1. Marx, Karl, “The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte,” in Feuer, L. S., ed., Basic Writings on Politics and Philosophy—Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (Garden City, NY, 1959), 320.Google Scholar

2. Jäckel, Hartmut, “Unser schiefes DDR-Bild,” Deutschland Archiv, 10 (1990): 1559–60.Google Scholar

3. Among the better studies are Heydemann, Günter, Geschichtwissenschaft im geteilten Deutschland (Frankfurt a.M., 1980);Google ScholarDorpalen, Andreas, German History on Marxist Perspective: The East German Approach (Detroit, 1988);Google ScholarFischer, Alexander and Heydemann, Günter, eds., Geschichtswissenschaft in der DDR, 2 vols, (Berlin, 1990);Google Scholar and Brinks, Jan Herman, Die DDR-Geschichtswissenschaft auf dem Weg zur deutschen Einheit (Frankfurt a.M., 1992).Google Scholar

4. See Riesenberger, Dieter, Geschichte und Geschichtsunterricht in der DDR (Göttingen, 1973);Google ScholarReuter, Frank, Geschichtsbewusstsein in der DDR. Programm und Aktion (Cologne, 1973);Google ScholarWolf, Hans-Georg, Zur Entwicklung des Geschichtsunterrichts in der DDR (Paderborn, 1978);Google ScholarSchmid, Hans-Dieter, Geschichtsunterricht in der DDR. Eine Einführung (Stuttgart, 1979);Google ScholarSchmitt, Karl, Politische Erziehung in der DDR (Paderborn, 1980).Google Scholar On some of the results of this education, see Borries, Bodo von, Kindlich jugendliche Geschichtsverabeitung in West- und Ostdeutschland (Pfaffenweiler, 1990).Google Scholar

5. “Geschichtsbewusstsein,” in Kleines politisches Wörterbuch (East Berlin, 1988), 319.Google Scholar

6. Malinowski, Bronislaw, “Myth in Primitive Psychology,’ in Magic, Science and Religion and Other Essays (Glencoe, IL, 1948), 78–79.Google Scholar The modern perception of myth began with Nietzsche in his Birth of Tragedy. See “Die Geburt det Tragödie,” in Nietzsche, Friedrich, Das Hauptwerk, vol. 3 (Munich, 1990), 514–20.Google Scholar See also Cassirer, Ernst, The Myth of the State (New York, 1946),Google Scholar and Eliade, Mircea, Aspects du Mythe (Paris, 1963).Google Scholar On the relationship between myth and history see Lessing, Theodor, Geschichte als Sinngebung des Sinnlosen (Hamburg, 1962)Google Scholar and Mali, Joseph, “Jacob Burckhardt: Myth, History and Mythistory,” History and Memory 3 (Spring, 1991).Google Scholar On myth and identification, see among others Hobsbawm, Eric, ed., The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge, 1983);Google ScholarWilentz, Sean, ed., Rites of Power: Symbolism, Ritual and Politics since the Middle Ages (Philadelphia, 1985);Google Scholar and Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities, rev. ed. (London, 1991).Google Scholar

7. The best summary of the historians' debate in English is Maier, Charles S., The Unmasterable Past (Cambridge, 1988). A detailed comparison of East and West German myth-building, as valuable as it would be, goes far beyond the parameters of this essay.Google Scholar

8. See Iggers, Georg G., ed., Marxist Historiography in Transition; East German Social History in the 1980s (New York, 1991).Google Scholar

9. On the question of legitimation, see Krisch, Henry, “Political Legitimation in the GDR,” in Rigby, T. H. and Feher, Ferenc, eds., Political Legitimation in Communist States (New York, 1982), 112.Google Scholar See also Meuschel, Sigrid, Legitimation und Parteiherrschaft: Zum Paradox von Stabilität und Revolution in der DDR 1945–1989 (Frankfute a.M., 1992). esp. 229–41.Google Scholar

10. On nationalism and “hegemony” among ruling elites, cf. Eley, Geoff, Reshaping the German Right: Radical Nationalism and Political Change After Bismarck (New Haven, 1980).Google Scholar

11. “Tourismus”; in Zimmermann, Hartmut, ed., DDR-Handbuch (Cologne, 1985), 480.Google Scholar

12. Buxhoeveden, Christina von, Geschichtswissenschaft und Politik in der DDR. Das Problem der Periodisierung (Cologne, 1980), 15.Google Scholar

