Review: Before the Deluge: A Portrait of Berlin in the 1920s

Before the Deluge: A Portrait of Berlin in the 1920s by Otto Friedrich
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This filled in so many gaps for me. An undergrad college course I took in European history was so dry and dull compared to this enlightening work. It flits between politics and art in a way that puts everything in a psychological context that never slows down. It contains as many references to artists and artistic life - Fritz Lang, Brecht, Dada, as it does to political goings on - Ludendorff, Schleicher, Hindenberg etc., and its very style of writing gives you a sense of wild instability. If most of what you've heard is "things were crazy", and people dumped out wheelbarrows full of money to trade the wheelbarrow, and you are fascinated by the film, literature, and music of the time - this is for you. This book, (from 1972 no less), really gives a sense for what a power vacuum feels like in a very tangible sense, while at the same time, demonstrating how the arts can flourish simultaneously, which raises more avenues of inquiry. Is a power vacuum a source of creativity as well as a political instability? Is a parliamentary system susceptible in ways the American system is not, or vice versa? Neither? Both? I'll be thinking. I found some clarification for some of the themes at the David Bowie Book Club podcast http://www.bowiebookclub.com, which is how I found this book. Easily a favorite history book.

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