Katja Hoyer: What Was East Germany Really Like? (Bristol Ideas)

When the Berlin Wall fell in 1990, East Germany ceased to exist.
For over 40 years, the GDR had built and developed its own identity, underpinned by socialist ideology. Historian and journalist Katja Hoyer - just four years old when her birthplace, East Germany, disappeared overnight - peels back the Iron Curtain to offer a new vision of the East Germany we think we know and understand. While the stories we remember and have ultimately ended up shaping our impressions of East Germany are those of oppression and hardship, this took place against the backdrop of stability that most people there craved for after many decades of crises and war, with improved housing, access to education, work and care, growing access to consumer goods including Levi jeans; and culture.
The state catered to citizens’ needs, while also subjecting them to constant state surveillance and the enduring threat of the Stasi secret police. In her new book, Beyond the Walls: East Germany, 1949-1990, Hoyer draws on interviews, letters, and records to present a different history of East Germany which explores these many paradoxes. Hoyer argues that East Germany was a place more dynamic than the portrayals and caricatures painted by the West, and perhaps we need to re-evaluate some of the ‘truths’ we think we know about East Germany.
In this discussion with Festival of the Future City director Andrew Kelly, Hoyer looks at, amongst others: the history of East Germany and West Germany; German communists often tragic relationship with the Soviet Union with the rise of Nazism; the Stalinist past of East German leaders; how East Germany grew from 1949; the attempts to stop people leaving and the erection of the Berlin Wall; and the eventual collapse of the GDR and what followed.
Katja Hoyer's Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990: uk.bookshop.org/a/11279/97802...
Presented by Bristol Ideas: www.bristolideas.co.uk

[@mrrol5212]

Have her book 'Beyond the Wall', and i can say it is well written and researched and fascinating! Well done Katja!

[@eliseleonard3477]

This was so fascinating. So often, discussions about E Germany are unrelentingly bleak. It was so interesting to get a glimpse of what the original idea must have been in those new-built apartments with communal spaces and mixing of class/educational background.

[@johntamlyn6383]

Absolutely fascinating, could listen to Katya endlessly!

[@acer9184]

Good interview 👍

[@johnbaugh2437]

Very enjoyable!

[@deichhund]

Great interview, but I don't quite agree with this statement. „… but the focus was never on the genocide of Jews that was never on the Holocaust it was always on the socialists …“ The genocide was discussed a lot, there were books and films that explicitly dealt with the fate of Jews and other marginalized groups, e.g. "Sterne" (movie), "Jakob der Lügner" (book, movie). Anne Frank's diary was of course well known, as were the many films and photographs documenting the Holocaust. In any case, as a child I was very strongly affected by the cruel fate of the Jews in Germany; the fact that political opponents were persecuted seemed more logical and less arbitrary to me. However, I didn't learn as much about the persecution of gays and I only found out much later that there was also anti-Semitism in the GDR.

[@klauskinski5969]

well in contrast to the west that only focussed on jews, the east focussed on all victims. ppl seem to forget that bolsheviks where a target of nazi germany too. jews where just a subgroup of it. and in contrast to the rest the socialists and communists tried to fight hitler from the start. how bad she understands the situation gets clear, when she denies that capitalism always turns into facsism.

[@TheRichardSpearman]

A revealing interview. Not mentioned (it never is) is the fact that after 1945 three countries were divided, Germany, Korea and Vietnam. The USA had a role in all three cases.

[@capitalist4life]

USSR had a role too…

[@Dutch_Uncle]

Austria was also divided. Remember "The Third Man."

[@klauskinski5969]

@@capitalist4life lol ussr wanted a united but demilitarized germany. usa allowed electings in korea and vietnam and as soon it was clear who wins blocked it and supported dictators.

[@petebondurant58]

So did the USSR.

[@petebondurant58]

@TheRichardSpearman So did the Soviet Union.

[@holgerlinke98]

Good but i found some stuff very odd, like the part where she mentions prussia, i mean prussia surely was used by the GDR but despised and the memory on Prussia and the other lost lands actively destroyed. The strange contradictions of the GDR could have been pointed out to larger degree.

