Latest documents http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/index/index/ Mon, 02 Aug 2010 12:44:53 +0100 Mon, 02 Aug 2010 12:44:53 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13856 This contribution was prompted by events in East Germany that ultimately led to German unification. Many forces contributed to the collapse of the GDR as a separate state, the final and most visible was the mass exodus via Hungary and Czechoslovakia. The Communist regime resisted change when change was taking place in most of East Germanys neighbors to the east and southeast. But an ever increasing number of increasingly restless citizens insisted on it and, not given a chance to change matters by improving the system, effected the most radical change of all: they swept away an unresponsive, cynical and calcified government. Herbert Deinert article http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13856 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 12:44:53 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13855 The musical ending [of Goethe's Novelle] recalls the fascination with "music as metaphor", "the power of music", among recent and contemporary poets from Pope and Dryden and Collins to E.T.A. Hoffmann and Kleist and, of course to Goethe himself. Music saves Faust's life on Easter morning at the end of a dreadful night, and we'll encounter a similar role of music in his Trilogie der Leidenschaft which we'll read in this context. Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13855 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 12:29:21 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13852 This is a version of an often revised lecture first given at Cornell University in 1983 during a symposium commemorating Luther's birth five hundred years earlier and is based on six major writings dating from 1522 to 1531. Herbert Deinert article http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13852 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 11:57:02 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13850 Words spoken at the Memorial Service on March 13, 2005, Sage Chapel, Cornell University Herbert Deinert other http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13850 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 11:25:34 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13847 Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13847 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 11:01:08 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13846 The 1926 silent classic was directed by FW Murnau and stars Emil Jannings (Prof. Unrat in "The Blue Angel") as Mephisto. Goesta Ekman is Faust, the incomparable Camilla Horn an unforgettable Gretchen. Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13846 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 10:50:04 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13845 Herbert Deinert article http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13845 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 10:40:41 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13844 450 years ago, in the early hours of February 18, the charismatic reformer and fearless combatant who had changed the face of Europe and of Christianity died in his home town of Eisleben while on a peace mission. The feuding Counts of Mansfeldt had asked him to mediate. Accompanied by his three sons, Luther, old at 62 and ailing, made the trip in mid-winter against the advice of friends and family. His body was returned to Wittenberg and buried there on February 22. It is impossible to overestimate his impact. The common priesthood of man, "everybody his own priest", this truly revolutionary notion at the core of his teaching, was immediately recognized for its (unintended) political, democratic implications. To him, all the faithful were one community, there was no room for separate casts. His zeal as a preacher of the "true faith", and his denunciation of those who would not accept it, earned him the reputation of intolerance, even anti-Semitism. The latter would surprise him, for he considered himself a prophet, though anointed against his will, like those of the Old Testament who also admonished, cajoled and condemned the "wayward children of Israel"' Herbert Deinert article http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13844 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 10:22:27 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13842 "The sun shines, and Hitler is master of this city. The sun shines, and dozens of my friends are in prison, possibly dead. Thousands of people like Frl. Schroeder are acclimatizing themselves, like an animal which changes its coat for the winter. After all, whatever government is in power, they are doomed to live in this town." These are among the final entries in Christopher Isherwood's Berlin Diaries. Hitler has legally assumed power and Isherwood, who "can't altogether believe that any of this has really happened," will leave the city he has come to love and return to England. The Nazi Movement that began a decade ago in seedy Bavarian beer halls has now conquered its very antithesis, Prussia. It seems unstoppable. The people, as always, will adapt or perish. Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13842 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 10:07:53 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13837 Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13837 Mon, 08 Feb 2010 08:39:59 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/12759 Eckbert the Fair. From Six German Romantic Tales, trans. Ronald Taylor. Dufour Editions. Here is my own more literal translation of the poems as they appear on pp. 21, 27 and 32. Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/12759 Tue, 02 Feb 2010 11:48:43 +0100 http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13817 Beethoven's Ninth in Bailey Hall the other evening, April 20, ending in an instant standing ovation by a clearly enchanted audience, was an unforgettable experience. And, like all such truly extraordinary events that are marked not only by artistic merit, but draw their power from the circumstances surrounding their creation or performance, it recalled others and enhanced their significance. I was reminded of a stellar performance on Christmas Day of 1989, only weeks after the unexpected fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, that haunting date in German history. Few people believed it would ever happen. But now, suddenly, reunification in justice and freedom, as the truncated old national anthem phrases it, was within reach. Herbert Deinert workingpaper http://publikationen.stub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/13817 Tue, 02 Feb 2010 11:11:56 +0100