336LG-05B-Weimar Germany and Doeblin

Listening Guide for

Lecture 05B: Weimar Politics (Basics) and Doeblin, Berlin Alexanderplatz

• 0:00 General discussion of main issues in Weimar politics.  References to Orlow can be replaced with background readings of Gordon Craig and Voelker Berghahn in their chapters on the Weimar period. All of these issues are covered in those texts. 
• Failure of Last Offensive; end of war. 
• SPD-led Reichstag left to deal with results. 
• German Left split, theoretically, by war, and then afterward.
• Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg
• Harvey Goldberg's incredible lectures on Rosa Luxemburg and the German Revolution (among other topics)
• Doeblin's book: Karl and Rosa
• 
  Rosa Luxemburg giving speech
• Friedrich Ebert [First SPD Chancellor of the Weimar Republic.]
• Two Republics founded, Nov. 9, 1918.
• 
  Declaration of the Republic (Phillip Scheidemann--SPD), 9 November 1918
• 
  Karl Liebknecht pressing for Soviet Republic, late 1918.
• Freikorps active on German streets: multiple images
• Murders of Karl and Rosa 
• 
  Funeral of Karl and Rosa
• 
• Kaethe Kollwitz tribute to Liebknecht
• Weimar Constitution: liberal, modern charter.
• Proportional representation leading to splintering
• Article 48: government by Emergency Decree by Chancellor--precedents for Hitler's assumption of power
• Versailles Treaty
• Economic disaster: hyperinflation [images and charts]
• Paramilitary political organizations: militarization and brutalization of Weimar politics.
• 
  Socialist  Reichsbanner images
• 
  KPD street fighters (1919)
• 
  Early Nazi gathering 
• Book takes place during "Golden Years" of Weimar era: relative economic stabilization due to Dawes and Young Plans--roughly 1924-29.
• 18:30: Start Analysis of Doeblin, Berlin Alexanderplatz. 
• Follow page numbers from here: 1-213.