In 1990, a country disappeared. When the Iron Curtain fell, East Germany ceased to be. For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp of a new millennium, the German Democratic Republic presented a radically different Germany than what had come before and what exists today. Socialist solidarity, secret police, central planning, barbed wire: this was a Germany forged on the fault lines of ideology and geopolitics. This is a fascinating history of the DDR, with perspectives that were new to me despite having read a lot about the country’s history. The author focuses often on the personalities and personal experiences of both the powerful and ordinary citizens to show why they acted as they did. I particularly appreciated the more nuanced view of how ordinary citizens felt about their country, the difference in social welfare policies between the DDR and West Germany, and why reunification wasn’t a wholly positive step for East Germans.

Beyond the Wall” adds depth to caricatures of East Germany “Beyond the Wall” adds depth to caricatures of East Germany

Barber, Tony (2021-01-18). "Blood and Iron by Katja Hoyer — conflicted Germany". Financial Times . Retrieved 2023-06-29. a b Conradi, Peter (2023-06-03). "Katja Hoyer tried to tell a different story about East Germany. Now Germans are furious". The Times. ISSN 0140-0460 . Retrieved 2023-06-03. The 1920s - Philosophy's Golden Age Wittgenstein changed his mind, Heidegger revolutionised philosophy (and the German language), and both the Frankfurt School and the Vienna Circle were in full swing. Matthew Sweet is joined by Wolfram Eilenberger, David Edmonds and Esther Leslie. Plus, a report on the plight of the Lukacs Archive in Budapest https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000q380 That says it all. The dull, grey, managed economy of the East could never compete with the free market liberalism of the West. But, amazingly, the communists who governed East Germany from 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990 remained convinced that a socialist state could succeed. Their stubborn commitment to the communist fantasy persisted until the end, despite by the late 1980s only being able to keep the State financial by borrowing heavily from Western financiers.

The acclaim for this in Britain astounds me. It is, at best, a competent popular history – but groundbreaking scholarship this emphatically is not.

Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990 - Goodreads

German historian and English resident Katja Hoyer's 2023 history of East Germany (Beyond the Wall) is a sympathetic history of the people of the communist totalitarian state of East Germany, which collapsed spectacularly on the night of 9 November 1989, when guards on the Berlin Wall gave up trying to prevent people from walking into West Berlin. You may change or cancel your subscription or trial at any time online. Simply log into Settings & Account and select "Cancel" on the right-hand side. This book is an excellent, very readable history of the German Democratic Republic, written with that view towards style and readability that is so characteristic of British historians (I was reminded of David Priestland's The Red Flag). a b Jeffries, Stuart (29 March 2023). "Beyond the Wall by Katja Hoyer review – overturning cliches of East Germany". The Guardian . Retrieved 25 July 2023.The reunification of Germany on October 3 1990 ended 41 years of division between the democratic West (FRG) and the communist East (GDR). But while West German lives “continued as before,” writes Katja Hoyer, for East Germans reunification “triggered a wave of change whose force, direction and pace were uncontrollable. It was sink or swim.” I would have loved to have read a deeper analysis of the East German alcohol industry, and what role it played.

Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990 eBook : Hoyer, Katja Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990 eBook : Hoyer, Katja

Hoyer argues Germany’s formal division into two separate states in 1949 hadn’t always been inevitable. Initially, Stalin aimed to keep Germany unified and neutral. However, Moscow eventually deemed it necessary to establish a socialist state in East Germany as a buffer between the capitalist West and the socialist East. Indeed w hile the West was rebuilding and forming a partnership with the UK and Americans after World War Two, the Soviet Zone’s gradual nationalisation of the economy made establishing a separate socialist state increasingly desirable to the Russians. David, Saul (2023-03-20). "Willkommen to the GDR! A warts-and-all history of East Germany". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235 . Retrieved 2023-06-03.Hoyer animates the story of the people of the East by beginning each chapter with an anecdotal snapshot of a personal event that replicates on an individual level broader political and social developments. Otherwise, her account follows a standard historical chronology of the East. It starts with post-war establishment in the late 1940s, and records the struggle to establish a working economy and society in the 1950s and '60s. Mikanowski, Jacob (2023-04-02). "Beyond the Wall by Katja Hoyer review – the human face of the socialist state". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712 . Retrieved 2023-06-03. But, in “Beyond the Wall,” the German historian Katja Hoyer claims that when it comes to the former East German state this characterisation is not the whole story. Ever since German reunification in 1990, inhabitants of the former West German Federal Republic have exhibited a patronising (at best) attitude towards ‘the Osties’, sneering at their obsolete Marxist state, and dismissing their experiences under that state in such a way that the GDR - and the lives of those who grew up under it - have been “written out of the national narrative”. In writing this book about the origins and history of the East German state, Katja Hoyer says her intention is to show that the GDR was “never a passive Soviet satellite” but was instead a distinct political entity with its own “economic, social, and cultural idiosyncrasies”. Hoyer maintains that the GDR “deserves a history that treats it as more than a walled ‘Stasiland’ and gives it its proper place in German history”. Katja Hoyer is a German-British historian, journalist and the author of the widely acclaimed Blood and Iron. A visiting Research Fellow at King’s College London and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, she is a columnist for the Washington Post and hosts the podcast The New Germany together with Oliver Moody. She was born in East Germany and is now based in the UK.

Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990 by Katja Hoyer Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990 by Katja Hoyer

East Germany's socialist founders certainly had it tough when young. They had been persecuted by the Nazis before the war, and those that survived and fled to the USSR were soon caught up in the deadly Stalin Terror of the late 1930s. Amazingly, incredibly, their Marxist convictions remained firm. The iconic development in East Germany was of course the erection of the infamous Wall in 1961. What the east government Orwellianly termed the 'anti-fascist protection barrier' was in fact necessitated by the substantial leakage of key personnel from the East. By the time of the Wall's construction, over 300,000 highly credentialed doctors, lawyers, architects and engineers were emigrating to the West each year, to escape repression and earn reasonable incomes. Brilliant. Hoyer is a historian of immense ability. Exhaustively researched, cleverly constructed, and beautifully written, this much-needed history of the GDR should be required reading across her homeland. Five stars.” Superb, totally fascinating, and compelling, Hoyer’s first full history of East Germany’s rise and fall is a work of revelatory original research—and a gripping read with a brilliant cast of characters.Essential reading.” Insofern sehe ich in „Diesseits der Mauer“ vor allem eine vertane Chance. Ein an sich interessante Buch-Idee, nämlich die DDR-Geschichte aus der Perspektive des Alltagslebens ihrer Bürger nachzuerzählen, scheitert tragisch an der fehlenden geschichtspolitischen Redlichkeit und der ausbleibenden Bereitschaft zur analytischen Tiefe ihrer AutorinA colorful and often revelatory re-appraisal of one of modern history’s most fascinating political curiosities. Hoyer skilfully weaves diverse political and private lives together, from the communist elite to ordinary East Germans.”