rise-and-fall-of-the-third-reich-william-shirer-pdf

LIFE IN THE THIRD REICH: 1933-37 215Music fared best, if only because it was the least political of the arts andbecause the Germans had such a rich store of it from Bach through Beethovenand Mozart to Brahms. But the playing of Mendelssohn was banned because hewas a Jew (the works of all Jewish composers were verboten) as was the musicof Germany’s leading modern composer, Paul Hindemith. Jews were quicklyweeded out of the great symphony orchestras and die opera. Unlike the writers,most of the great figures of the German music world chose to remain in Nazi Germanyand indeed lent their names and their talent to the New Order. WilhelmFurtwaengler, one of the finest conductors of the century, remained. He was outof favor for a year in 1934 because of his defense of Hindemith, but returnedto activity for the remaining years of Hitler’s rule. Richard Strauss, perhapsthe world’s leading living composer, remained and indeed for a time becamepresident of the Reich Music Chamber, lending his great name to Goebbels’prostituting of culture. Walter Gieseking, the eminent pianist, spent much ofhis time making tours in foreign countries which were organized or approved bythe Propaganda Minister to promote German ”culture” abroad. But becausethe musicians did not emigrate and because of Germany’s great treasure of classicalmusic, one could hear during the days of the Third Reich symphony musicand opera performed magnificently. In this the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestraand the Berlin State Opera were pre-eminent. The excellent music fare didmuch to make people forget the degradation of the other arts and of so muchof life under the Nazis.The theater, it must be said, retained much of its excellence as long as itstuck to classical plays. Max Reinhardt, of course, was gone, along with allother Jewish producers, directors and actors. The Nazi playwrights were so ludicrouslybad that the public stayed away from their offerings, which invariablyhad short runs. The president of the Reich Theater Chamber was one HansJohst, an unsuccessful playwright who once had publicly boasted that wheneversomeone mentioned the word ”culture” to him he wanted to reach for hisrevolver. But even Johst and Goebbels, who determined what was played onthe stage and who played and directed it, were unable to prevent the Germantheater from giving commendable and often moving performances of Goethe,Schiller and Shakespeare.Strangely enough, some of Shaw’s plays were permitted to be performed inNazi Germany – perhaps because he poked fun at Englishmen and lampooneddemocracy and perhaps too because his wit and left-wing political views escapedthe Nazi mind.Strangest of all was the case of Germany’s great playwright, Gerhart Hauptmann,Because he had been an ardent Socialist his plays had been banned fromthe imperial theaters during Kaiser Wilhelm II’s time. During the Republic hehad been the most popular playwright in Germany, and indeed he retained thatposition in the Third Reich. His plays continued to be produced. I shall neverforget the scene at the close of the first night of his last play, The Daughterof the Cathedral, when Hauptmann, a venerable figure with his flowing whitehair tumbling down over his black cape, strode out of the theater arm in armwith Dr. Goebbels and Johst. He, like so many other eminent Germans, hadmade his peace with Hitler, and Goebbels, a shrewd man, had made much effectivepropaganda out of it, tirelessly reminding the German people and theoutside world that Germany’s greatest living playwright, a former Socialist andthe champion of the common man, had not only remained in the Third Reich