Customer Reviews

The German Genius: Europe's Third Renaissance, the Second Scientific Revolution, and the Twentieth Century

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The book is intended as a history of German ideas over the last 250 years or so, and specifically not a political, economic, or comprehensive "national" history of Germany. The narrative begins near the end of Bach's life (1685-1750), well prior to a German nation having been achieved (1871), and continues beyond the events of 1989 and the subsequent re-unification of what we recall as East and West Germany.

The book considers German ideas as being those of German people, which exceeds the bounds of citizenship in any German nation but instead also includes people of German cultural background from Austria, Bohemia, Moravia and other territories where German-speaking peoples lived en masse. A reader may no doubt quibble with some of the persons who are included as being "German" by the author, but a disagreement over any one person is indeed a quibble, not an indictment of the underlying premise.

The book would seem to have at least three purposes:

1) By documenting the immense fertility of German culture in generating powerful advances in the arts, science and the humanities the author attempts to restore (for those for whom it is needed) a wider, more balanced perspective on Germany than apparently currently exists. Without any attempt to minimize, dismiss, or overlook the evil of the Nazi's and the Holocaust (for which "Germany" has been stigmatized), the narrative offers a reminder of great achievements that were not accidental, but a product of German culture and society.

2) By explaining the elements of German culture that gave rise to those fertile developments, an explanation is also proposed for reasons that some of those same elements could ironically allow or make possible the barbaric (and distinctly uncultured) Third Reich. The exploration of these German cultural elements that "cut both ways" seems even-handed, and consistent with a mature perspective that there is much in life that is ambiguous, with the potential for both good and unintended, tragic outcomes. Again without minimizing the horror of the Holocaust or the role of the German people, the author offers a nuanced view of the cultural ground soil within which the Nazi's were allowed to grow and seize power.

3) To follow the widening influence of German ideas throughout the Western Civilization, part of which reflects the mass emigration of talented Germans during the Third Reich (principally Jewish-German artists and scientists) and part of which reflects the sheer impact of notable Germans. As a quote from Erich Heller presented as an epigram to the book states, "Defeated in two world wars, Germany appeared to have invaded vast territories of the World's minds" or in the author's own words, "The United States and Great Britain may speak English but, more than they know, they think German."

Of noteworthiness is the scope of this book. Reporting that it is 849 pages (plus an author's note, an appendix, and end-notes) does not adequately convey the amount of information contained within. Short biographical sketches for noteworthy individuals pepper the text, usually arrayed to tell the story of the development of a branch of science, commerce or the arts.

The sheer bulk of this information may test one's patience, but it is the supporting evidence for the author's themes.

Well, enough about length, what of substance?

Both the Introduction, titled 'Blinded by the Light: Hitler, the Holocaust, and "the Past That Will Not Pass Away"' and the final chapter, titled 'German Genius: The Dazzle, Deification, and Dangers of Inwardness' are, quite literally, excellent summary bookends to the book's themes, which in some ways have to be culled out of the extensive narrative of people, events and achievements that are documented in between. Reading the introduction and conclusion in sequence proved very helpful.

The book delivers a compelling case for considering such persistent cultural elements as Prussian Pietism (which became institutionalized early through professorships of theology in both Halle and Göttengen), the development of the German university ideal (whose trained graduates fed the burgeoning need for skilled thinkers and bureaucrats in an increasingly centralized world), the search for an agreeable concept of "nationality" for a group of people who had never shared a "nation" before (the concept of the volk was conceived to satisfy the search), and other notable elements (such as the concept of Bildung, a secular version of Pietism) as cultural influences that "cut both ways." These led to both outstanding achievements in the arts, industry and science, as well as led to a national mindset that made Nazi power a possibility and an unfortunate reality.

Quite correctly, there is nothing in this book that would be considered sympathetic to Nazi Germany. In fact, many prominent Nazi "thinkers" are quietly pilloried (like Theodor Frisch, a theologian who argued that Jesus was not a Jew, but that Galileans were actually Gauls, and therefore Jesus was really German!). The author appears interested only in a more complete understanding of the period and of the German people, which includes some empathy for the course of ordinary human lives and the human condition.

