Concept

Weimar culture

Overview

Weimar culture was the emergence of the arts and sciences that happened in Germany during the Weimar Republic, the latter during that part of the interwar period between Germany's defeat in World War I in 1918 and Hitler's rise to power in 1933. 1920s Berlin was at the hectic center of the Weimar culture. Although not part of the Weimar Republic, German-speaking Austria, and particularly Vienna, is also sometimes included as part of Weimar culture.

Germany, and Berlin in particular, was fertile ground for intellectuals, artists, and innovators from many fields during the Weimar Republic years. The social environment was chaotic, and politics were passionate. German university faculties became universally open to Jewish scholars in 1918. Leading Jewish intellectuals on university faculties included physicist Albert Einstein; sociologists Karl Mannheim, Erich Fromm, Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Herbert Marcuse; philosophers Ernst Cassirer and Edmund Husserl; political theorists Arthur Rosenberg and Gustav Meyer; and many others. Nine German citizens were awarded Nobel Prizes during the Weimar Republic, five of whom were Jewish scientists, including two in medicine. Jewish intellectuals and creative professionals were among the prominent figures in many areas of Weimar culture.

With the rise of Nazism and the ascent to power of Adolf Hitler in 1933, many German intellectuals and cultural figures, both Jewish and non-Jewish, fled Germany for the United States, the United Kingdom, and other parts of the world. The intellectuals associated with the Institute for Social Research (also known as the Frankfurt School) fled to the United States and reestablished the Institute at the New School for Social Research in New York City. In the words of Marcus Bullock, Emeritus Professor of English at University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, "Remarkable for the way it emerged from a catastrophe, more remarkable for the way it vanished into a still greater catastrophe, the world of Weimar represents modernism in its most vivid manifestation." The culture of the Weimar period was later reprised by 1960s left-wing intellectuals, especially in France. Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari, and Michel Foucault reprised Wilhelm Reich; Jacques Derrida reprised Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger; Guy Debord and the Situationist International reprised the subversive-revolutionary culture.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

Possible passages

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In Germany, not more than a century ago, a natural instinct for what is called "poetry" was awakened in some young men. Are we to think that the generations who had lived before that time had not spoken of the art, however really strange and unnatural it may have been to them? We know the contrary; that they had thought, written, and quarrelled about it with all their might--in "words, words, words." Giving life to…
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Thoughts Out of Season, Part II
States what Weimar culture is.
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The summer he, for several years, continued still to spend in Jena; to which, especially its beautiful environs, he declared himself particularly attached. His little garden-house was still his place of study during summer; till at last he settled constantly at Weimar. Even then he used frequently to visit Jena; to which there was a fresh attraction in later years, when Goethe chose it for his residence, which, we…
Thomas Carlyle, The Life of Friedrich Schiller Comprehending an Examination of His Works
Close in meaning to Weimar culture; the term itself is not named.
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An important piece of writing, like an important speech, can only be the outgrowth of actual life. The author no more than the man of action can fashion the conditions under which he is born and under which he acts. Each one, even the greatest genius, suffers in some respects from the social and political conditions of his age, just as in other respects he benefits by them. And only from a real nation can a national…
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Goethe's literary essays
Close in meaning to Weimar culture; the term itself is not named.
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Related ideas

Place in the tradition

Part of Philosophical anthropology.

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