When it comes to telling natural and cultural history, incorporating political influences as well as social upheavals, we often read about choosing a new approach. A promise that is not always kept. One certainly cannot blame Birgit Aschmann and her extensive book “The Germans and Nature” for this. She rejects the narrowing of perspective that the new key term “Anthropocene” would bring with it. On the contrary, Aschmann is not (only) interested in the “destructive dimension of human action”. Following the science historian Lorraine Daston, she works with three “perception foils”: the specific and local natures and the universal natural laws. There is a lot of contextualization and condensation, for example in relation to industrialization – which is very much related to the steel company Krupp. Elsewhere, it goes into greater detail, for example when it comes to the rectification of the Rhine. The Rhine serves here as a starting point for a history of standstill and development of humans and our use of nature.
The professor of 19th century European history at the Humboldt University in Berlin devotes over 700 pages to the book, which also has its origins in the preparation of a lecture series. The appendix alone takes up 150 pages with notes, a list of literature and sources, and a list of people and places. But this “other story of the 19th century” would have done well with a few pages less. On the other hand, religion and romance don’t exactly play small roles and these two are known to be rather wordy in nature.
Aschmann delivers a historical narrative of colonialism and exploitation, devastation and worship of nature, the supernatural and the very real, war and peace, art and culture, medicine and emotions. What should be positively emphasized is that, in addition to well-known personalities from that era, there are also a number of less common names and women. Gustav inevitably includes Amalie Struve, alongside Rudolf Virchow we read about Rahel Varnhagen and Robert can’t go without Clara Schumann. Aschmann does meander sometimes, but that’s what we also appreciate about rivers that aren’t straight.
The bottom line is clear after this complex ride through the 19th century: “There is not just one way to deal with nature.”
Review: Alexander Schramm
Birgit Aschmann
The Germans and nature.
Propylaea Publishing House. 720 pages, €38
A historical narrative by
colonialism and exploitation,
Devastation as well as worship of nature