572
PARTISAN REVIEW
Since the reunification of Germany-that is the term always used
because it has been unified before-the Wessies have been rushing to
Dresden, pouring billions into building new old Dresden into one of
Germany's leading tourist destinations. To boost the economy even fur–
ther, Siemens built a microchip factory, and Volkswagen built a glassed–
in plant where a customer can spend two days watching his car being
assembled. Yet the unemployment rate remains high and Wessies seem
to get the bulk of the new jobs.
The new tourist literature, in giving the history of the city, seldom
offers a date between
I9I8,
when the Saxon monarchy was abolished,
and the
I945
bombing. "The Friends of Dresden" brochure which
raises money for the rebuilding of the Frauenkirche, offers no date
between an
I843
Wagner debut and the
I945
bombing. Photographs of
the blackened rubble, some of it untouched until very recently, can be
easily seen. Less available is the
I934
picture of little Nazi boys in
brown shirts, all at attention for the visit of Nazi Propaganda Minister
Josef Gobbels to the city, or the
I944
photo of thousands of Dresdeners
cheering flags of the Third Reich, the graceful arches of the fourteenth–
century Augustus bridge across the Elbe in the background.
I FLEW INTO DRESDEN from Munich on a Sunday afternoon. This flight
is always full of Wessies returning from their weekend shopping in the
West, festooned in voluptuous furs, supple leather, and designer every–
thing.
In the heart of old Dresden, I seemed to be in the center of an old Ger–
man city. Patches of virgin stone filling in missing parts on a statue, a
crest, or a wall, were subtle reminders, along with the scaffolding on the
unfinished Frauenkirche and Dresden Castle, of what otherwise
appeared to be a well-preserved eighfeenth- and nineteenth-century
European city.
It
is not only the East German nation and the East German ideology
that the Ossies are now told meant nothing, but also the East German
buildings. The old center of Dresden is surrounded by East Germany–
monotonously repetitious, cheaply fabricated rows of low-ceilinged,
unornamented buildings. "I never thought it was ugly. I thought it was
modern socialism," said Brigit Stoof.
In truth, the West German architecture of the
'60S
and
'70S
was no
better.
It
was all concrete, harsh and stark-Bauhaus gone wrong. Where
the West Germans have tried to build their own modern architecture in
