Myth and Reality of German Warfare: Operational Thinking from Moltke the Elder to Heusinger


Gerhard Paul Groß - 2016
    To counteract these threats, generations of general staff officers were educated in operational thinking, the main tenets of which were extremely influential on military planning across the globe and were adopted by American and Soviet armies. In the twentieth century, Germany's art of warfare dominated military theory and practice, creating a myth of German operational brilliance that lingers today, despite the nation's crushing defeats in two world wars.In this seminal study, Gerhard P. Gross provides a comprehensive examination of the development and failure of German operational thinking over a period of more than a century. He analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of five different armies, from the mid--nineteenth century through the early days of NATO. He also offers fresh interpretations of towering figures of German military history, including Moltke the Elder, Alfred von Schlieffen, and Erich Ludendorff. Essential reading for military historians and strategists, this innovative work dismantles cherished myths and offers new insights into Germany's failed attempts to become a global power through military means.

The Bride’s Trunk: A Story of War and Reconciliation


Ingrid Dixon - 2016
    She has survived British and American bombs and witnessed the destruction of Aachen, her ancient and beautiful city. How will a German woman cope in austere post-war Britain, where she is still regarded as the enemy?Illustrated with almost 100 images and original documents, The Bride’s Trunk describes the adventures of an unremarkable piece of luggage and three generations of its owners, whose journeys across Europe are determined by the turbulent events of twentieth century history.

The End of Law: A Novel of Hitler's Germany


Therese Down - 2016
    Gunter is intensely loyal to the Third Reich, entirely ruthless, and dreams of military renown, so is outraged to be placed in charge of the T4 euthanasia programme. Muller, an engineer and trainee doctor, reluctantly oversees the safe delivery of lethal gases and drugs to the killing centres, and is required to convert shower rooms and bathrooms to gas chambers in commandeered hospitals and prisons. The End of Law focuses on the difficult moral choices made by soldiers and civilians under a corrupt regime, and on the disruptive power of an awakened conscience.

Electri_City: The Düsseldorf School of Electronic Music


Rudi Esch - 2016
    The capital of North Rhine-Westphalia became the centre of an analog electronic movement which changed the course of all popular music to come.Electri_City is the oral account of the city's most influential bands, including Kraftwerk, NEU!, DAF, Die Krupps and many more. This history uncovers the myths and reality of the bands emerging from the artistic backdrop of a wealthy, modern, post-WWII German city; the conditions that fostered such a creative explosion.Interviews include Daniel Miller (Mute Records), Paul Humphreys and Andy McCluskey (OMD), Martyn Ware (Human League), Glenn Gregory (Heaven 17), Rusty Egan (Visage) Ryuichi Sakamoto and producer, Giorgio Moroder.

Justifying Genocide: Germany and the Armenians from Bismarck to Hitler


Stefan Ihrig - 2016
    But Stefan Ihrig shows that they were much more connected than previously thought. Bismarck and then Wilhelm II staked their foreign policy on close relations with a stable Ottoman Empire. To the extent that the Armenians were restless under Ottoman rule, they were a problem for Germany too. From the 1890s onward Germany became accustomed to excusing violence against Armenians, even accepting it as a foreign policy necessity. For many Germans, the Armenians represented an explicitly racial problem and despite the Armenians Christianity, Germans portrayed them as the Jews of the Orient.As Stefan Ihrig reveals in this first comprehensive study of the subject, many Germans before World War I sympathized with the Ottomans longstanding repression of the Armenians and would go on to defend vigorously the Turks wartime program of extermination. After the war, in what Ihrig terms the great genocide debate, German nationalists first denied and then justified genocide in sweeping terms. The Nazis too came to see genocide as justifiable: in their version of history, the Armenian Genocide had made possible the astonishing rise of the New Turkey.Ihrig is careful to note that this connection does not imply the Armenian Genocide somehow caused the Holocaust, nor does it make Germans any less culpable. But no history of the twentieth century should ignore the deep, direct, and disturbing connections between these two crimes."

