Germania: In Wayward Pursuit of the Germans and Their History by Simon Winder

Aug 19, 2011 Megan rated it 4 of 5 stars

The thesis of this book is that the Nazis manipulated and warped German traditions and culture in a way that has obscured the centuries that preceded them. Moreover, the horrors of that outrageous time command an inordinate amount of attention in history because of their outrageousness and world-altering effects. Therefore, it takes concentrated effort to engage with the rich but somewhat neglected history (at least within popular, mainstream history) of Central Europe from the time of the fall...more

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Apr 25, 2010 Steve Kettmann rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: books-read-2010

A disappointing effort, overall. Here is my review for the San Francisco Chronicle:

Germania
In Wayward Pursuit of the Germans and Their History
By Simon Winder
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 454 pages; $25)

At first glance one assumes that Simon Winder has in mind with "Germania" something like an updating of the late great Gordon Craig of Stanford's "The Germans," a classic study by the onetime dean of American historians of Germany. Actually, not at all.

Winder, who "works in publishing" in Britain,...more

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Feb 29, 2012 Janice Durante rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction, travel

I've often thought it unfortunate that so many people refuse to consider visiting Germany. Simon Winder's lively, quirky valentine to the country could change a few people's minds -- if only they'd give him a chance. I know what you're thinking: The food's bad, the climate's so-so, the language impossible, the history dark. Yes, there's some truth in all of that, but ... there's so much more. For those of us who love to wander medieval lanes, enter ancient castles, and experience another culture...more

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Apr 28, 2013 Steve rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: history

I've never found European History all that interesting, it always seems to dwell on France and Italy (which are a bit dull really), and apart from the obvious 20th century madness, I've not known much about Germany. Simon Winder corrects this omission with Germania – as a Germanophile it is difficult not to be pulled into Winder's enthusiasm for the German collection of states, principalities and dukedoms.

While no book about German history can avoid the Nazi's, Winder, rightly in my view, decid...more

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Apr 16, 2013 LiB rated it 4 of 5 stars

I've recently moved to Germany, and wanted to read some German history that was not about Nazis or the Cold War. In one sense this book failed - this book is often, if indirectly, about the Third Reich, the way the Nazis misused previous German history, the way that it overpowers previous events so that everything is read as leading to fascism or tragically failing to stop it.

It took me a while to get into it. Its a combination of travelogue/history - the author starts each section with a descr...more I've recently moved to Germany, and wanted to read some German history that was not about Nazis or the Cold War. In one sense this book failed - this book is often, if indirectly, about the Third Reich, the way the Nazis misused previous German history, the way that it overpowers previous events so that everything is read as leading to fascism or tragically failing to stop it.

It took me a while to get into it. Its a combination of travelogue/history - the author starts each section with a description of his travels to a particular little town and ruminates on a particular monument or building to expand on wider German history. It is therefore by design anecdotal and personal, and even though chronological, it meanders back and forth in time. Ancient and early medieval history, with less contemporary physical presence, is approached through later romantic or nationalistic interpretations, such as Goebbels' attempts to recreate ancient Germanic groves. Not only did it take me a few chapters to get used to the style, I think the author takes a few chapters to hit his stride - the book becomes both funnier and more tangential as it goes on. You get a very clear sense of the authors taste, and even though I often disagree with him, I quite appreciated his delight in things he found charming, tacky and inspiring. Its judgemental, but with a self-deprecation that takes out the sting.

I was grateful that I knew some German history beforehand - I think trying to read this without a basic framework would have been very confusing. He also assumes a fair bit of cultural knowledge. There's a joke about the bitchiness of Karl Marx's journalistic writing in the 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon for example.

Despite all the humour its a very sad book - the author explicitly tries to celebrate the past without hindsight, but as we get closer to the 1930's the book becomes even more of an elegy for a lost cosmopolitan culture and a country with an ordinarily awful history. I'm glad I read it - its certainly made we want to travel around my new country even more, and I think it will add to my appreciation of what I find.(less)

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Jan 24, 2013 Dan Sumption rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, history

So many reviewers of this book get caught up with the fact that the author claims not to be able to speak German. OF COURSE HE CAN SPEAK GERMAN, albeit not as well as he would like to, he is just being terribly, _terribly_ British about it.