The author points out that, like many cultures, Germany was deeply influenced by a respect for classic antiquity. Greek models of the arts and intellectual thought materially shaped German culture. Which makes it doubly unfortunate then, that there was a collective failure to learn from one of the greatest of Greek achievements, tragic drama. The unfortunate experience of Germany and the victims of Nazi Germany appear as a cruel, ironic enactment of Greek Tragedy. Choices made for seemingly well-intended purposes result in, perhaps many years later, the preconditions for an enormous amount of suffering. The protagonists cannot foresee the looming disaster despite the chorus that tries to warn them. Perhaps one of the points of The German Genius, though, is that because of certain German cultural elements, the chorus wasn't loud enough to be heard.

As the author further points out, strains of the German Genius are still with us (including an emphasis upon science and technology, as well as an emphasis on "inwardness" - his description of the effects of Pietism or Bildung - at the expense of community involvement). Read this book, it is both a history and a timeless story.

Oh please, with peace to the previous reviewer. Here's my problem with the review. When one says that they are rather ignorant of German culture and history and then goes on to myopically focus in on the Nazi era and holocaust as if it were the sum of German history, I have to wonder if they had learned anything constructive from Watson's excellent survey at all.

It is as if Anglos are perpetually in the grip of wartime propaganda some 70 years after the war. Actually, the propaganda really goes back to WWI in which the UK launched the first modern state propaganda campaign against another people, using race imagery btw.

Watson's book is an attempt at a corrective to this distorted and one sided view of history, and it should be applauded in so far as it succeeds. Unfortunately, based on the previous review, I wonder if he has. Although I'm of Anglo ancestry, I have lived in Germany and speak German with intermediate ability. It is a wonderful country and people, and being a classical musician, I can say that their achievement in that sphere is unparalleled in the history of mankind. The most we Anglos can muster seems to the Beatles and other such low rent music (Elgar, who spent summers in Bavaria, excepted). What does that compare with Mozart or Bach?

What galls me in such thinking is the presumptuous, arrogant and glib superiority complex that Anglos have about themselves. We view ourselves as the world's angels, forgetting the international slave trade (which Germans had nothing to do with), the creation of concentration camps (for Boers in S.A. during the Boer War), the wholesale extermination of various native tribes in North America, and host of other crimes against humanity. Yet, we continue to put on as if we are the greatest thing to happen to humanity while treating Germany as if she were still a rogue state (one only need think of Thatcher's reaction to German reunification). Bottom line is that we will go down as history's biggest hypocrites. Germans will fortunately be spared that epitaph.

There's no need for Watson to grill a great culture once more over their 'crimes.' Enough (not for some of course) has been written on that to occupy one for a lifetime. Watson's goal is to remind English speaking readers that the world we live in today in so many ways is a creation of German speaking technology and culture. This is an incontrovertible fact. While, on a purely geopolitical level, they failed to become dominant since the UK could not and would not dare imagine themselves after 1815 as anything but number #1 rather like the USA today, yet they succeeded in virtually every other sphere.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone with an open mind about Germany's many sided contributions to European and global culture. If you're looking for yet another 'Hitler and the Germans' or 'Germany and the Nazis' book, you need to look somewhere else. It is a much needed breath of fresh air into the discourse surrounding a people literally central to the present European Union.

This work is compendious and detailed, indeed may be too heavy for some readers. There is a wealth, not only of facts
but also a comprehensive reporting of most aspects of society and the matrix in which modern German contributions and thinking across the spectrum of activities.
Definitely the best I've read on this subject

Excellent one-volume overview of the German genius from the death of J. S. Bach to the advent of the Third Reich. Obviously a well-read man, Watson gets to the heart of these geniuses and their work in a decidedly pithy way; to me, this book is the starting-point of my real research into the German genius.

But if you wanted the author to write more about Goethe, Schopenhauer, Diesel, Hegel, Schlegel, Schiller, Schubert, Mahler, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, Friedrich, Herder, Wolf, Fichte, Humboldt (and so on and so on), well, you ask for too much. So, I'd say start here and enjoy the journey.

The introduction alone was worth the purchase price and is what pulled me into purchasing the book. It is quite fascinating. Given that it is written by a British author/journalist who discusses England's relationship to Germany and some of his motivations for writing the book is also a plus.

German Genius is not a fast read and at times I wish for more of the synthesis of information that he displayed in the Introduction, however one realizes the problem as he appears to really be trying to bring in every German of significant contribution.

And as an author he appears to be able to stand in the background. I'd like to read this book faster, but it doesn't lend itself to that because of the level of detail, but I am finding out things about Germany I have never seen in other contexts.