notmsparker's Berlin Companion


Beata Gontarczyk-Krampe - 2016
    

Frederick Barbarossa: A Prince and the Myth


John B. Freed - 2016
    A leading monarch of the Middle Ages, he legalized the dualism between the crown and the princes that endured until the end of the Holy Roman Empire.   This new biography, the first in English in four decades, paints a rich picture of a consummate diplomat and effective warrior. John Freed mines Barbarossa’s recently published charters and other sources to illuminate the monarch’s remarkable ability to rule an empire that stretched from the Baltic to Rome, and from France to Poland. Offering a fresh assessment of the role of Barbarossa’s extensive familial network in his success, the author also considers the impact of Frederick’s death in the Third Crusade as the key to his lasting heroic reputation. In an intriguing epilogue, Freed explains how Hitler’s audacious attack on the Soviet Union in 1941 came to be called “Operation Barbarossa.”

The Rise of the Luftwaffe, 1918-1940


Herbert Molloy Mason - 2016
    The rest of the world… was stunned at the overrunning of sixty thousand miles of courageously defended terrain in only twenty-six days.” In the winter of 1918, Germany’s conquerors set about rendering the Reich forever incapable of waging war. The existing German Air Service of nearly 15,000 planes was to be scrapped - the treaty of Versailles would ensure that no military aircraft would ever be flown in Germany again. But less than a generation later Europe shook before the threat of the Luftwaffe, believed to be the most powerful air force in the world. The Rise of the Luftwaffe tells how it happened. Denied warplane factories and flying schools in their homeland, the Germans built them in Russia and it was there that they trained an elite pilot corps. At home state-sponsored gliding schemes gave a new generation of pilots their first taste of the air, and clandestine factories, ostensibly making perambulators or washing machines, turned out warplanes. As confidence grew, and the actual restrictions on German aviation eased, so a new dimension was added to the bluff. Germany’s re-occupation of the Rhineland was carried out under cover of planes lacking guns and ammunition; the Luftwaffe’s apparent capability was exaggerated by the use of stripped-down versions of fighters in speed-record attempts. Now, instead of concealing the existence of their air power from the rest of Europe, the Germans were concealing its limitations. Herbert Molloy Mason charts every step of the subterfuge and ingenuity by which the transformation was brought about. He describes the pioneering of new developments such as the Stuka dive-bomber, and the proving of this secretly trained and created air force first in the Spanish Civil War and later against Poland and France. At the same time he explodes some of the myths of German technical and organizational superiority: meddling by Hitler, bickering between designers and bureaucrats, and ineptitude by the morphine-addicted Goering cost the Luftwaffe a war-winning strategic bomber force and jet fighters even before World War II began. Praise for Herbert Molloy Mason ‘Worth taking seriously.’ - Earl F. Ziemke Herbert Molloy Mason (1927-2013) was a noted writer of military history, and wrote sixteen books, including The Lafayette Escadrille and To Kill Hitler. He lived in San Antonio, Texas with his wife who was an artist.

Marie von Clausewitz: The Woman Behind the Making of On War


Vanya Eftimova Bellinger - 2016
    Many historians have noted the instrumental role Marie played in the creation, development, and particularly in the posthumous editing and publishing of Clausewitz's opus, On War, which remains the seminal text on military theory and strategic thinking. Highly intelligent and politically engaged, Marie was also deeply involved in her husband's military career and advancement, and in the nationalist politics of 19th-century Prussia. Yet apart from peripheral consideration of her obvious influence on Clausewitz and on the preservation of his legacy, very little has been written about Marie herself. In Marie von Clausewitz, Vanya Eftimova Bellinger proposes to address this oversight, capitalizing on the recent discovery of a vast archive of material―including hundreds of previously unknown letters between Marie and Clausewitz―to produce the first complete biography of this understudied figure. Delving into the private correspondence between the two, Bellinger shows how Marie, a highly educated woman of Prussia's upper echelon, broadened Clausewitz's understanding of the cultural and political processes of the time; provided him with insights into the practical side of daily politics; sharpened his writing style; and served as the catalyst for his ideas. The depth of her influence on and contribution to Clausewitz's theoretical writings, Bellinger argues, is greater than historians have previously suggested. Bellinger also establishes Marie as an impressive figure in her own right, both politically outspoken and socially adept at moving among the ranks of Prussian nobility. The marriage between Marie, an intimate of the royal family, and Clausewitz, an obscure young lieutenant with dubious claims to nobility, allows Bellinger to engage in a broader discussion of gender and class relations in 19th-century Europe; and her study of their epistolary debates also sheds light on the political climate of the time, particularly incipient German nationalist fervor.

