The Good Patriot: A Newspaper on a Mission (The 2023 Friends of Germanic Studies Lecture)

Jack Arscott’s talk spirits us back to the Weimar Republic, a period of tantalising possibility in which Germany’s fate was far from sealed and a small but vocal minority of left-wing journalists was busy re-imagining what it meant to be German and dreaming of what the future might hold for their country if it could be persuaded to disavow militarism, revanchism and class hatred once and for all.

Among the most eloquent and impassioned proponents of this left-wing patriotism were the writers of Die Weltbühne, a weekly journal that gave a platform to many of the most combative and mordantly funny political commentators of the era. In his in-depth case study, Arscott anatomises the newspaper’s complex relationship with the German nation and exposes the fallacy that patriotism is, or ever has been, the exclusive preserve of the right wing. Jack Arscott has recently completed his doctoral dissertation at the Institute of Languages, Cultures and Societies, for which he was sponsored by the Friends of Germanic Studies at the ILCS. 

Speakers: Jack Arscott and Godela Weiss-Sussex (ILCS, University of London)

Event date: 10 May 2023