Blackbourn, David

The Conquest of Natur: Water, Landscape and the Making of Modern Germany

London

2006

0224060716

Synopsis (Amazon)
This brilliant new book explores how, over the last 250 years, the German people have shaped their natural environment and how the landscapes they created took a powerful hold on the German imagination. It investigates how the most fundamental element - water - was 'conquered' by draining fens and marshes, straightening the courses of rivers, building high dams and exploiting hydro-electric power. The book begins in the 1740s with Frederick the Great of Prussia, who regarded the reclamation of marshland as 'conquests from barbarism'. We meet Johann Gottfried Tulla, 'the man who tamed the wild Rhine' in the nineteenth century. We learn about the construction of the Prussian port of Wilhelmshaven on the Jade Bay, later to become a symbol of the new Germany's naval ambitions. We witness the colonisation of the moors and the triumph of the steamship. We encounter Otto Intze, 'master dambuilder' of the years around 1900, whose modern marvels supplied drinking water to a fast-growing population and provided hydro-electrical power - 'white coal'. But the dark side of this conquest emerged under the Nazis, who set out to colonise 'living space' in the East. Convinced of their superiority over the 'marsh-dwelling Slavs', the Nazi occupiers of Poland embarked on a programme of population transfer and racial engineering. This physical and ethnic reshaping of the east European landscape would result in the murder of millions of Jews and Poles. Race and reclamation went hand in hand. The modern idea of 'mastery'' over nature always had its critics, whether their motives were aesthetic, religious or environmentalist. Germany's defeat in 1945 brought renewed attachment to an idealised natural landscape. This persisted as a conservative reproach through the ensuing 'economic miracle', which caused major problems of pollution and environmental destruction. It was in the 1970s, however, that protecting the environment became a central part of the West German political agenda and soon began to show results. The collapse of the Wall in 1989 then revealed the catastrophic state of the environment in East Germany, a country that had been in thrall to Soviet-style industrialisation. "The Conquest of Nature" is a groundbreaking study that opens new vistas on the history of Germany. It also shows that while mastery over nature delivers undoubted benefits, it has often come at a tremendous cost to both the natural environment and human life.
This brilliant new book explores how, over the last 250 years, the German people have shaped their natural environment and how the landscapes they created took a powerful hold on the German imagination. It investigates how the most fundamental element - water - was 'conquered' by draining fens and marshes, straightening the courses of rivers, building high dams and exploiting hydro-electric power. The book begins in the 1740s with Frederick the Great of Prussia, who regarded the reclamation of marshland as 'conquests from barbarism'. We meet Johann Gottfried Tulla, 'the man who tamed the wild Rhine' in the nineteenth century. We learn about the construction of the Prussian port of Wilhelmshaven on the Jade Bay, later to become a symbol of the new Germany's naval ambitions. We witness the colonisation of the moors and the triumph of the steamship. We encounter Otto Intze, 'master dambuilder' of the years around 1900, whose modern marvels supplied drinking water to a fast-growing population and provided hydro-electrical power - 'white coal'. But the dark side of this conquest emerged under the Nazis, who set out to colonise 'living space' in the East. Convinced of their superiority over the 'marsh-dwelling Slavs', the Nazi occupiers of Poland embarked on a programme of population transfer and racial engineering. This physical and ethnic reshaping of the east European landscape would result in the murder of millions of Jews and Poles. Race and reclamation went hand in hand. The modern idea of 'mastery'' over nature always had its critics, whether their motives were aesthetic, religious or environmentalist. Germany's defeat in 1945 brought renewed attachment to an idealised natural landscape. This persisted as a conservative reproach through the ensuing 'economic miracle', which caused major problems of pollution and environmental destruction. It was in the 1970s, however, that protecting the environment became a central part of the West German political agenda and soon began to show results. The collapse of the Wall in 1989 then revealed the catastrophic state of the environment in East Germany, a country that had been in thrall to Soviet-style industrialisation. "The Conquest of Nature" is a groundbreaking study that opens new vistas on the history of Germany. It also shows that while mastery over nature delivers undoubted benefits, it has often come at a tremendous cost to both the natural environment and human life.

List of Maps

Acknowledgements

Preface

Introduction: Nature and Landscape in German History

Chapter One: Conquests from Barbarism

A Wilderness of Water and Marsh

The Lords and Masters of Nature

Colonists

Fields of Joy and Abundance

Paradise Lost?

Chapter Two: The Man Who Tamed the Wild Rhine

The Beils of Pfotz Tulla's Plan

Remaking the Upper Rhine Winners and Losers

Chapter Three: Golden Age

The Jade Bay

Colonizing the Moors

The Triumph of the Steamship

Further Victories over the Powers of Nature

Chapter Four: Dam-Building

In the Wonderland of Technology

Otto Intze: 'Grand Master' of German Dams

Flood Protection, Navigation and 'White Coal'

With Mastery of the Water Comes the Opportunity for Conflict

The Impact on Environment and Landscape Drowned Villages, Broken Dams

Chapter Five: Race and Reclamation

A Grey-Dark Wilderness

Race, Reclamation and Genocide

Conservation and Conquest

The Mystique of the Frontier and the 'Wild East'

Indian Wars

Chapter Six: Landscape and Environment in the Post-war Germanys

The Garden of our Hearts: The 'Lost Lands' in the East

The 'Economic Miracle' and the Rise of Ecology

Implementing the Transformation of Nature in Germany

Epilogue: Where It All Began

List of Abbreviations Notes

Bibliography Index