The Shadow of His Wings: A Graphic Biography of Fr. Gereon Goldmann


Max Temesou - 2016
    Without betraying his Christian ideals, against all odds, and in the face of Evil, Gereon Goldmann was able to complete his priestly training, be ordained, and secretly minister to German Catholic soldiers and innocent civilian victims caught up in the horrors of war. How it all came to pass will astound you.Father Goldmann tells of his own incredible experiences of the trials of war, his many escapes from almost certain death, and the diabolical persecution that he and his fellow Catholic soldiers encountered on account of their faith. What emerges is an extraordinary witness to the workings of Divine Providence and the undying power of love, prayer, faith, and sacrifice.

Johann Trollmann and Romani Resistance to the Nazis


Jud Nirenberg - 2016
    The Nazis would not accept him as the winner because he was Sinto. Many Sinti and Roma (or "Gypsies") had long been involved in the sport, but Nazi ideology demanded that only Aryans excel as fighters. Trollmann used his visibility in the ring for shocking and aggressive protest, turning boxing into politically charged performance art. He fought for his country, and against its prejudice. Roma and Sinti were victims of fascism, but they also were soldiers, activists, and underground resistors. Since World War II, there has been a struggle to obtain greater recognition of this past. From underground fight nights to Madison Square Garden, from secret partisan meetings to concentration camp uprisings, across several continents, this is a hard-hitting look at forgotten history.

From Christ to Confucius: German Missionaries, Chinese Christians, and the Globalization of Christianity, 1860-1950


Albert Wu - 2016
    In time, their increased openness catalyzed a revolution in thinking among European Christians about the nature of Christianity itself. At a moment when Europe’s Christian population is falling behind those of South America and Africa, Wu’s provocative analysis sheds light on the roots of Christianity’s global shift.

The 500 Hidden Secrets of Berlin


Nathalie Dewalhens - 2016
    - Each year sees Berlin attract more visitors than the last - over 30 million tourists will take a trip to Berlin this year The 500 Hidden Secrets of Berlin is the perfect book for those who wish to discover the city, but avoid all the usual tourist haunts, as well as for residents who are keen to track down the city's best-kept secrets.

High Fashion: The 20th Century Decade by Decade


Emmanuelle Dirix - 2016
    A history of haute couture in the 20th century decade by decade Turning the pages of this lively book is like rummaging with a fancy dress box overflowing with clothes from the 20th century S Dirix is a fabulous guide Daily Mail What defined the way women dressed in the 1930s When did haute couture become offthepeg How did economic highs and lows influence style in the 1980s High Fashion answers these questions and more by exploring fashion design in the 20th century one decade at a time Each chapter looks at the significant stylistic changes that occurred in one decade and places them in a wider cultural and socioeconomic context The designers whose work best represents their era are profiled and their key looks deconstructed from the vertical silhouette of the 1900s to minimalism in the 1990s High Fashion combines thoughtful analysis with a carefully curated selection of archive images to create an invaluable resource for fashion students and a fascinating journey through 20thcentury style for fashionistas It reveals how styles have changed what those changes tell us about individuals and society at that time and how our current relationship with fashion was formed

Bach : A Musical Biography


Peter Williams - 2016
    S. Bach composed some of the best-loved and most moving music in Western culture. Surviving mostly in manuscript collections, his music also exists in special and unique publications that reveal much about his life and thoughts as a composer. In this book, Peter Williams, author of the acclaimed J. S. Bach: A Life in Music, revisits Bach's biography through the lens of his music. Reviewing all of Bach's music chronologically, Williams discusses the music collection by collection to reveal the development of Bach's interests and priorities. While a great deal has been written about the composer's vocal works, Williams gives the keyboard music its proper emphasis, revealing it as crucial to Bach's biography, as a young organist and a mature composer, as a performer in public and teacher in private, and as a profound thinker in the language of music.