13. Protokoll des VII. Weltkongresses der Kommunistischen Internationale, 2 vols., reptint (Erlangen, 1974);Google ScholarBecher, Johannes R., “Zur Frage der politisch-moralischen Vernichtung des Faschismus,” in idem, Gesammelte Werke, vol. 16 (East Berlin, 1978), 406.Google Scholar

14. “Manifest zur Goethe-Feier der Nation,” in Dokumente der SED, vol. 2, (East Berlin, 1952), 332–34.Google Scholar The SED asserted that Bach was in fact a progressive and folkloristic musician who forced by the clergy to write church music, and whose true greatness lay in his “secularization” of religious music through his incorporation of folk melodies, See “Nationales Bekenntnis zu Bach, ” in ibid., 464–67; see also the Bach file in the Institut für Geschichte der Arbeiterbewegung, Zentrales Parteiarchiv (IfGA ZPA), IV 2/906/70. The Soviet-inspired campaign against “formalism” was directed against abstract literature, music, and art. Formalism “leads to the uprooting of national culture, the destruction of national consciousness, promotes cosmopolitanism and thus means a direct support of the war policy of American imperialism.” “Der Kampf gegen Formalismus on Kunst und Literatur, für eine fortschrittliche deutsche Kultur,” in ibid., vol. 3 (East Berlin, 1953), 434–35.

15. “Zum 125. Todestag Ludwing van Beethovens am 26. März 1952,”; in ibid., 756–57.

16. Abusch, Alexander, Irrweg einer Nation, 2nd ed. (East Berlin, 1949), 232.Google Scholar

17. On the treatment of historical landmarks in Berlin during this period, see Flierl, Bruno, “Vom Münzen turm zum Fernsehturm, Höhendominanten in der Stadtplanung von Berlin”, in Karl-Heinz, Klingenburg, ed., Studien zur Berliner Kunstgeschichte (Leipzig, 1986), 32–41;Google ScholarZuchold, Gerd-H., “Der Abriss der Ruinen des Stadtschlosses und der Bauakademie in Ost-Berlin,” Deutschland Archiv 2 (1985): 178–207;Google Scholar and Winters, Peter Jochen, “Wiederaufbau in Ost-Berlin”, Deutschland Archiv 12 (1985): 1304–19.Google Scholar

18. On the Buchenwald camp and the 1945 uprising, see Leibbrand, Robert, Buchenwald. Ein Tatsachenbericht (Stuttgart, 1945);Google Scholar and Bartel, Walter et al. , eds., Buchenwald. Mahnung und Verpflichtung. Berichte und Dokumente (Frankfurt a.M., 1960).Google Scholar On the monument itself, see Koch, H., “National Mahn- und Gedenkstätte Buchenwald. Geschichte ihrer Entstehung,” Buchenwald 31 (Weimar-Buchenwald, 1988);Google ScholarFrank, V., Antifaschistische Mahnmale in der DDR (Leipzing, 1970).Google Scholar For a fascinating exposé of the tense relations between resistsance fighters and the SED, and an explanation of the ambiguity of the Buchenwald monument's symbolism, see Rosenhaft, Eve, “The Legacy of Communist Resistance in the GDR”, in Nicosia, Francies R. and Stokes, Laurence D., eds., Germans against Nazism: Resistance in the Third Reich (New York, 1990), 369–88.Google Scholar A key book for understanding the role of monumental architecture and myth-building in modern Germany is Mosse's, GeorgeThe Nationalization of the Masses: Political Symbolism and Mass Movements from the Napoleonic Wars through the Third Reich (New York, 1975.)Google Scholar

19. That the antifascist myth was Partially successful is evidenced by a series of surveys carried out by the SED's Institut für Meinungsforschung among workers, soldiers, and FDJ members during an intense propaganda campaign for socialist “Wehrerziehung” (paramilitary training) in the late 1960s and early 1970s. While questionable in methodological terms, these surveys nevertheless showed that while most East Germans still felt that the Federal Republic was stronger economically and militarily, a majority agreed with the proposition that nothing connected them to the imperialist FRG and everything connected them to the socialist and antifascist GDR. IfGA, ZPA IV B2/2.028/16.Google Scholar

20. Hermann Weber has pointed out that more German politburo members were killed by Stalin's NKVD than by Hitlers's Gestapo. Weber, Hermann, “Kommunistischer Widerstand gegen die Hitler-Diktatur 1933–1939,” Beiträge zum Widerstand 1933–1945 33 (1988): 17.Google Scholar

