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Rudy Koshar
contentious Motor-Kritik, whose editors vociferously touted the advantages of
small, fast cars for a sportier and more technically inclined readership; the glossy
Motor, which appealed to upper-class drivers with expensive tastes; and the gear
head’s bible, the Automobiltechnische Zeitschrift. 15 That this literature could
appeal to audiences beyond the circle of automobile enthusiasts was revealed in
a 1920s English commentator’s claim that German car magazines amounted
to nothing more than “women’s literature” because of their emphasis on entertainment
rather than hard-core technical discussion. 16 Whereas the obvious
implications of this comment for gender history must be left aside in this chapter,
there is little doubt that German car magazines offered information on the whole
panorama of car culture. Readers could find tips on driving, racing accessories,
service and maintenance, tourist routes, insurance, traffic regulations and “speed
traps,” coverage of racing events and automobile shows, automotive clothing and
cosmetics, and vacation gear such as tents, canteens, and sleeping bags. The AAZ
and other publications – like their fascinating counterpart in Britain, Autocar
magazine – also kept up a busy correspondence with readers, who submitted
hundreds of letters to the editors on every possible aspect of automobile usage.
For many, reading such publications was an important part of contemporary leisure
culture and did not entail ownership of an automobile, at least not at first; the
English automotive writer Owen John noted that he was an avid reader of car
magazines before he bought his first automobile. 17
In the 1930s, no subject riveted the attention of German automotive writers
and their readers more than driving on the Autobahns. Although planning for a
limited-access German superhighway devoted exclusively to automotive travel
dated back to before World War I, it was only under Hitler that planning became
reality. After 1933, Germans built almost 4,000 kilometers of new highway,
including some 9,000 bridges. Impressive though this accomplishment was, it fell
short of Hitler’s goal of 7,000 kilometers. Recent scholarship discusses the
propagandistic success of the Autobahn project, the unthinking “passivity” with
which drivers experienced the Autobahn’s many natural landscapes and exciting
banked turns, and the eventual exclusion of Jews and other minorities from “the
Führer’s roads.” 18 One can hardly gainsay the last of these perspectives, particularly
in the light of the publication of Viktor Klemperer’s important memoir of
life under Hitler’s rule. A professor of Romance languages, a secular Jew, and the
husband of a non-Jewish German woman, Klemperer was spared the worst
consequences of Hitler’s politics. But he lived an anxiety-ridden existence shaped
not only by the loss of his profession but also by the innumerable small insults
and persecutions that Nazi racial policy imposed on Jews and others. In 1939, all
Jews were prohibited from operating motor vehicles. But for the preceding three
years, after nervous driving lessons and the purchase of a used Opel, Klemperer
drove a car when and where he could – for trips to the doctor or the store, to be
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