This is a very quirky, very personal, utterly British, history of and travel guide to Germany. And I loved it. It's full of fascinating information, and endearing prejudices: I chuckled at his repeated Basil Fawlty-like assurances that he is not, under any cir...more

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Dec 16, 2011 David Cheshire rated it 4 of 5 stars

On one level this is an amusing travel book around the Germany of the scores of tiny medieval city-states whose dottiness charm and fascinate the author; the reader must simply follow on behind in awe of his weird and obsessive learning. But there are also some mind-blowing bits of more modern historical insight. Building an insignificant naval base in the 1850's but then calling it 'Wilhelmshaven' left the nationalistic Germans with no choice but to build a navy to go in it; hence followed Angl...more

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Jul 30, 2011 James (JD) Dittes added it · review of another edition

I admit that I'm a sucker for "subjective" history books--as long as they're not about my own country. Winder is very opinionated--particularly about German food and just about every Land north of Hesse--yet he brings such insights into art, history and architecture that the reader cannot help but learn more about German history. One admirable trait of this book is its effort to describe the lunacy and interelations of the hundreds of German kingdoms and duchies that made up the Holy 'Roman Empi...more

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Sep 16, 2010 Maia rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

I have so many issues with this book that I don't know where to begin--but I'm glad I didn't buy it, only borrowed it.

First off, let me say that as someone brought up by a historian dad who's always had an intense interest in Germany (though he himself is Italian) I found the lack of historical accurateness or academia here quite baffling--even non-historians writing historical books usually tend to rely on history! Also, as someone now married to a German and for the past 2 years living in Germ...more I have so many issues with this book that I don't know where to begin--but I'm glad I didn't buy it, only borrowed it.

First off, let me say that as someone brought up by a historian dad who's always had an intense interest in Germany (though he himself is Italian) I found the lack of historical accurateness or academia here quite baffling--even non-historians writing historical books usually tend to rely on history! Also, as someone now married to a German and for the past 2 years living in Germany a lot of the time (and learning German--as impossible a language as it is) I was also completely puzzled and later disgusted by Winder's utter and unapologetic lack of interest in 1) the German language (even if he does excuse this by his so-called language obtuseness), 2) 'real' Germans and 'real' German's Germany, and 3) post-Nazi Germany (which is intrinsically connected to pre-Nazi Germany: the one by which he is ostensibly so fascinated). Both of these points--his lack of historical scholarism and his lack of knowledge/interest in 'true' Germanness--put the book at a disadvantage for me from the start, and I was skeptical throughout my reading of it.

That said, there ARE quite a few interesting tidbits within it and if you're at loose ends in a bookstore, say, you could do worse than reading them. However, the best reviews on these books are those by Bonnie B. Lee on Bookslut and Steve Kettmann in the San Francisco Chronicle (just found out he's posted it here, too): they both point out the obvious. That this a book written by a Brit in a self-apologetic style (you need to apologize if you're British and have an inexplicable fondness for Germany) and almost exclusively for Brits, for whom even today after 70+ years--and especially, one would think, after the 'economic miracle' that left Britain far behind--everything German leads to Hitler, Nazism, and the war 'they' (the Brits, with our help of course!) won. The truth is, in my way of thinking, that WW2 for the Brits isn't just about Nazism--it's also about the end of their empire, the passing of an imperial torch to the US, and finalization of a British way of life. To that end, Germany is always to blame, isn't it?

Bottom line, though: don't trust a book about Germany written by a nerdy Brit who doesn't speak a word of German, hasn't a single conversation with a real German, and doesn't even include philosophy or psychology in his exploration of what constitutes Germanness--impossible things to avoid, really, since both are not only 100% German products but entirely connected to what IS German. Furthermore, the "Personal History" subtitle of the book has got to be simply a publishing gimmick, because we never really get to understand just why this plump little British boy becomes so obsessed by a country and culture he's never had any connection to and we're given barely any 'personal' historical facts.(less)

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Feb 22, 2012 Rennie rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: germany, history, austria

I expected a humorous portrayal of modern Germany alongside historical context, but when a sense of humor appeared it was more weird and offensive than anything, like in one instance the author wrote that unattractive people spend a lot of time looking at maps. Maybe a stereotype I've so far never encountered? (Or just personal bias because I consider myself not unattractive and also interested in maps, but there are plenty of other occasions when he makes sweeping and seemingly random generaliz...more

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Feb 24, 2013 Nick added it · review of another edition

