Prussia - Attempt to take stock

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Berlin special postage stamp from 1981

The exhibition Prussia - Attempting a Balance Sheet was presented from August 15 to November 15, 1981 by the Berlin Festival in the Martin-Gropius-Bau . It was the climax of the so-called Prussian exhibition in 1981 , which had a great success without the occasion of an anniversary and thus initiated a paradigm shift in the historical view of Prussia.

prehistory

After the Governing Mayor of Berlin , Dietrich Stobbe , suggested a Prussian exhibition for 1981 in Berlin in June 1977 , the concept and direction of the exhibition were heatedly debated for years. In autumn 1977, the publisher Wolf Jobst Siedler took up the idea in a conversation with a skeptical Helmut Schmidt . A Prussian-Polish exhibition was also debated. But in Poland, which occupies about half of the former Prussian national territory, no one wanted to know about a Prussian heritage. Franz Josef Strauss feared an “ideologically based distortion” of the exhibition. But the signs of a historical renaissance in Prussia were abundantly visible. B. excavated the statues of the Siegesallee and initially only secured. In 1979 Sebastian Haffner noted a bilateral historical deficit in post-war Germany when he came to the conclusion in his book “Prussia without Legends” that “there are certainly still many ex-Prussians in today's German states, some of which are characteristic of their former state sorely miss: in the Federal Republic the strict Prussian order and honesty, in the GDR the dry Prussian liberality and freedom of thought. ”In 1980 the English historian Hannsjoachim W. Koch pointed out in his monograph“ History of Prussia ”that there was agreement that the Prussian state had perished, but by no means what temporal dimension it occupied.

When did Prussia arise?

When did Prussia go under?

Which Prussia are we talking about and what is its inheritance?

Since no agreement could be reached on these questions, Werner Knopp's formula was obtained with a view to the television program that ran in May 1981: Prussia - A process in five negotiations expressed a consensus on what one should not be: The exhibition should not be a “Prussian temple ”, But also not become a“ courtroom ”. Stobbe, on the other hand, endeavored to establish the common historical identity of history in Berlin:

“What devil got me into trying to make Prussia topical again in the four-power city of Berlin? Many people asked critically when my proposal from June 1977 to have a Prussian exhibition held in Berlin triggered a surge of approval. Wasn't that applause from the wrong side? Did I have a Prussian revival in mind? A 'late glory' for the fallen state? Or a 'handle in history' according to the famous Prussian virtues? And was I possibly blind to the alienation that such a proposal could cause, in the West as in the East? […] Prussia is anything but dead. Of course, the state of Prussia no longer exists - it began to perish when the national state of the German Empire was founded; Hitler's perverted nationalism finally put an end to him. But the legacy of Prussia? Doesn't the uncertain and hectic reaction to the proposal of a historical exhibition show that it continues to have an effect? Do we not have to recognize that not only the division of Germany, but also its permanent insurmountability is related to the continued effect of Prussia's European experience? In Berlin, more than anywhere else, the traces of Prussia, both positive and negative, can be sensually experienced. "

- Dietrich Stobbe

Simultaneously with the developments in West Berlin and West Germany, the image of Prussia in the GDR began to change. In November 1980 the equestrian statue of Frederick the Great was re-erected on Unter den Linden . The order came from Erich Honecker , who already referred to Friedrich II as the “great one” in an interview given previously with Robert Maxwell . This was a novelty in the GDR and made people sit up and take notice. In the same year Ingrid Mittenzwei's biography "Friedrich II of Prussia" was published .

