A History of Germany from the Medieval Empire to the Present

Among the various history texts on modern Germany, Diether Raff's book occupies a special place. Conceived during a spell at the Institute for Advanced Foreign Language Study in Beijing, China, it is specially designed for German Studies courses around the world. Its emphasis is on easy comprehensibility, detailed empirical information rather than complex structural analysis, and full coverage of the political, economic and cultural development of German society from the eighteenth-century to the present. In an introductory chapter the author presents a brief survey of the history of the Germans from the very beginning. Reviewers of the German edition have invariably praised the author's superior style which makes the history of this period genuinely come alive for the non-specialist. The volume contains a helpful select bibliography, biographical notes on the major historical figures mentioned in the text, and maps. Teachers as well as students will find the chronologies at the beginning of each chapter, which list the most important dates and events of the period, additionally useful.