I quite liked this, and think the mixed nature of reviews here have to do with the highly charged subject matter. The SF chronicle review rightly notes the unorthodox nature of Winder's theory that WWI would have been better with the UK remaining neutral and a German victory. But overall I think the thesis holds up -- that German history is not like that of the other Western European powers, but rather a tangled and mostly forgotten linchpin for the chaotic character of European history, from Ro...more

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Jul 08, 2010 Lauren Albert rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: history-european

Highly demented and highly educational at the same time. Winder shows the complexity (and artificiality) of national identity. Affectionate mockery of all things German(ish) is his modus operandi.
[on local museums:] “Sometimes there are engaging reconstructions of mammoths or other fun creatures, but on the whole you are left simply with a puzzled sense of the surety all curators have of hair-lengths for early humans for whom all evidence derives from skeletons and why do they all look like Wes...more

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Sep 07, 2011 Rob rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I appreciate the need to bring unfamiliar material to a new audience and judging by the way Germania has been marketed, Winder has done us all a service by charting a German history that reintroduces us all to Frederick the Great, the Roman city of Trier, Thomas Mann, marzipan and the Thirty Years War - our memories having been clouded by twentieth century totalitarian regimes from Right and Left.

But I would have appreciated a less frivolous account. Too often, Winder lapses into Henry Blofeld...more

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Jul 27, 2011 Alex G. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

An excellent book which teaches a lot while keeping a light-heatred, humouristic style and approach. Through anecdotes and personal experience, Simon Winder gives us an in-depth analysis of the course of German history - or should I say the history of the region of modern Germany, Austria, Poland, Hungary... and all the rest of Central and Eastern Europe which got involved in the successive empires. The book not only replaces Germany in its rightful cultural and historical context, but it also a...more

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Mar 31, 2010 Lisa rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

Right from the beginning, Simon Winder acknowledges the elephant that’s in the room of any history of Germany: “Germany is shunned for a very good reason — the enormity of its actions is part of the last century.”
But he immediately follows that with a reason for writing about Germany regardless:
“I want to get round the Fuhrer and try to reclaim a bit of Europe which is in many ways Britain’s weird twin, and which for almost all of its history has been no less attractive and no more or less admir...more Right from the beginning, Simon Winder acknowledges the elephant that’s in the room of any history of Germany: “Germany is shunned for a very good reason — the enormity of its actions is part of the last century.”
But he immediately follows that with a reason for writing about Germany regardless:
“I want to get round the Fuhrer and try to reclaim a bit of Europe which is in many ways Britain’s weird twin, and which for almost all of its history has been no less attractive and no more or less admirable than many other countries.”
And thus begins “Germania,” part history, part travelogue, and part cultural analysis, not only of Germany but of aspect of Europe as a whole. It starts at the very beginning — the gloomy forests and Roman Germans — and ends when Hitler seizes power in 1933.
Each chapter is divided into shorter sections that have a sharp focus, making this longish book seem short and quick. And it’s informative and interesting; instead of a long list of names and dates, Winder talks about things that happened or people who lived, and what effects these people and events had at the time and into the future. He lovingly details art and architecture in German towns well-known and unsung, and doesn’t gloss over the kind of warts and nutty rulers that pop up in any nation’s history.
Winder mixes in plenty of fun factoids and colorful characters with his thoroughly researched and expertly detailed explanations of historical figures, places and happenings. And, of course, he indulges us with descriptions of some of the more unappetizing culinary aspects of Germany (though the author, as a Brit, has to admit that Germans hardly hold a monopoly on disgusting food).
The writing in “Germania” is artful and erudite, irreverent and arch, and at times quite funny, without ever quite crossing the line into snark. Winder’s sincere in his fascination with Germany and unashamed in his admiration for a well-built cathedral, artistic tapestry or breathtaking view. He has taken two millennia of chaotic history and organized it into a much less jumbled and more coherent package, one that’s as informative as it is entertaining.(less)

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Feb 01, 2013 Stuart rated it 3 of 5 stars

I received quite an education on Germany here, but I kept thinking, what would your average German think of the book.

I got bored and started finding it tedious to get through, however, having said that, it is probably orders of magnitude more interesting than your average history book.

I was so tired of looking for a book on Germany at the library only to find yet another book about Hitler and crew, that finding Mr Winders take on Germany was a refreshing change of pace.

