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Book
Author Stern, Fritz, 1926-2016, author

Title Gold and iron : Bismarck, Bleichröder, and the building of the German empire / Fritz Stern
Edition First edition
Published New York : Knopf, 1977
New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 1977

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Location Call no. Vol. Availability
 W'PONDS  943.080924 Ste  AVAILABLE
Description xxiv, 620 pages, 8 unnumbered leaves of plates : illustrations ; 25 cm
Contents First encounter -- Bismarck's struggle for survival -- Between the throne and the gallows -- A banker's share in Bismarck's triumph -- Bismarck's purse and Bleichroder's place -- The third war -- Hubris in Versailles -- A new baron in a new Berlin -- Imperial style in politics and economics -- Greed and intrigue -- The fourth estate -- The prince enriched -- The world of banking and diplomacy -- Rumania: the triumph of expediency -- The reluctant colonialist -- The fall of Bismarck -- The Jew as patriotic parvenu -- The hostage of the new anti-semitism -- The embittered end
Summary Traces the history of the complex relationship between Bismarck and his banker, Gerson von Bleichröder, viewed as a symbolic encounter between German conservative political power and capital. Surveys German society in the 19th century, pointing out the persistence of latent anti-Jewish prejudices, especially in aristocratic circles. Ch. 14 (pp. 351-393), "Rumania: The Triumph of Expediency", relates Bleichröder's efforts on behalf of Romanian Jewry between 1867-80, and his intervention with Bismarck to try to force the Romanian government to grant emancipation to the Jews. Remarks on Bismarck's pragmatic and opportunistic approach to the "Jewish question". Ch. 17 (pp. 461-493), "The Jew as Patriotic Parvenu", and ch. 18 (pp. 494-531), "The Hostage of the New Anti-Semitism", discuss the social status of German Jews on the eve of the emergence of political antisemitism in the 1880s, and the impact of the antisemitic discourse of persons such as Stöcker and Treitschke. Bleichröder became a major target of antisemitic propaganda, a symbol of Jewish financial domination and the "Jewish international plot"
Analysis Geschichte 1862-1890
Notes Includes index
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 601-602) and index
Subject Bismarck, Otto, Fürst von, 1815-1898.
Bleichröder, Gerson von, 1822-1893
Bleichröder, Gerson von, 1822-1893.
SUBJECT Bismarck, Otto von -- Finanzpolitik
Bleichröder, Gerson von
Subject Bankers -- Germany -- Biography.
Statesmen -- Germany -- Biography.
Genre/Form Biographies.
LC no. 76026128
ISBN 0140552189
0394495454
9780140552188
9780394495453