21. See, among others, Overesch, Manfred, “Thüringen 1945—Das Ende der antifaschistischen Gründunglegende in der SBZ/DDR,” Deutsche Studien (December 1990): 348–59;Google Scholar and Grunenberg, Antonia, “Antifaschismus—Ein deutscher Mythos,” Die Zeit 18 (1991): 15.Google Scholar

22. On street names, see Azaryahu, Maoz, Vom Wilhelmplatz zum Thälmannplatz. Politische Symbole im öffentlichen Leben der DDR (Gerlingen, 1991), esp. 63–76.Google Scholar

23. Jarausch, Konard R., “Das Versagen des ostdeutschen Antifaschismus. Paradoxien von Wissenschaft als Politik,” Initial 2 (1991): 114.Google Scholar

24. On the quasi-religious nature of “tradition cabinets”: Flierl, Thomas, “Das antifaschistische Traditionkabinett als ideologischer Staatsapparat”, in idem, ed., Mythos Antifaschismus. Ein Traditionskabinett wird kommentiert (Berlin, 1992), 12–24.Google Scholar

25. Kopp, Anatole, L'architecture de la periode stalinienne (Grenoble, 1978).Google Scholar

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27. On the “Schlageter course” see Wippermann, Wolfgang, Faschismustheorien, 5th ed. (Darmstadt, 1989), 15–16.Google Scholar One history book actually admits the Communists' debt to the Nazis on this point, although in very, very cautious terms. See Haase, Horst et al. , eds., Die SED und das kulturelle Erbe (East Berlin, 1986), 25–26.Google Scholar On the Soviet use of nationalist historiography, see Mehnert, Klaus, Weltrevolution durch Weltgeschichte. Die Geschichtslehre des Stalinismus (Stuttgart, 1953);Google Scholar Georgi Verbeeck, “Kontinuität und Wandel im DDR Geschichtsbild”, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschehen (9 March 1990): 32–33. On Nazi uses of the past, see Blackburn, Gilmer W., Education in the Third Reich: Race and History in Nazim Textbooks (Albany, 1985).Google Scholar

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29. Harald, Müller, ed., Blücher Der Held des Volksheeres (East Berlin, 1954);Google ScholarFabian, Franz, Clausewitz. Sein Leben und Werk (East Berlin, 1957);Google ScholarStern, Leo, Martin Luther und Philipp Melanchthon (East Berlin, 1953);Google ScholarSchulz, Robert, F. L. John. Ein Patriot unseres Volkes (East Berlin, 1953);Google ScholarScurla, Herbert, Ernst Moritz Arndt. Der Vorkäapfer für Einheit und Demokratie (East Berlin, 1952);Google ScholarKuczynski, Jürgen, Scharnhorst. Ein General des Fortschritts (East Berlin, 1953).Google Scholar

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31. On military uniforms and traditions, see Forster, Thomas M., Die NVA (Cologne, 1979), 30, 284–96.Google Scholar

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51. The pro-Chinese campaign began with the GDR's heavy press coverage of the Tienanmen “counterrevolution” in June 1989. From then until 9 Novemebr scarcely a day passed without full front-page coverage of joint government communiques, youth delegation visits, Chinese film festivals, etc. The campaign culminated in the GDR's first ever celebration of the Chinese Revolution in October.Google Scholar

52. The Politburo's detachment was obvious, as was the sad performance of most Western journalists and political scientists throughout the 1980s. But even the “Stasi” secret police held on to its mythic worldview until the very end. For example, according to former GDR state secretary Alexander Schalck-Golodkowski, Stasi boss Erich Mielke did not crush the GDR opposition in 1989 because he was convinced that the Soviet Union would come to the GDR's rescue. Berliner Zeitung, 4 April 1990. Furthermore, recent studies have shown that while the Stasi was aware of neo-Nazi activity in the GDR, it believed so strongly that the GDR was an antifascist state that it could never admit that this problem—or any other sign of discontent—was homemade and not imported from the West. See Walter Süss, “Was wusste die Stasi über die Neonazis in der DDR?” Die Zeit, 30 April 1993.Google Scholar

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54. See Weber, Hermann, “Abstruse Legenden beschwören das Bild einer heilen DDR”, Berliner Zeitung, 16/17 Novemebr 1991.Google Scholar