Mighty Kleist
‘German intellectuals are fascinated by outsiders, especially tortured rebels like Heinrich von Kleist’
Politics, Ideas and the Arts
Kosher Craze
‘Their grandparents fled the Nazis, their parents boycotted all things German, but their children are flocking to Berlin’
Lax on Tax
'Germans are obsessed with paying taxes - they are affronted by any state with little or not taxation - such as the British Virgin Islands'
Germane Germans
‘Do we still have an intellectual elite that reads, and writers to cater for it? In Germany, we have Merkur’
Intelligence Spared
‘Europe’s intellectuals should get on with the job of helping to lift the continent out of its apparently endless crisis’
American Money Worries
'Germany’s reaction to America’s credit-rating downgrade was predictable: a pre-emptive schadenfreude that has become the gold standard when reacting to US affairs'
German Hysteria
‘In Germany, whether it’s a matter of beansprouts or nuclear power plants, moral superiority can quickly turn into self-centred hysteria’
American Dreaming
‘I only discovered both how much I was missing New York and what was irritating me about Berlin when I visited Manhattan in the week after bin Laden’s killing’
That’s Politainment!
‘When Mr Googleberg attempts a comeback, he will come up against a German attachment to truth and decency’
No Wunder, Women
‘Every woman among male egos knows she has to fight a war—an older colleague calling you “Blondie”, for instance’
Past Lives
‘Who would want a dusty collection of children’s books, their spines broken, written in German?’
All Change
‘Now that I am about to leave, I realise how uniquely American is the craving for “change”’