Show Notes
Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum, begins his series examining 600 years of German history through objects, with a reflection on Germany's floating frontiers. Twenty-five years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, which led to the reunified modern Germany, Neil visits the Brandenburg Gate. In November 1989 the East Berlin crowds gathered there and cheered and then poured into West Berlin as the Berlin Wall fell and the world changed. It was there in July 2014 that a huge crowd celebrated Germany's victory in the World Cup in Brazil. In 1950 the first major demonstration was held there to protest against Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe: the crowd pulled down the red flag that flew over the Brandenburg Gate and demanded free elections. And in 1806 Napoleon made his triumphal entry into Berlin through the Brandenburg Gate, after humiliating the Prussian army. From this focal point of modern Germany, Neil begins a 30 part series which reveals the profound influence of Germany's history, culture and inventiveness across Europe, as well as the catastrophic events of the 20th century.
More from Germany: Memories of a Nation
Neil MacGregor began his journey through 600 years of German history at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, and ends it at the Reichstag, seat of the German Parliament. These two extraordinary buildings, only a few hundred yards apart, carry in their very stones the political history of the country. Neil talks to architect Norman Foster, who in 1992 won the commission to restore the Reichstag, when Germany's Parliament returned to Berlin in the wake of re-unification. Producer Paul Kobrak.
Neil MacGregor focuses on Ernst Barlach's sculpture Hovering Angel, a unique war memorial, commissioned in 1926 to hang in the cathedral in Güstrow. Producer Paul Kobrak.
After concentration camps like Buchenwald and extermination camps like Auschwitz, it seemed that the story of Jews in Germany must come to a full stop at the end of the war. Why would any Jew in 1945, or in 1965 for that matter, see any part of their future in Germany? But remarkably Germany today has the fastest-growing Jewish population in Western Europe. Neil MacGregor visits a synagogue in Offenbach, near Frankfurt, which was inaugurated in 1956 and has been greatly enlarged in the years since then. Producer Paul Kobrak.
Neil MacGregor talks to a Trümmerfrau, a woman who cleared rubble from the streets of Berlin in 1945, and focuses on a sculpture by Max Lachnit, a portrait of a Trümmerfrau made from hundreds of pieces of rubble. Neil also examines the role the launch of the Deutsch Mark played in the re-building of Germany. Producer Paul Kobrak.
Neil MacGregor focuses on a small hand-cart to tell the story of the forced movement of more than 12 million Germans, who fled or were forced out of Central and Eastern Europe after 1945. For many, the only way of transporting their possessions was a hand-cart, as they walked to parts of Germany they had never seen before. And Neil also reflects on the 1949 Berlin staging of Brecht's play Mother Courage, examining a model of the production's set. Fiona Shaw, who has played the title role, discusses how the image of Mother Courage pulling her cart, amidst the devastation of war, became one of the most memorable stage pictures of the 20th century. Producer Paul Kobrak.