The German Revolution: Its Meaning and Menace


Joseph King - 2016
     However, published in 1933, The German Revolution: Its Meaning and Menace charts and analyses the political situation in Germany without knowledge of the terrible climax. After the First World War, Germany collapsed into revolution. Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated and fled. Germany became the Weimar Republic. The Spartacist Uprising sought a Communist State. Communist leaders Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht were murdered. The political right began to rise… A contemporary British politician, Joseph King gives a perspective and commentary on post-war Germany, examining from the implementation of the Treaty of Versailles, through the political turmoil and putsches, to the rise of Hitler as Chancellor. This wide-ranging approach sets the scene for Hitler’s rise to power and the policies he began to implement. A contemporary account, The German Revolution: Its Meaning and Menace is not only a valuable historical work, but also a fascinating insight into how Germany was viewed in this tumultuous time. Joseph King (1860-1943) was a British politician. Beginning his career in the Liberal Party, Joseph transferred to Labour after the First World War. Joseph wrote a number of political works, particularly on Russia and Germany.

'Trash, ' Censorship, and National Identity in Early Twentieth-Century Germany


Kara L Ritzheimer - 2016
    These provisions enabled legislations to adopt two national censorship laws intended to regulate the movie industry and retail trade in pulp fiction. Both laws had their ideological origins in grass-roots anti-'trash' campaigns inspired by early encounters with commercial mass culture and Germany's federalist structure. Before the war, activists characterized censorship as a form of youth protection. Afterwards, they described it as a form of social welfare. Local activists and authorities enforcing the decisions of federal censors made censorship familiar and respectable even as these laws became a lightning rod for criticism of the young republic. Nazi leaders subsequently refashioned anti-'trash' rhetoric to justify the stringent censorship regime they imposed on Germany.

Reading Heidegger's Black Notebooks 1931–1941


Ingo Farin - 2016
    In 2014, the notebooks from 1931 to 1941 were published, sparking immediate controversy. It has long been acknowledged that Heidegger was an enthusiastic supporter of the Nazi Party in the early 1930s. But the notebooks contain a number of anti-Semitic passages—often referring to the stereotype of “World-Jewry”—written even after Heidegger became disenchanted with the Nazis themselves. Reactions from the scholarly community have ranged from dismissal of the significance of these passages to claims that the anti-Semitism in them contaminates all of Heidegger's work. This volume offers the first collection of responses by Heidegger scholars to the publication of the notebooks. In essays commissioned especially for the book, the contributors offer a wide range of views, addressing not only the issues of anti-Semitism and Nazism but also the broader questions that the notebooks raise.

Hitler's Soldiers: The German Army in the Third Reich


Ben H. Shepherd - 2016
    Ben Shepherd draws on a wealth of primary sources and recent scholarship to convey a much darker, more complex picture. For the first time, the German army is examined throughout the Second World War, across all combat theaters and occupied regions, and from multiple perspectives: its battle performance, social composition, relationship with the Nazi state, and involvement in war crimes and military occupation. This was a true people’s army, drawn from across German society and reflecting that society as it existed under the Nazis. Without the army and its conquests abroad, Shepherd explains, the Nazi regime could not have perpetrated its crimes against Jews, prisoners of war, and civilians in occupied countries. The author examines how the army was complicit in these crimes and why some soldiers, units, and higher commands were more complicit than others. Shepherd also reveals the reasons for the army’s early battlefield successes and its mounting defeats up to 1945, the latter due not only to Allied superiority and Hitler’s mismanagement as commander-in-chief, but also to the failings—moral, political, economic, strategic, and operational—of the army’s own leadership.