I chose to read this book because I am an admirer of both Peter Watson's previous books on the history of ideas, "From Fire to Freud" and "The Modern Mind". I am NOT particularly knowledgeable about German history or culture, so I have very little to which I can compare this effort. Whereas Watson's previous technique of skimming over the surface and presenting only the stong points of Western culture gives added coherence to all he covers, I am not sure that it works as well here. Too much of "German Genius" reads like a library reference book. There are grand lists of important cultural figures but not enough about them (even in a 900) page book) to engage in the way I remember with Watson's previous work. This is a *cultural* history and sometimes it does not sufficiently connect with the political and economic events in the time. Two of the key issues in German history it seems to me are why the jews came to be so hated in a country where they seem to have been so deeply assimilated, and why Nazism arose almost unopposed in what was unarguably the most educated, most artistically and culturally sophisticated country in Europe. Watson does not touch the first question (then again nobody has !). And he has nothing original to the second question. I consider the long introduction and the summary to be worth the price of the book, however. At the beginning and the end he condenses the critical issues brilliantly. And for those looking for a guide to German cultural history this would serve as an excellent reference book, but it does not tell an engaging story with the obvious success as his earlier work. Is there a better introduction on the subject? I don't know. Few people are willing to give so much credit to the dominant influence of German culture upon all of western culture, I suspect, out of deep ambivalence to recent German history. Watson makes a strong case that we should get over it.

Irony struggles with world history in this recent Financial Times headline "Germany told to act to save Europe." Times have changed since 1945. We missed something along the way in all our readings and movies. Convenient villains for so long, the Germans are now asked to play savior. It is time to pull aside the historical blinders of World War Two, its atrocities and aftermath and open our eyes to Germany's contributions to science, philosophy, music, modern thought and their effect on our twenty first centuries sensibilities. Peter Watson's massive survey book reacquaints the reader, if "reacquainting" is the right verb, to the Germanic phenomenon with his deep research and cultural sensitivity without leaving unaddressed the twelve years of Nazi rule. Reading it is a sumptuous feast on Germanic erudition, philosophical thought and achievement by an author with a keen eye for detail and a gift for synthesis.

To paraphrase Philip Larkin, this is a serious book on serious ground; not to be consumed in one or two sittings; its complexities and intricacies are many, inviting the reader to carefully ponder the roots of Western philosophical thought, the wellsprings of nineteenth century symphonic music (mostly Germanic), the scope of Western artistic achievement, the nature of politics and political dialogue in our modern society and the engines of science in the past two hundred years. Watson plies his deep knowledge of the German character in his concluding chapter with five traits of German culture worthy of thoughtful consideration; an educated middle class inhabiting the world of scholarship (and by scholarship, he includes research), the arts (music, film, stage and literature), science, the legal, medical, and religious professions based not on the acquisition of knowledge but "as a process of character development;" a personal reflective character "inwardness" leading one to observe "new structures of our minds;" the German concept of "Bildung," being the primary achievement of the central driving force of inwardness, resulting in a harmonization of research with scholarship leading as " a defining phenomenun of modernity;" and a redemptive community "sustaining a moral community in the face of rampant individualism." These are thought provoking concepts for a people as controversial - and consequential - as the Germans have been for the last century.

Watson offers a fascinating take on the cultural pessimism of German middle class society post World War One and its relationship to Hannah Arendt's theory of "a temporary alliance between the educated elite and the mob" leading to a "constant murderous arbitrariness." This is a view one might not readily read about.

This wide ranging examination of German culture invites the American reader to contrast our American culture with German culture. Writers like Thomas Mann and other emigres to this country shine a caustic light on our culture; in Mann's words, he commented on "the American tendency to oversimplify . . . the `barbarous infantilism' of American life." This is not intended to provocate but to evaluate our culture and how the German literary elite saw us over time. It deserves our attention.

As I write this, the Wall Street Journal leads with a commentary by one of their business writers about the importance of the present day decisions of Angela Merkel on the 2012 elections prospects in this country. It is about time German society and culture is examined more carefully then it has been in the past. Peter Watson's book is a good starting point.

Peter Watson says that our continuing preoccupation with the Nazi period - even in school syllabuses - has prevented the general public in Britain and the United States from doing justice to - and sometimes even to being aware of - the huge contributions that Germans have made in every cultural fields in pre- and post-Nazi times.

