Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Britain's Take on Germany
Heard the German Ambassador on the radio give an impassioned view of how the British treat the Germans. Made some good points. Britain has done nothing to encourage links between the nations. It reinforces the culture of Hitler “Ask an English person to name a famous German and he would reply Hitler”. He pointed out, quite rightly, that Hitler was an unfortunate part of Germany’s past, things have changed since then. Come to think of it, Britain has an unfortunate history in the slave trade. Speaking of Germany, I was taken by a passage in Isherwood’s Goodbye to Berlin:
There are now good many summer visitors to the village. The bathing beach by the pier, with its array of banners, begins to look like a medieval camp. Each family has its own enormous hooded wicker beach-chair, and each chair flies a little flag. There are the German city flags – Hamburg, Hanover, Dresden, Rostock and Berlin, as well as the National, Republican and Nazi colours. Each chair is encircled by a low sand bulwark which upon have set incriptions to fir cones: Walderruh, Familie Walter, Stahlhelm. Heil Hitler! Many of the forts are also decorated with the Nazi swastika. The other morning I saw a child of about five years old, stark naked, marching along all by himself with a swastika flag over his shoulder singing “Deutschland uber alles”.
There are now good many summer visitors to the village. The bathing beach by the pier, with its array of banners, begins to look like a medieval camp. Each family has its own enormous hooded wicker beach-chair, and each chair flies a little flag. There are the German city flags – Hamburg, Hanover, Dresden, Rostock and Berlin, as well as the National, Republican and Nazi colours. Each chair is encircled by a low sand bulwark which upon have set incriptions to fir cones: Walderruh, Familie Walter, Stahlhelm. Heil Hitler! Many of the forts are also decorated with the Nazi swastika. The other morning I saw a child of about five years old, stark naked, marching along all by himself with a swastika flag over his shoulder singing “Deutschland uber alles”.