“Prussia is part of our past. You only have to go through a few cities in the GDR, especially Berlin and Potsdam, to see this. You can encounter stone witnesses to Prussian history here at every turn. "

- Ingrid Mittenzwei

exhibition

Initially, the exhibition was to take place in the vacant Reichstag building, where the exhibition Questions on German History was already shown. But for those responsible, the proximity to a state office building - in 1971 the four-power agreement on Berlin was concluded, which excluded the Reichstag from meetings of the Bundestag - too conflicted. Therefore, the decision was made to go to the Martin-Gropius-Bau, which was not yet fully completed, directly behind the Wall in East Berlin , where the exhibition "Karl Friedrich Schinkel - Works and Effects" was on view from March 13 to May 17, 1981. The general secretary and actual creator of the exhibition was Gottfried Korff , who was assisted by the Mannheim professor of modern history Manfred Schlenke to advise on scientific issues. Richard von Weizsäcker , who later became President of the Federal Republic of Berlin and has been the Governing Mayor of West Berlin since June 11, 1981, opened the exhibition “Prussia - An Attempt at a Balance Sheet” on August 15. More than 2000 artifacts were displayed in the thirty rooms, which still had the charm of a shell. Loans came from Austria, Switzerland, France, the Netherlands and England. Forty percent of the exhibits were brought together from West Berlin archives and museums or from private collections, such as the Prussian Crown Jewels from Charlottenburg Palace . The Prussian exhibition, which particularly attracted a high influx of visitors from outside the island city, developed into an unexpected huge success with around 450,000 visitors, which took over Berlin for almost its entire duration and initiated numerous accompanying and supplementary events before, during and afterwards. The Kaiserpanorama , the Moses-Mendelssohn-Path and the Kaiserdenkmal with a pedestal were among the crowd pullers. The aim was to show that Prussia "played its part in promoting and inhibiting many developments in German history." Above all, the historical stereotypes of the post-war period were critically questioned by the militaristic spirit of submission and a public debate began about the role of Prussia in German history.

consequences

Looking back, everyone agrees that this exhibition ushered in a turning point in the historical reception of the Prussian state in both German states as a fixed point in the formation of German identity and thus spurred reunification. As a result, numerous publications, films and exhibitions appeared in both states that attempted to redefine the evaluation of the state of Prussia - from their own point of view. B .:

west

  • Lothar Gall Monograph: Bismarck. The white revolutionary. West Berlin 1980.
  • Prussia - A process in five negotiations TV film: ZDF May 1981. In five episodes, the history of Prussia is heard before a fictional TV court.
  • Prussia - attempt to take stock: ZDF: Berlin discussion event "Who 'belongs to the Prussian legacy?" On September 17, 1981 with Klaus von Bismarck , Günter Graß , Wolf Jobst Siedler and Dieter Sauberzweig , the former Senator for Culture in Berlin.
  • From Pomerania to Berlin, exhibition of the Landsmannschaft Pommern in the town hall of Charlottenburg from November 7th to December 6th, 1982
  • Manfred Schlenke Preussen: a historical balance sheet in data and interpretations, Freiburg 1983
  • Exhibition by the Secret State Archives of Prussian Cultural Heritage on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the death of King Friedrich II. West Berlin in 1986.
  • Bismarck TV movie: West Germany 1990

east

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Exhibition catalog

The exhibition catalog was divided into five parts:

  • Volume 1 - Prussia, attempt to take stock, exhibition guide
  • Volume 2 - Prussia, Contributions to a Political Culture
  • Volume 3 - Prussia, on the social history of a state
  • Volume 4 - Prussia, Your Spree-Athens
  • Volume 5 - Prussia in Film

Web links

literature

  • Gottfried Korff (Hrsg.): Prussia - attempt a balance . 5 volumes. Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag, Reinbek near Hamburg 1981.

Individual evidence

  1. Jump up ↑ Neither Temple nor Courtroom, Die Zeit: Jan. 2, 1981
  2. ↑ Historian at York University, Fellow of the Royal Historical Society
  3. ↑ On the topicality of Prussia. In: Prussia - attempt to take stock. Exhibition guide, Hamburg 1981
  4. ↑ Friedrich II. Of Prussia. A biography. Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, Berlin 1980. Pahl – Rugenstein, Cologne 1980, ISBN 3-7609-0512-9 , foreword