Selling Hitler: Propaganda and the Nazi Brand


Nicholas O'Shaughnessy - 2016
    The Nazis pursued propaganda not just as a tool, an instrument of government, but also as the totality, the raison d'etre, the medium through which power itself was exercised. Moreover, Nicholas O'Shaughnessy argues, Hitler, not Goebbels, was the prime mover in the propaganda regime of the Third Reich - its editor and first author. Under the Reich everything was a propaganda medium, a building-block of public consciousness, from typography to communiques, to architecture, to weapons design. There were groups to initiate rumours and groups to spread graffiti. Everything could be interrogated for its propaganda potential, every surface inscribed with polemical meaning, whether an enemy city's name, an historical epic or the poster on a neighbourhood wall. But Hitler was in no sense an innovator - his ideas were always second-hand. Rather his expertise was as a packager, fashioning from the accumulated mass of icons and ideas, the historic debris, the labyrinths and byways of the German mind, a modern and brilliant political show articulated through deftly managed symbols and rituals. The Reich would have been unthinkable without propaganda - it would not have been the Reich."

New GCSE History Complete Revision & Practice - For the Grade 9-1 Course (with Online Edition)


CGP Books - 2016
    New GCSE History Complete Revision Practice - For the Grad

Critical Theory of Communication: New Readings of Lukács, Adorno, Marcuse, Honneth and Habermas in the Age of the Internet


Christian Fuchs - 2016
    One of the world's leading theorists of digital media Professor Christian Fuchs explores how the thought of some of the Frankfurt School's key thinkers can be deployed for critically understanding media in the age of the Internet. Five essays that form the heart of this book review aspects of the works of Georg LukAcs, Theodor W. Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, Axel Honneth and Jürgen Habermas and apply them as elements of a critical theory of communication's foundations. The approach taken starts from Georg LukAcs Ontology of Social Being, draws on the work of the Frankfurt School thinkers, and sets them into dialogue with the Cultural Materialism of Raymond Williams.Critical Theory of Communication offers a vital set of new insights on how communication operates in the age of information, digital media and social media, arguing that we need to transcend the communication theory of Habermas by establishing a dialectical and cultural-materialist critical theory of communication.

Europe: Chained By History: What Force Can Break the Chain?


Larry J. Hilton - 2016
    What persistent darkness allowed Hitler to lead the world into a second devastating world war? What will it take for today's European Union to survive? He answers these questions with fascinating details about what it was like to live in Vienna from the first century through the days of hyper-inflation after World War I.

Amnesiopolis: Modernity, Space, and Memory in East Germany


Eli Rubin - 2016
    It focuses particularly on the experience of East Germans who moved, often from crumbling slums left over as a legacy of the nineteenth century, into this radically new place -- one defined by pure functionality and rationality -- a material manifestation of the utopian promise of socialism.Eli Rubin employs methodologies from critical geography, urban history, architectural history, environmental history, and everyday life history to ask whether their experience was a radical break with their personal pasts and the German past. Amnesiopolis asks: can a dramatic change in spatial andmaterial surroundings sever the links of memory that tie people to their old life narratives, and if so, does that help build a new socialist mentality in the minds of historical subjects? The answer is yes and no -- as much as the East German state tried to create a completely new socialistsettlement, divorced of any links to the pre-socialist past, the massive construction project uncovered the truth buried -- literally -- in the ground, which was that the urge to colonize the outskirts of Berlin was not new at all. Furthermore, the construction of a new city out of nothing, usingrepeating, identical buildings, created a panopticon-like effect, giving the Stasi the possibility of more complete surveillance than they previously had.