This book also allowed me...more

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Dec 27, 2012 Sven rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Since coming back from my German holiday I have made a concerted effort to 'swat up' on my German history. Simon Winders book was one of the first on the subject that I pulled off the book shelf and after finished it I am a little confused.

As a man who professes his love for Germany his comments are, more often than not, belittling and riddled with sarcasm and it is only near the very end of the book that he admits that he finally 'gets' Germany.

There were a few times when I wanted to simply put...more

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Sep 05, 2012 Tom Paver rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

They may have mullets and wear garish checked jackets, and they may have a habit of arguing with their neighbours, but the Germans are our cousins. Family. Our entire Royal Family, in fact. So it's incumbent on us to understand them better.

This book helps and it's perfectly sized to leave on your pool-side lounger. With your towel.

Like the Germans themselves it's entertaining enough without sending you to fits of laughter and the narrative flows along nicely. But somehow I didn't feel as full as...more

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Nov 14, 2011 Dergrossest rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is German history 102, not 101. The author clearly assumes that the reader has some basic understanding of the German people and, mostly, sets about telling you why you have it all wrong, all the while sprinkling the text with a few fascinating historical nuggets. For example, he makes a clever argument that there is no "German" people, that our understanding of same is based upon a misunderstanding of an ancient Roman text written by Tacitus, that we are still living under the influence of...more This is German history 102, not 101. The author clearly assumes that the reader has some basic understanding of the German people and, mostly, sets about telling you why you have it all wrong, all the while sprinkling the text with a few fascinating historical nuggets. For example, he makes a clever argument that there is no "German" people, that our understanding of same is based upon a misunderstanding of an ancient Roman text written by Tacitus, that we are still living under the influence of anti-Ottoman Hapsburg propaganda, that it might have been better for the world if Vienna had fallen to the more urbane and less conservative Turks, that there is no grand German tradition of military competency, that the British were perhaps even more cruel in their administration of their colonial empire than the German "Huns" ever were in World War I, and that Germans have continually existed under the umbrella of a deep-seated inferiority complex. I did not agree with all of the book's conclusions, in particular that the Holocaust could really have happened anywhere (particularly given the author's illustration of multiple examples since 1100 A.D. when the Germans have sporadically massacred Jews for no apparent reason), but I thought that many others, including the vastly overrated nature of Frederick the Great's military acumen, were completely spot-on. At a minimum, the book made me re-think many of my opinions regarding 2000 years of European history.

Cleverly, the author concludes his history just as Hitler takes power in 1933. The way he has set it all up, you really do not feel short-changed since the author has already made his case as to why the Nazis came to power, and, less convincingly, why the German people might be forgiven for same.

Unfortunately, the book frequently bogs down when the author attempts to be funny. Not that the author is not funny. It is just that he is funny in a Benny Hill sort of way, i.e., very funny 15% of the time and not very funny at all the rest of the time (what was it with all of those stupid songs he sang anyway?). And, although he made a valiant effort, I was just not very interested in reading the anecdotes from the author's apparently very boring life. He is no Tony Horowitz of Confederates in the Attic and Blue Horizons fame.

On the other hand, Tony Horowitz is really more of a travel writer and rarely has as many truly interesting historical insights and unique theories challenging our basic understanding of key historical events and movements, as does Simon Walker. I also find Tony Horowitz's writing to have a much shorter shelf-life since it all based upon fleeting contemporaneous observations on current socio and political conditions in the various places to which he travels. Accordingly, even if his is a somewhat boring trip to much blander places, I tip my hat and the scales in Mr. Walker's favor.

Highly recommended for those interested in German history and the Holocaust. Not so much for anyone else.

(less)

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May 16, 2010 Douglas rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A highly entertaining travelogue from Schloss to Schloss documenting Germany's history over many hundred years from a contemporary point of view.

