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Print Price: $79.95

Format:
Paperback
344 pp.
12 b/w illustrations, 156 mm x 234 mm

ISBN-13:
9780199695867

Publication date:
October 2011

Imprint: OUP UK

Hindenburg

Power, Myth, and the Rise of the Nazis

Anna von der Goltz

Series : Oxford Historical Monographs

Hindenburg reveals how a previously little-known general, whose career to normal retirement age had provided no real foretaste of his heroic status, became a national icon and living myth in Germany after the First World War, capturing the imagination of millions. In a period characterized by rupture and fragmentation, the legend surrounding Paul von Hindenburg brought together a broad coalition of Germans and became one of the most potent forces in Weimar politics.

Charting the origins of the myth, from Hindenburg's decisive victory at the Battle of Tannenberg in 1914 to his death in Nazi Germany and beyond, Anna von der Goltz explains why the presence of Hindenburg's name on the ballot mesmerized an overwhelming number of voters in the presidential elections of 1925. His myth, an ever-evolving phenomenon, increasingly transcended the dividing lines of interwar politics, which helped him secure re-election by left-wing and moderate voters. Indeed, the only two times in German history that the people could elect their head of state directly and secretly, they chose this national icon. Hindenburg even managed to defeat Adolf Hitler in 1932, making him the Nazi leader's final arbiter; it was he who made the final and fateful decision to appoint Hitler as Chancellor in January 1933.

Readership : Students, scholars, and general readers interested in European history and the rise of the Nazis.

Reviews

`Review from previous edition Anna von der Goltz sets the stage brilliantly.'
The Canada Post
`lucid study...Anna von der Goltz does an expert job in deconstructing the Hindenburg legend'
David Cesarani, Literary Review
`This book...offers important new insights. It demonstrates like no previous study the dynamism and universal appeal of the Hindenburg myth as arguably the most important unifying factor of the Weimar Republic.'
Gerd Krumeich, Süddeutsche Zeitung
`Impressive, innovative, convincing'
Wolfgang Kruse, HsozKult
`This clear, well-written and thoughtful work is an excellent vindication of the thesis at its best... This is an important work that indicates the pernicious consequences of the First World War for Weimar politics.'
Jeremy Black, History
`This is a profound study that will help any reader, German or not, better to understand this unique era in German history.'
Contemporary Review

Introduction
1. The 'Victor of Tannenberg'
2. Surviving failure
3. Anti-democratic politics
4. Electing 'the Saviour'
5. Buying the icon
6. Hollow unity
7. The 'inverted fronts' of 1932
8. 'The Marshal and the Corporal'
9. Hindenburg after 1945
Conclusion
Bibliography

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Anna von der Goltz won the German History Society Essay Prize in 2006 and was awarded the prestigious Fraenkel Prize in 2008 for her work on the Hindenburg myth. Since 2007, she has been a contributor to the research project 'Around 1968: Activism, Networks, Trajectories' funded by the AHRC and the Leverhulme Trust.

The Bismarck Myth - Robert Gerwarth
Writing the Holocaust - Zoë Vania Waxman
Making Sense - Margot Northey and Joan McKibbin

Special Features

Explores the political cult of Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg, President of Germany 1925-34.
Winner of the prestigious Fraenkel Prize in 2008.
Reveals the role of the Hindenburg myth in fashioning the Führer cult, as exploited by Hitler.
Draws on wide range of vivid and unpublished sources - secret reports, memoirs and diaries, advertisements, films, newspapers, and Hindenburg's radio speeches.