Beethoven's Third Symphony 'The Eroica' (The Landmark Library)


James Hamilton-Paterson - 2016
    Intellectually and emotionally, Beethoven's Third Symphony, the 'Eroica', was revolutionary music. After those first two stunning chords, Western music was never the same again. And the whiff of actual political revolution was woven into the work, for it was originally dedicated to Napoleon Bonaparte, a dangerous hero for a composer dependent on conservative royal patronage. James Hamilton-Paterson reconstructs this great moment in Western culture, the shock of the music and the symphony's long afterlife. The Landmark Library is a testament to the achievements of mankind from the late stone age to the present day. Each volume is handsomely illustrated and carries a text of 25,000 words devoted to a crucial theme in the history of civilization.

Thieves in Court: The Making of the German Legal System in the Nineteenth Century


Rebekka Habermas - 2016
    Habermas draws from an unusual cache of archival documents of theft cases, tracing the evolution and practice of the legal system of Germany through the nineteenth century. This close reading, relying on approaches of legal anthropology, challenges long-standing narratives of legal development, state building, and modern notions of the rule of law. Ideal for legal historians and scholars of modern German and nineteenth-century European history, this innovative volume steps outside the classic narratives of legal history and gives an insight into the interconnectedness of social, legal and criminal history.

Degeneration and Revolution: Radical Cultural Politics and the Body in Weimar Germany


Robert Heynen - 2016
    Drawing on key Weimar theorists and addressing artistic and cultural movements ranging from Dada to worker-produced media, this book challenges us to rethink conventional understandings of left culture and politics, and of Weimar culture more generally.

Hitler versus Stalin: The Eastern Front 1941 - 1942: Barbarossa to Moscow


Nik Cornish - 2016
    

Six Minutes in Berlin: Broadcast Spectacle and Rowing Gold at the Nazi Olympics


Michael J. Socolow - 2016
    German rowers, dominant at the Games, line up against America's top eight-oared crew. Hundreds of millions of listeners worldwide wait by their radios. Leni Riefenstahl prepares her cameramen. Grantland Rice looks past the 75,000 spectators crowding the riverbank. Above it all, the Nazi leadership, flush with the propaganda triumph the Olympics have given their New Germany, await a crowning victory they can broadcast to the world. The Berlin Games matched cutting-edge communication technology with compelling sports narrative to draw the blueprint for all future sports broadcasting. A global audience--the largest cohort of humanity ever assembled--enjoyed the spectacle via radio. This still-novel medium offered a "liveness," a thrilling immediacy no other technology had ever matched. Michael J. Socolow's account moves from the era's technological innovations to the human drama of how the race changed the lives of nine young men. As he shows, the origins of global sports broadcasting can be found in this single, forgotten contest. In those origins we see the ways the presentation, consumption, and uses of sport changed forever.

Exploring the World of J. S. Bach: A Traveler's Guide


Robert L. Marshall - 2016
    S. Bach puts Bach aficionados and classical music lovers in the shoes of the master composer. Bach scholar Robert L. Marshall and veteran writer-translator Traute M. Marshall lead readers on a Baroque Era odyssey through fifty towns where Bach resided, visited, and of course created his works. Drawing on established sources as well as newly available East German archives, the authors describe each site in Bach's time and the present, linking the sites to the biographical information, artistic and historic landmarks, and musical activities associated with each. A wealth of historical illustrations, color photographs, and maps supplement the text, whetting the appetite of the visitor and the armchair traveler alike.

A Contented Man and Other Stories


Zoë Beck - 2016
    A mythical Irish puca who refuses to take no as a response to his presence. A man obsessed with a long-dead woman in an Impressionist painting. A boy haunted by what might have happened to a woman pulled dead from a lake. Everything is sharply observed and tightly woven, with a heavy dash of psychological suspense. The four stories in this mini collection create an undertow that the reader cannot escape. With an acute eye for both the phases of life and varying mental states, Zoë Beck has created an unforgettable array of compelling stories about people who find themselves enmeshed in situations beyond their control. In addition to her thrillers, Beck is an accomplished master of the short story, with her uncanny knack for compressing shifting interpersonal constellations into small prose jewels. Her cool, direct, unsentimental, and precise language makes Beck's unique contemporary twist on timeless themes all the more apparent.