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Dec 06, 2011 Mark rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history, travelogue

One of the things I love about this website is the fact that you encounter all sorts of genres and books you may never have encountered before and titles which endear, charm or intrigue...yep Dan, you know who you are. Then there is that encounter with the opinions through reading others reviews of books you have read or are in the process of reading and this is often a wonder too as you read someone who has encountered the book and experienced it in a quite different way and it perhaps enables...more One of the things I love about this website is the fact that you encounter all sorts of genres and books you may never have encountered before and titles which endear, charm or intrigue...yep Dan, you know who you are. Then there is that encounter with the opinions through reading others reviews of books you have read or are in the process of reading and this is often a wonder too as you read someone who has encountered the book and experienced it in a quite different way and it perhaps enables you to get a different slant and think 'oh now I never saw it from that angle but yeah i see what you mean ' but then you also sometimes read reviews from people who appear to have read a totally different book to the one you opened and this is just a long intro to that comment. Some of the reviews of Winder's book seem to have lost sight of what the man quite clearly stated he was setting out to do and then moan when his book is not what they want it to be but is instead what he told them it would be.

Anyway enough. Winder writes an entertaining and fascinating personal take, remember people a PERSONAL take, on the strains and stresses of the long road of german expansion and creativity. This takes him to delve into the odd and unique, the stupid and the wise, the foul and the fair all in quite equal measure though he does love the odd and the excessive it has to be said but he does stride through the centuries from the dark ages of the first millenium coming to an end to the Dark Age of Nazism beginning in 1933 and gives a windwhistle tour in a little over 400 pages of that huge swathe of battle, invention, religion, politics, alliance and disaster. If you are coming to the book for in-depth analysis you won't get it unless you wish for the analysis of odd collections and buildings but that is his way. He enables you to hoover up enormous amounts of fact and insight even without realizing you are doing so.

Many people have compared him to Bill Bryson and there is certainly a good deal of similarity in the style of the throwaway line and amusing aside but it is all done in the quite clear atmosphere of Winder's love and admiration for the German people. He pokes fun at the lunacy of the proliferation of minor duchies and princedoms and the dynastic struggles which, even after the Unification of Germany as an Emperor in 1871, continued to dazzle and dance. Some of the Royal families had dynastic names you would kill; for my favourite being something like ' Schleswig-Holstein-Wollfenbuetten-Braumschweig'. Unfortunately I have looked through the book but couldn't find it again to spell it totally correctly but it was something like that. I am always fascinated by the history of royal Europe and this book is a feast for all the long gone minor royals who crept or swept or were totally inept in their posession of these thrones sometimes sat upon by impressive, intelligent and constructive regal bottoms and sometimes taken over by fools and thugs who seemed to communicate through aforementioned orifices.

There is, in all this wealth of fun information and discovery a serious reflection on the nature of choice and history. Winder expresses his belief that the Prussia of Great War Mythology was no more vicious or murderous or grasping than the enemies ranged against it. The behaviour of the British in so many places or of the French and Italians and Belgians and Americans in less situations but no less arrogant oppression shows that to load the blame for the Great War on to Kaiser Wilhelm was crass, simplistic and untruthful. The aftermath, for him, of the Great War was not just the end of European Imperial ambitions with the domino effect of the end of Austro-Hungarian, Russian, German and Ottoman Empires dragging into a total mess most of the little petty states which cowered in their seemingly more powerful shadows (and allowing for the fact that theoretically the british expression limped on for another few decades), but was also the destruction of a whole way of envisaging society. In Winder's vision the transcultural nature of these weird hotch-potch entities which for years had been held together and co-existed was destroyed by shortsightedness and thus began the horrendous divide into ultra nationalistic madness which ripped Europe apart and with which we are still struggling. I am not sure if I would wholeheartedly go along with all of his theory but his attempt to unpick and fairly look at the actions of all the protagonists involved is impressive and thought provoking.

I have read cynical comments that he stopped at 1933 so as to enable a new book to be commissioned. This seems to me to be an unjust and disingenuous criticism. His book expresses his understanding that just as the Black Death in 14th Century Europe seperates the Medievel Society from the renaissance and is a moment which divided one form of European life from its successor in a never to be fully reconnected way so the end of the 'Ancien regime ' of imperial and royal Europe with the disaster of the 1914-18 war destroyed and obliterated not just the silliness of wigs, uniforms and crowns but also a way of life which could, if it had evolved, prevented so much monstrous evil and the ravages which scarred the world but which was now vanished forever. This may or may not be a theory the reader runs with but it is, as i stated at the start, a PERSONAL view of Winder and can only be disagreed with not disbelieved. For him the Germany of which he was writing disappeared with Hitler's destruction of the Weimar republic and thus the book's purpose came to an end.

