Synopses & Reviews
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF A SPY AMONG FRIENDSIn 1886 Elisabeth Nietzsche, Friedrich’s bigoted, imperious sister, founded a “racially pure” colony in Paraguay together with a band of blonde-haired fellow Germans. Over a century later Ben Macintyre sought out the survivors of this “Nueva Germania” to discover the remains of this bizarre colony. Forgotten Fatherland vividly recounts his arduous adventure locating the survivors, while also tracing the colorful history of Elisabeth’s return to Europe, where she inspired the mythical cult of her brother’s philosophy and later became a mentor to Hitler. Brilliantly researched and mordantly funny, this is an illuminating portrait of a forgotten people and of a woman whose deep influence on the twentieth century can only now be fully understood.
Synopsis
"A fascinating, provocative, and highly eccentric volume that is part biography, part travelogue, part detective story" (The New York Times), from the bestselling author of The Spy and the Traitor
In 1886 Elisabeth Nietzsche, Friedrich's bigoted, imperious sister, founded a "racially pure" colony in Paraguay together with a band of blonde-haired fellow Germans. Over a century later Ben Macintyre sought out the survivors of this "Nueva Germania" to discover the remains of this bizarre colony. Forgotten Fatherland vividly recounts his arduous adventure locating the survivors, while also tracing the colorful history of Elisabeth's return to Europe, where she inspired the mythical cult of her brother's philosophy and later became a mentor to Hitler. Brilliantly researched and mordantly funny, this is an illuminating portrait of a forgotten people and of a woman whose deep influence on the twentieth century can only now be fully understood.
Synopsis
From the bestselling, acclaimed author of Operation Mincemeat and The Spy and the Traitor, the fascinating story of Elisabeth Nietzsche's maniacal attempt to found a utopian colony in the jungles of Paraguay in the late nineteenth century "A fascinating, provocative, and highly eccentric volume that is part biography, part travelogue, part detective story."--The New York Times
In 1886, Elisabeth Nietzsche, the bigoted, imperious sister of the famous philosopher, founded a "racially pure" colony in Paraguay with her husband, anti-Semitic agitator Bernhard F rster, and a band of fair-skinned fellow Germans. More than a century later, Ben Macintyre tracked down the survivors of Nueva Germania, as the colony was called, and found a strange, tight-lipped people, still interbreeding to the point of genetic deterioration.
Digging into recently opened German archives, Macintyre unfolds how Elisabeth, who returned to Germany in 1893, grafted her anti-Semitic, nationalist ideas onto her brother's philosophy, building a mythic cult around him, and how she later became a mentor to Hitler--her stately funeral in 1935 attended by a tearful F hrer. Laced with mordant irony, Macintyre's brilliant piece of investigative journalism explores how the Nazis perverted Friedrich Nietzsche's ideas to justify their evil deeds, and unearths a rich and disturbing vein of the twentieth century's dark history.
Synopsis
"A fascinating, provocative, and highly eccentric volume" (The New York Times) exploring the true story of Elisabeth Nietzsche's maniacal attempt to found a utopian colony in the jungles of Paraguay in the late nineteenth century--from the bestselling author of Prisoners of the Castle. In 1886, Elisabeth Nietzsche, the bigoted, imperious sister of the famous philosopher, founded a "racially pure" colony in Paraguay with her husband, anti-Semitic agitator Bernhard F rster, and a band of fair-skinned fellow Germans. More than a century later, Ben Macintyre tracked down the survivors of Nueva Germania to discover the remains of this bizarre colony, and found a strange, tight-lipped people, still interbreeding to the point of genetic deterioration.
Digging into recently opened German archives, Macintyre unfolds how Elisabeth, who returned to Germany in 1893, grafted her anti-Semitic, nationalist ideas onto her brother's philosophy, building a mythic cult around him, and how she later became a mentor to Hitler--her stately funeral in 1935 attended by a tearful F hrer. Laced with mordant irony, Macintyre's brilliant piece of investigative journalism explores how the Nazis perverted Friedrich Nietzsche's ideas to justify their evil deeds, and unearths a rich and disturbing vein of the twentieth century's dark history.
About the Author
BEN MACINTYRE is a writer-at-large for The Times of London and the bestselling author of A Spy Among Friends, Double Cross, Operation Mincemeat, Agent Zigzag, The Napoleon of Crime, and Forgotten Fatherland, among other books. Macintyre has also written and presented BBC documentaries of the wartime espionage trilogy.