On Overgrown Path Gets Caught In A Thicket

Today, Pliable linked to one of his fascinating old posts about Furtwängler's programming while at the helm of the Berlin Philarhmonic. It is well worth reading, and Pliable knows it, as he's reposted it twice, not counting the link today.

Sensitive as he is to the plight of Germany under the Nazis, he does make a dreadful misstatement at the outset:

Remember that Hitler was not a democratically elected leader, and many of those, musicians and others, trapped in the beleagured city were not rabid Nazis. Like those in the Twin Towers, New Orleans and the London Underground history dictated that many were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. The predicament faced by the performing arts in the 21st century palls into insignificance compared with the conditions that the inhabitants, and musicians, of Berlin faced in the final months of the war.

Hitler most certainly was a democratically elected leader, every bit as much as he wasn't. What Pliable means is that he was not set atop Germany by a majority vote, like Reagan trouncing Mondale in '84.

However, his toehold on power came through massive gains in the electorate. Had he not come in 2nd in the March Presidential election, he would have had less of a claim to the chancellorship. Had the Nazi Party not won a plurality in the July elections, his claim would have weakened still.

In March, there were 800,000 Nazi party members. By July, 14 million Germans had voted for the Nazi party. That is an extraordinary political gain, and it is the foundation for the rest of Hitler's advance towards tyrrany.

Without such electoral support, Hitler would've gotten nowhere. So, while it's technically true that he did not ascend to the head of state on the wings of a massive electoral victory, he would not have attained such power without several smaller ones. If we're to use this period of German history as a cautionary tale, it doesn't do much good to gloss over the most important bits with wishful thinking.

Hitler at Bayreuth

Pat Buchanan's new book is a real wealth of information. He is extraordinarily well-read. The book puts the lie to the notion that Churchill was the Great Man of the Century, and to a lesser extent, the notion that Hitler had plotted out his course to WWII.

Again and again, Buchanan points out how Hitler bumbled into one fiasco after another, but had the political awareness to know when he was in grave danger. One of the biggest challenges he faced was when the Austrian Nazis assassinated Engelbert Dollfuss on July 25, 1934. Hitler was busy building on the precarious relationship he had with Mussolini, and he knew the preemptive coup could seriously screw the pooch for him in Italy, which saw Austria as a buffer state. Hitler had assured Mussolini that he would respect Austrian sovereignty, and an assassination of the Austrian dictator by his own political party was the last thing he needed.

One of the fascinating bits of information that emerges in the book is where Hitler learned of the coup:

"Whether Hitler knew it was coming remains in dispute. But when word reached him at the Bayreuth Festival in Munich that Dollfuss had died at 6 P.M, that the putsch had been quelled, and that the Nazi assassins were under arrest, Hitler was alarmed. Given the Austrian Nazi hand in the coup, Mussolini might well conclude that Hitler had lied to him.

Late that night, at the home of Wagner's widow, Cosima, who had died in 1930, Hitler appeared nervous. He phoned Berlin, only to be told that the German ambassador in Vienna was negotiating for safe passage for the Nazi assassins out of Austria. Hitler shouted with rage, he countermanded Berlin's orders, fired his ambassador in Vienna, and demanded that Franz von Papen, under house arrest since he had narrowly escaped Nazi death squads in the Roehm purge, be flown to Munich. Papen had befriended Dollfuss and warned Hitler about the Austrian Nazis.

Papen found Hitler in a 'state of hysterical agitation, denouncing feverishly the rashness and stupidity of the Austrian Nazi Party for having involved him in such an appalling situation.'

'We are faced with a new Sarajevo!' Hitler shouted.

Sibelius & Swastikas

Sibelius (right) at his 70th Birthday Gala
Jessica Duchen penned a lovely little ode to Sibelius in today's Independent. She recaps the case for ranking Sibelius' among the greats, ostensibly "to restore Sibelius to his rightful status".

What could possibly affect his status (aside from the usual garden-variety musical snobbery)?

Nazi admiration, of course. Because the Germans gave him some medal and Adorno subsequently lumped the Finn in with the Fascists, apparently there's a taint on Sibelius.

Rehabilitating composers from their Nazi connections has become quite the cottage industry, and whether it's Soho the Dog wringing his hands over Webern or Dieter Borchmeyer deconstructing Wagner, even the slightest connection to the Third Reich in a composer's legacy inevitably leads to an overreaction.

As Mike Godwin pointed out almost 20 years ago, when any discussion can't free itself of the Nazi issue, it's probably outlived its usefulness. Hitler liked a lot of stuff, from stuffed squab to Siegfried. That shouldn't stop anyone from enjoying either.