The German Century

In 1871 the shadow of the German eagle fell over Europe. Industrially powerful, militarily formidable, the newly created empire soon showed its ambitions. The balance of power had gone and the stage was set for what General de Gaulle called 'the thirty years war of our century', which only ended when Germany was fragmented once more. Michael Sturmer tells the sombre yet compelling story of two world wars spanning the first part of the century, and then that of the last fifty years as one half of the country reinvented itself and the other froze in the grip of the Cold War. Then the Berlin Wall came down; but as soon as the goal of unity had been achieved, a new aim, European integration, replaced it - as if the burden of German history is only bearable if shared. Thanks to Michael Sturmer's analysis and photographs that have been assembled, we can study the protagonists at close range, as well as the social and artistic background before which they perform.