Short Oxford History of Germany: Weimar Germany. Edited by Anthony McElligott. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2009. Pp. xviii + 324. Cloth $99.00. ISBN 978-0-19-928006-3. Paper $34.95. ISBN 978-0-199280070.

摘要

To recommend a book in English (or German) that introduces newcomers tornWeimar Germany while at the same time offering scholars some food forrnfurther thought is notoriously difficult. Hans Mommen’s The Rise and Fall ofWeimar Democracy offers a dense, chronologically narrated political history. It is dif-rnficult to understand without considerable prior knowledge, as is Detlev Peukert’srnmore broadly conceived, intellectually stimulating The Weimar Republic: ThernCrisis of Classical Modernity. Moreover, both are by now a bit dated. Since thern1990s, a heterogeneous flow of studies has explored local societies fromrnGreifswald to Cologne, milieux from Bavarian peasants to Reichstag deputies, intel-rnlectual circles from left-wing social scientists to self-appointed conservative revolu-rntionaries, and aspects of political culture fromrepublican festivities to the activities ofrnright-wing women. It is this bewildering diversity that continues to fascinate histo-rnrians but makes any attempt at synthesis highly challenging. The volume underrnreview now aims to give structure to the period, to revisit some classical issues,rnand to explore more recent ones. It largely succeeds in this endeavor, and itrnbrings some much-needed contingency into the interpretation of the period. AsrnAnthony McElligott argues in his insightful introduction,Weimar, for all its prob-rnlems, had considerable accomplishments to its credit and benefited from morernpopular support and elite consensus than is often recognized. The idea of arn“doomed” republic warrants qualification because it pays insufficient attention tornshort-term political shifts. And Peukert’s “crisis of classical modernity” needs tornbe replaced by a more flexible emphasis on competing visions of Germany’srnpresent and future as a modern society.