Guenter Lewy - Jews and Germans

An impressive workcomprehensive and magisterial in its overview and detail. Moreover, having lived these tragic events, Lewy generously shares his personal experience, making this a unique and valuable source book that every informed reader and library must have.

Peter Loewenberg, professor of history at the University of CaliforniaLos Angeles

It is a remarkable and most enviable achievement when a distinguished scholar well on into his tenth decade completes yet another work of scholarship that at least equals and at points surpasses his earlier important work. Everything Lewy explores, he illuminates, bringing serious scholarship, clarity, intellectual balance, careful consideration of even the most controversial of issues, and insights galore to the most complex of relationships: between Germans and Jews.

Michael Berenbaum, professor of Jewish studies at American Jewish University

The Jewish Publication Society expresses its gratitude for the generosity of the following sponsors of this book:

In appreciation of this thorough presentation of the long, often troubled yet distinguished history of Jews in Germany. To honor my mother, Frieda Roberg, and my uncle Wilhelm Marx, who enabled my own perilous escape in 1941. And to memorialize our family members who died in the Holocaust.

Kurt W. Roberg

Guenter Lewy

The Jewish Publication Society | Philadelphia

University of Nebraska Press | Lincoln

2020 by Guenter Lewy

Cover designed by University of Nebraska Press; cover image iStockphoto/RapidEye.

Author photo Matthew Richard Smith.

All rights reserved. Published by the University of Nebraska Press as a Jewish Publication Society book.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Lewy, Guenter, 1923, author.

Title: Jews and Germans: promise, tragedy, and the search for normalcy / Guenter Lewy.

Description: Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: Jews and Germans is the only book in English to delve into the history and challenges of the German-Jewish relationship from before the Holocaust through today. Were the Weimar Republic years (19181933) truly reciprocal for Jews and Germans? Post-Holocaust, how has that complex relationship evolved?Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019053433

ISBN 9780827615038 (hardback)

ISBN 9780827618497 (epub)

ISBN 9780827618503 (mobi)

ISBN 9780827618510 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH : JewsGermanyHistory18001933. | GermanyEthnic relationsHistory18001933. | GermanyPolitics and government18001933. | JewsGermanyPublic opinionHistory18001933.

Classification: LCC DS 134.25 . L 49 2020 | DDC 943/.00492400904dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019053433

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

In der Fremde

Ich hatte einst ein schnes Vaterland.

Der Eichenbaum Wuchs dort so hoch, die Veilchen nickten sanft.

Es war ein Traum.

Das kte mich auf deutsch, und sprach auf deutsch

(Man glaubt es kaum,

Wie gut es klang) das Wort: Ich liebe dich!

Es war ein Traum.

In a Foreign Land

I once had a beautiful fatherland.

The oak

grew there so high, the violets gently nodded.

It was a dream.

It kissed me in German, it spoke in German

(one can hardly believe it,

it sounded so good)