The Freest Country in the World

STEPHEN BROCKMANN is Professor of German with courtesy appointments in English and History at Carnegie Mellon University.

[A]n admirable and useful synthesis.

Andreea Ritivoi, William S. Dietrich Professor of English and Department Head, Carnegie Mellon University:
It is hard not to get quite dark in reflecting both on the missed opportunities of the 1989 revolutions, and on the way in which Western nations in a way exploited that moment to further impose a narrative of Western triumphalism. But instead of getting dark, I am inspired by this book to continue to think about promises and hope, and to use works of art and literature to inform how we recover possibilities rather than abandon them to the graveyard of history.

Donna Harsch, Professor of History, Carnegie Mellon University:
The Freest Country in the World is a richly detailed and analytically acute book about 1989-1990 at the time in the GDR and in the memory of that time among both East and West Germans. I learned so much from every chapter: about novels, films, punks, neo-Nazis, the sausage-making of memorials.

Outstanding. . . . This is one of the most exciting books on East Germany that I have read in a long time and should be required reading for all who are interested in East Germany, be they scholar, student, or the general public alike.