[@rosalindalay4499]

My mother used to speak of Prussia very much..she said she was from East Prussia

[@jurgenrudiger]

It’s a completely different place. It’s divided between Russia and Poland now

[@NewsHistorian]

Prisons have security and cheap rent too. Yeesh.

[@garypowell1540]

This is a perfectly true story and I hope interesting one, so please try to read it all. What is perhaps not so well known is that not just fascists existed in East Germany but very real Nazis. You know the whole 10 yards. There were groups of young Nazis in every East German college including the very top ones in Berlin. I know because I met with around 20 of them shortly after the wall fell in 1994-95. They were extremely polite and welcoming and could all speak perfect English, but avoided doing so if at all possible. I met them through an X girlfriend of their top leader who was a concert pianist in the Berlin Youth Orchestra and his X girlfriend was a clarinetist in the same. I lost contact with them shortly afterward, for reasons that will become self-evident. When I first met them they were playing what they called party games. These were like intellectual circle jerks, where they all strived to outdo each other with their mathematical or knowledge-based prowess. Not something that was ever done at English Universities, not to my knowledge anyway, we were all far too stoned for that sort of thing. After this and they all having a great laugh at my massively inadequate German, all of the guys earnestly gathered around a large oak table in the center of the apartment. A large detailed map was rolled out and they began planning something using markers. It took me some time to work out exactly what they were doing while I sat in the corner sipping my flat East German lemonade with the incredibly attractive blond girls. Eventually, I got the gist of what they were doing. This was because "Töte die türkischen Schweinehunde," I could understand even with my highly limited command of the German language. They were meticulously planning attacks on Turkish immigrant workers during a visit from the Turkish head of state. This was just before the announcement of the venue for the next Olympic games, which went to Sydney. The Brandenberg gate area was all set up to celebrate Berlin getting them, so it was all a bit of an anticlimax that weekend. I don't personally go in for beating people up so politely decided not to participate, not that any of them seriously expected me to, I am sure. These were just the leaders, none of them personally got up to any violence themselves to my knowledge, they left that sort of grubby thing to others as these kinds always do. She took me to some other very strange places that weekend that still existed in many parts of East Berlin at that time. I still have a video of my few days there. Many of the streets were still cobbled and many of the buildings were still covered in bullet holes. She took me to Potsdamer and several large bomb sites that looked very dystopian indeed. These were decorated with very weird satanic-looking graffiti and artistic constructions made from pieces of scrap metal and parts of Russian or German military equipment. One of them even had a bar, and was clearly where many East German youth liked to spend a romantic evening with friends. I could go into some of this young lady's sexual preferences, but it is best, I don't do so. I imagine that she wanted to show me these kinds of places as she had no doubt that they were soon going to be demolished by those 'nasty' West Germans. She did take the time to explain to me that he had dumped her because she was not so keen on some of his political leanings. However, to me, there was still a Nazi in there somewhere and this Germanic archetype combined with a communist atheist indoctrination had done none of them any good. She seemed to have little understanding of how Western minds thought by then. She could not understand that the vast majority of Westerners had long since forgotten and forgiven the Germans and moved on, even British Jews were all but over it by then. She and her friends reminded me that we may have gotten over it, but they had not, as East German youth had not been allowed to forget it or forgive themselves. It was very clear to me that even 4 years after the wall had fallen much of East Germany had not changed at all, very much including many East Germans. None of these particular young Germans were at all happy about the fall of the Wall, quite the contrary they were pissed right off. They seemed worried about their future prospects having once been part of the elite of East German youth. I reassured them that they had nothing to worry about and would likely end up becoming ministers or even Chancellors one day with such a work ethic, smart dress sense, high intelligence, socialist leanings, obvious talent, and self-discipline. I met up with this girl 20 years later when she visited London. I still don't understand what she saw in me especially as I was 15 years older than her and Jewish, but what can I say she must have liked something about me? She had gone on to become a music teacher like her mother. Not surprisingly her X boyfriend went on to become an MP for the German Green Party in 2002. You can't keep a 'good' Nazi down, it seems.

[@andreakoch7689]

hello gary. thanks for sharing your very own, exotic and personal berlin story of the 1990's. i bet you had a wonderful learning experience and loads of adventures in the crazy place berlin was in the first years after the fall of the wall which will stay with you for the rest of your life. things have moved on meanwhile and you can be happy to have seen places which are now long gone or have changed beyond recognition. - by the way, i like the end of your story. and the smart english sense of humour with which you close your story...