Watson covers them all. That is a monumental undertaking, but one cannot be a master of it all, and of necessity some of his summaries are knowledgeable and illuminating, while others are more superficial; occasionally we have lists of names about whom nothing else is mentioned other than that they belonged to a particular group of people. But it would be churlish, I think, on these accounts to give such an encyclopaedic treasure-house less than five stars. Often Watson draws our attention to German achievements, little known to the British general public, which, important as they are, do not in themselves have a specifically German character. For example, German scientists made enormous contributions (about which there is a great deal in this book), but science is international and there nothing GERMAN about its character. (Only when the Nazis denounced relativity theory as unscientific and took racial "science" to new excesses could one speak of the peculiarities of German science.) In this short review I would like to single out some of the features which are uniquely German.

The first is the nature, role and self-conscious mission of German universities. Already in the early 18th century there were some 50 universities in Germany, when England had only two. Among the most important were Halle in Prussia and Göttingen in Hanover. These were pervaded with the spirit of Pietism, a form of Protestantism which taught the duty to develop what is best in you, but also the obligation to make this world a better place by active service, hard work, efficiency and incorruptibility. Frederick William I of Prussia (1713 to 1740) had become a convert to Pietism in 1708. Like the other German princes, he controlled the universities and staffed them with pietist teachers, and promoted pietists in the civil service and the army.

Deeply religious though they were, the Pietists broke the hold of the theological faculties on the universities and promoted philosophy and secular subjects. They created and developed the concept of Bildung, the notion that you should not only be the recipient of education, but should undertake the task to engage in continual inner self-development, including doing your own research and submitting it to the discussion of fellow-students. The importance attached to universities by the state (which, authoritarian though it was in so many ways, yet encouraged the intellectual freedom of scholars) and the ways in which these methodically organized themselves for research is surely the foundation for the pre-eminence of German scholarship in the 19th century. During the 1860s and 1870s the Technische Hochschulen (unlike the English polytechnics) acquired the prestige of the universities as centres of research, and their diploma winners could use the title of Doctor to symbolize this. This, too, contributed to the successes of innovative German industries.

Another specifically German aspect culture was what Watson calls "speculative philosophy". The German Aufklärung (Enlightenment) laid much stress on organic development as distinct from the external causation of Newtonian science. It was seen as the philosophical principle that was the basis of understanding not only history and the life-sciences, but of the Self and of the World as a whole; and it was best apprehended and conveyed by the genius and by the poet. The great artist raises the arts (especially music) from being vehicles of entertainment to vehicles of truth.

Watson describes the peculiarly German philosophies of Kant, Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, where his condensation of already dense and particularly abstruse ideas is, I think, not entirely successful (and, in the case of Hegel woefully inadequate). The cult of the Will, also, is primarily associated with 19th and 20th century German thinkers. The philosophy of Heidegger, too, has elements which are uniquely German.

Nationalism, racism, antisemitism - all these can be found in countries other than Germany; but Watson describes circumstances in which these ideas acquired a peculiar force in 19th century Germany, so that, in retrospect, one can see in them the seedbed of Nazism in the 20th century. When he comes to the Nazi period, he describes in detail the full awfulness of Nazi "aesthetics" which one might call uniquely German, were it not that it mirrored so closely those of Stalinist Russia. Similarly we get a uniquely German "theology" in the German Christian Church, challenged by German theologians like Barth, Bultmann, Tillich and Bonhoeffer whose ideas will acquire international influence.

The immense contribution in every field made by German intellectuals who emigrated to the United States and to Britain during the Nazi period is also extensively chronicled in two substantial chapters.

The last two chapters deal with developments in post-war Germany. In part they deal with a group of German thinkers analyzing pre-Nazi German culture in an effort to understand why that it had been unable to stand up against the Nazis. There was the famous Historikerstreit (the debate about whether the murderous crimes of the Nazis were uniquely German - it receives only a marginal reference in this book) and the debate about the nature of Germany's so-called Sonderweg. The novels of Grass, Böll and Schlink also confronted the recent past. The events of 1968 and the decade which followed, so argued Konrad Jarausch, at last marked a decisive anti-authoritarian transformation of values in West Germany; and it is surprising how many writers in East Germany (apart from Brecht, mostly completely unknown in the West) were able to confront the regime there.

Must stop: no space to discuss, for example, the seriousness of German theatre; important post-war films; or Watson's Conclusion which draws so many threads of the book together and shows the enormous influence German thought, for good and for ill, has had on the rest of the world.