This is not a book in which indepth history is studied. Indeed its not a detailed examination of anything but rather is it the opportunity to meet another man's love and see him explore it; sometimes joyously, sometimes sadly but never boringly. I thoroughly enjoyed this.(less)

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Jan 24, 2013 Franz rated it 1 of 5 stars

I had high hopes for this book that were cruelly dashed. After almost almost half way through this book, I gave up on it. The author is far too self absorbed and genuine insights too rare, and for someone who spends a fair amount of time in a foreign country, Winders willful refusal to learn the language and willingness to engage in superficial stereotypes of the most insulting sort made me leave the book to gather dust for several months. Perhaps he meant the book as a satire and I don't get th...more

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Oct 09, 2010 Aniesa rated it 3 of 5 stars

I would like to rate this 3.5 stars because I am somewhere between "liking" and "really liking" it. The beginning was fascinating. I love the author's style and I couldn't put it down to start. But somewhere in the middle it became a bit tiresome. At 300 pages of sarcastic and anecdotal I was a bit done. But it picks up again somewhere around the period leading up to World War I, and I liked his views on its aftermath. Overall, I think the book is thoughtful, thought-provoking, and mostly entert...more

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Jun 24, 2010 David Bales rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010

Very interesting, funny, poignant and brilliant book on German history, from the Dark Ages to 1933; Winder is a British "Germano-phile", which is actually kind of rare. He journeys all over the sprawling, central European mass of Germania, a region not fixed onto the boundaries of the modern country and explores the great figures of German history, like Charlemagne, who was mostly French, or Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor who was kind of, well, Belgian, if such a thing really existed. He looks in...more

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Mar 21, 2012 Meika is currently reading it

So far this is really good. I went to Germany last fall and was completely enchanted. It seems that Germany is on the mend - Bavaria (where I spent my time) is complex and mysterious, and while you certainly can see signs of the Reich all over the place, if you allow yourself to take in the whole landscape and culture, you can see it in balance. Hitler is a blight on a long, murky but fantastic history, but for most of us he IS German history. This book acknowledges that in the subtext, but the...more

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May 12, 2012 Virginprune rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

well the first step is to adapt to the author's breezy style...

this is a book about what made Germany (and to a lesser extent Austria - but not Switzerland etc.) what they are now, whilst stopping at 1932. anything after there is the author's personal experiences - frequently very personal and often only obliquely relevant to the topic.

despite being an editor by profession, you get the feeling that one thing that this book needs more than anything is editorial influence. the text rambles rather...more

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May 04, 2013 Eddy Allen rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: arts-and-historical

A UNIQUE EXPLORATION OF GERMAN CULTURE, FROM SAUSAGE ADVERTISEMENTS TO WAGNER

Sitting on a bench at a communal table in a restaurant in Regensburg, his plate loaded with disturbing amounts of bratwurst and sauerkraut made golden by candlelight shining through a massive glass of beer, Simon Winder was happily swinging his legs when a couple from Rottweil politely but awkwardly asked: “So: why are you here?”

This book is an attempt to answer that question. Why spend time wandering around a country t...more

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Aug 03, 2012 Cyril Wussow rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The further I read, the more I hate this book. But I have to finish it because I do not want to judge it as a whole yet, I still have hope that in the next pages, my thoughts about Winder will change. I paid around €12, I do not want to think and feel that I've wasted €12.

Updated on the 3.August 2012:

I've finished it finally. It is not a total waste to force myself to finish the entire book even if I was already disappointed. Just like any other books, this too has its share of pro's and con's.

C...more

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Apr 13, 2012 Greta rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: general-non-fiction

Having lived in Germany, spoken German with Germans, and studied German History at University, I found this book disappointing. The author writes with wit and humor, but mostly only when he applies it to himself. "I even spent some happy days in Meissen under the pathetic delusion that I could learn to draw everything I saw in coloured pencil, sitting by the Elbe sketching the Albrechtsburg, hoping that my lack of talent could be balanced out by buying really expensive pencils and paper. Having...more

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Mar 17, 2012 Morticia Adams rated it 3 of 5 stars

I found it quite difficult to read this book in anything other than short bursts; sometimes I went for weeks without picking it up. It’s essentially a history of the idea of Germany, through the subjective eyes of a writer who is obsessed with the place. He starts with hairy men that dwelled in semi-mythic “gloomy forests”, and gave the Roman empire a scare from time to time, and signs out with the collapse of the Weimar government in the 1930s. But while there is a broad chronological framework...more

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