[@garypowell1540]

@@andreakoch7689 Very much so although I could write an entire book about my many 'exotic' experiences in many parts of the world. I had a glorious ten years between marriages packing in an incredible amount at that time in one's life when a man could be said to be at his prime. I am still paying the price but you can't have your cake and eat it, as they say. Young women seem to go a bit crazy when they meet an older and more experienced man. They seem to greatly appreciate the extra maturity they hardly ever find in a man of a similar age. Someone who actually bothers to listen to what they say and responds appropriately even if they don't like it, which is more often than not. Intelligent women must find males of their own age and intelligence incredibly arrogant and frustrating. I greatly sympathize with their problem. I am sure I was no better when I was 19. When I traveled in those days a woman invariably became part of the story sometimes before I even left the airport and once before I left the aircraft. The latter was a Russian Tennis Coach traveling with a Russian Mafia Family to Mauritius, another interesting one. Whatever hormones they had been giving her when young had some interesting effects on her body and libido. 28 years old with the body of a 14-year-old, that went like an overheated steam train with no breaks or the slightest desire to ever use them. East Berlin was like a Dystopian Hollywood Movie at that time, it was like the war had only ended a few years previously. They were still selling Russian and German war memorabilia in the street markets and driving Trabants. You could taste the pollution eating away at your nostrils. I failed to mention we also visited the Sachsenhausen concentration camp which was an unforgettable experience. Yep, I used to let myself in for it back then. I spent most of the 3 hours with tears in my eyes but it was worth the visit. It was constructed in the middle of one of the nicest and most affluent parts of Berlin. Large middle-class houses on tree-lined roads. Then you arrive at the entrance of what could be a large state school, walk through the unassuming entrance, and arrive in hell. The birds singing in the trees and the sun shining in the sky, but hell all the same. It is difficult to imagine how the local residents at the time could not have known what was going on only a few yards away, but if they insisted, I would not call them liars. Human beings are like this. Their innate capacity to ignore what they subconsciously wish to ignore is legendary and is happening today every bit as much if not more as it was then. We ignored the worst possible horrors then and we are ignoring them now, nothing ever really changes. Human beings are notoriously awful at living in the real world. They can't even deal with their own inevitable deaths never mind anyone else's. We all live in a constant state of denial. The truth is, life is a bitch then you marry one, then you die, and that is if you are lucky. Everything else is a bonus so make the best of every second as however bad it may seem it could be so much worse. Always be grateful even if you can't think of anything to be grateful about. Always live this mortal experience as if there is far more to come even if there is not. God will look after you, indeed He is looking after you whether you know it or not or have worked out how or why he does so. What nastiness or ill intent you bring into this world will come straight back at you usually sooner and sometimes later. You may be judged when you die but your punishment often comes far sooner. Comfort yourself, with the real possibility that this is nothing more than a punishment for past failures in character and resolve to be a better person this time. Why not? Being of good intent is more fun and you always end up with better friends or friends worth having. Stubbornly remain of good intent, as evil will either ignore you or swiftly move on. Evil always goes for the easy victim or soft option.

[@andreakoch7689]

what did really bring the wall down was the desire of the east germanz for western consumer goods. they saw it on west german telly ads every day and this was the driving force behind it - not the desire for freedom. i still remember, one east german summarised it in a talk show after the fall of the wall: "i want l,marlboro, marble jeans, a ghetto blaster and a golf GTI.". that was the driving force which brought the berlin wall down. the primitve desire for western consumer goods. these days it is, of course, shown in a different light. - this woman here is far too young in order to be able to report properly about the ddr. anybody who is younger than 50 has no clue and should not lecture about the topic, particularly not abroad. imagine an english native at the age of 25 trying to teach germanz about the thatcher times. that is as absurd as what this woman here is doing with her gdr-lecturing.

[@Johnconno]

It was exactly the same as 1980's Liverpool. 🗜️

[@briandelaney9710]

But with the Stasi

[@Johnconno]

@@briandelaney9710 We had Merseyside Police.