In this wonderful book, Peter Watson exposes us to the many ideas and inventions of Germans that have played an enormous role in our way of thinking. The book begins by showing us the bias in regards to German history since the end of the Third Reich. Students are enthralled with Hitler and his Holocaust while only giving a passing glance to the great thinkers that preceded Hitler and emerged after his fall. The rest of the book is focused on bringing these thinkers into view while showing their influence on Western thought. I found one of the most interesting parts of the book to be where Watson explains the connections between classical music and philosophy in Germany. Coming from someone who has no interest at all in classical music, I was surprised at the curiosity it stirred in me. Other great topics covered include the "Germanisation" of the university and the exiled intellectuals during the Third Reich. The only problem I have with the book is that at times Watson skips around from one thinker to another without any explicit connection. This can lead to a little confusion, but it is only a minor issue that doesn't affect the overall greatness of the book. I credit this book with opening my eyes to the greatness of a Germany most people fail to recognize.

Peter Watsons work is masterful and reaching. This 850 page book is a journey of enlightenment and rediscovery of the plethora of German Genius in the arts and sciences preceding the Third Reich. It examines the German predicament of remembering the past and moving on with poignant knowledge of the worlds view of Germany in the shadow of Adolf Hitler, and their own view. Watson's view is it is easier to understand the Third Reich if one can offer salient reasons for how it happened and why it happened. The Geniuses are too numerous to mention (Mozart, Bach, Koch, Goethe, Ehrlich, Mendel...)The Greek influence, German Historicism, Prussian Dynasty, Industry Giants, Discovery of Physics, Freudian thought, Bildung (enrichment of the inner life of man), Weimar democracy, anti-semitism,fourth Reich (Effect of German Emigrees on America), Positivism, Theology, and Rebuilding and Reunification are discussed in detail. Watson's theories are admixed throughout the book with ample supportive material on how the UnGerman Third Reich came to power. Watson theorizes an educated middle class, lack of direction in expressionism, Bildung, inwardness, the PhD and Modernity, and Nationalist Cultural Pessimism all played a role in Hitler's Rise to Power. Throughout the book there are poignant entries such as the worst betrayal of all to the German Geniuses were the Nazi Doctors and subsequent unethical experiments carried out. The 93 signatures signed by German Giants in support of the First World War in trying to preserve the great German Culture may be seen as arrogance further substantiated by isolationist thinking; Germans believed they could conquer their European adversaries, who in their mind could not win without the help of the United States. To the Germans, they did not need help from outside Europe it was the increased numbers of forces that led to their demise. This would be repeated in World War II. Another passage in the book on wars indicated if you want to win wars, you need friends, and the Nazi's simply burned too many bridges. Watson does a good job of explaining why art was preferred over science in Germany as a piece of art can transform a nation,romanticize the mind whereas a scientific experiment may only be understood by a handful of people. A picture or a poem can reflect the image of perfection and perfection was only achieved via creation as Baumgarten pointed out. A piece of art can motivate the masses to think in a new mould. The concept of nature is also a stationary term throughout the book. A man's physical nature is somewhat complete but inner nature has yet to be achieved. Regarding the definition of genius, Watson uses multiple sources, one from Resewitz envisions the product of which is a form of perfect knowledge, sampling divine knowledge. Inwardness may be defined as withdrawing from politics and to look inward, for the artist especially, the inner rather than the outer world was the real one. In Germany the function of the artist was to move the unconscious to the surface of the conscious, as art is more than a mere observation. The Prussian Dynasty mandated that children aged seven to fourteen attend school starting in the 1820s. German Literacy rates were the highest in Europe. With more Germans reading, skepticism crept in when an idea such as democracy or liberalism entered the fray. Reading also propelled inwardness. Germans clung to the private life and stayed out of the public sphere, they cherished their culture not parliamentary hearings. As humans can not altogether escape their past, so too countries cannot emerge from history so easily as Gerhard Schroder said. Germans are not umbilically linked to Hitler (Steve Crawshaw)and Germany is much more than the Third Reich. Did German historicism prepare the platform for Hitler? Was the Art/politics dichotomy too strong to avert disaster? Did the dishelvement of Hitler's Germany change the artists ethos? These questions are analyzed in this book. Germans born in 1945 became the involved generation showing activism in the late 1960s on Berlin, Vietnam, and Russia. They retreated from inwardness and migrated to the public sphere, where democratic values were internalized and change happened. History from one generation moved another generation toward Bildung, a very German idea.