Weekend in Munich

Discusses Nazi ideology and the centrality of the arts in Hitler's worldview and as an instrument of propaganda. Analyzes the Nazi concept of "degenerate" art, which was equated with Jewish-influenced art, even though most of the artists condemned by the Nazis were not, in fact, Jewish. Describes the third annual Day of German Art celebrated in Munich on 14-16 July 1939 and attended by Hitler and most of the leading Nazis. This festival was filmed in technicolor by a group of amateurs. In conjunction with the screening on British television in 1993 of a documentary based on this film ("Good Morning, Mr. Hitler"), the directors interviewed Munich citizens who had taken part in the Festival in their youth and who recalled their enjoyment. Most of them denied having known anything of the Holocaust. Charlotte Knobloch, a Jewish survivor, recalls a very different youth, spent in constant fear. The last chapter points to the revival of neo-Nazism, Skinhead violence against foreigners and Jews, and Holocaust denial in reunified Germany and elsewhere in the world.