The exhibition Berlin Transit on Jewish migrants from Eastern Europe in the 1920s at the Jüdisches Museum is (sadly) over already, but its website is still a great resource. Among other things, it offers a virtual tour of important places of Jewish life in 1920s Berlin.
Category: Berlin
Off Topic: East Berlin 1990
This documentary about everyday life in Berlin’s Prenzlauer Berg district shortly after the fall of the Wall is an incredibly useful resource for teaching German history. It’s available for free online and can also be downloaded.
It’s set nearly 60 years after the Weimar Republic, but maybe some members of the WSN might find it useful.
Staasbibliothek stipends
The Staatsbibliothek in Berlin offers research grants for international students and scholars planning to use its archives and holdings. The monthly stipends are €900 (for applicants with a first degree) or €1,200 (for applicants with a PhD) and are awarded for 1-3 months depending on the individual project. There is also an additional travel grant of €500. Deadline for applications is 30 September.
Online databank on Weimar press
A very useful tool for research on the Weimar press is the Austrian Academy of Sciences’s online database Hypress. Besides detailed information on the Austrian press from 1848-1945, there is a comprehensive part on the press of Weimar Berlin, listing even obscure or short-lived papers, complete with circulation, political affiliation and other details.
Musical trade between London and Berlin
West End and Friedrichstraße. Cross-Cultural Exchange in Popular Musical Theatre 1890-1939, an interesting international research project based at Freie Universität Berlin and Goldsmiths College London, considers the cultural transfer between Berlin’s and London’s musical districts. A report on a recent conference on the topic can be found online (in English).
Weimar Berlin reconsidered
The enduring allure of the Weimar Republic is inextricably intertwined with its capital city, Berlin. However, the problem of Berlin’s historical image has always been the fact that it largely relies on a handful of canonical texts, most of which supply a seriously skewed image of the city, variously describing it as ‘Germany’s most American city’, ‘Chicago an der Spree’ and ‘Spree-Athen’; Christoper Isherwood’s famous account of Berlin’s debauchery further added to its mystery – which is being reanimated today.
Weimar at the Berlinale
The Berinale Film Festival rolls out the red carpet today and Weimar cinema takes centre stage: this year’s Retrospektive part of the festival is dedicated to Mezhrabpom, the Russian-German film studio dubbed ‘The Red Dream Factory’.
On 12 February, the Filmstudio Babelsberg, where most of the great works of Weimar cinema like Metropolis or Der blaue Engel were produced, will celebrate its centenary with a special programme at the Berlinale. German media are already gearing up to the 100-year anniversary with various features on Babelsberg’s history:
Babelsberg-Diva Asta Nielsen: Deutschlans erster Superstar (Der Spiegel)
Hollywood in Brandenburg: 100 Jahre Babelsberg (Financial Times Deutschland)
Film ab! Ein Streifzug durch Babelsberg – und 100 Jahre Film (Deutschlandradio)
Studio Babelsberg: Die Illusionsmaschine (Berliner Zeitung)
Die Weltbühne Online
The entire back catalogue (1918-1933) of Die Weltbühne, one of the most important forums for leftist intellectuals in the Weimar Republic, has been uploaded to the Internet Archive. It can be viewed online or downloaded as PDF under the Creative Commons license.
The British in Weimar
The image of the Weimar Republic in the English-speaking world (and the image of the English visiting Weimar Germany, for that matter) has long been dominated by Christopher Isherwood and his circle. In fact, Isherwood’s 1939 novel Goodbye to Berlin could be credited with creating the long-lasting picture of the Weimar Republic as a ‘dance on the volcano’ – a burst of progressive culture and sexual licentiousness before the backdrop of political chaos and economic crisis.
Colin Storer’s new study Britain and the Weimar Republic: The History of a Cultural Relationship injects some much-needed academic rigour into this legendary part of Anglo-German relations, challenging Isherwood’s hegemonic account of British life in Weimar Germany. (Thanks to Tara Windsor for pointing it out).
Twenties Revival in Berlin
As The Guardian noticed recently, ‘the decadence of the 1920s is back in fashion in the German capital’. Anyone who is interested in studying the on-going Twenties revival more closely should give it a whirl at the Bohème Sauvage party in Berlin on 30 April.
New book on murder in Weimar-era Berlin
The University of Michigan Press has published Murder Scenes. Normality, Deviance, and Criminal Violence in Weimar Berlin by Sace Elder. The book examines the social effects of criminal investigation in Weimar-era Berlin.
The Guardian reports on the 1920s revival in Berlin
The Guardian reporter Helen Pidd writes about the new fashionability of the ‘Golden Twenties’ among Berlin’s party-goers. Regular theme parties are being held where ‘you can dress up as a flapper, dance the Charleston, drink absinthe while smoking from a foot-long cigarette holder‘ and there are even several Weimar-inspired hotels in the German capital now:
Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome … to 1920s Berlin
The decadence of the 1920s is back in fashion in the German capital, so vamp it up like Dietrich with our tips on everything from the best bars for a glass of absinthe to where to shop for that vintage party frock