“The Green Table,” choreographed by Kurt Jooss and composed by Fritz A. Cohen, first premiered in Paris, France and won first place in the Paris choreographic competition held by the International Archives of the Dance in early July of 1932 (Martin 155). Kurt Jooss (1901—1979) was a German choreographer and dancer, as well as quite the visionary for his time. Fritz A. Cohen (1904-1967) was a German composer, who worked closely with Jooss to create this anti-war message-driven piece. The ballet “Der Grüne Tisch,” subtitled, “A Tatentanz,” achieved praise not only in Paris and Germany, but also Amsterdam, Brussels, London, and America (Martin 155). As Martin sums up, “In eight loosely connected scenes…it pictures the bitter futility of war” (Martin 155). In other words, Jooss explores the ineffectiveness of violence through a series of scenes depicting battle and woe. The New York stock market crash in 1929 sparked a worldwide economic crisis (“Hitler Comes to Power”). By June of 1932, six million people were unemployed in Germany and the economic distress led to a rise in the support for the Nazi party; consequently, the Nazi party won the votes of almost 40 percent of the electorate in the German parliament elections of July 1932 (“Hitler Comes to Power”). However, by November of 1932, the Nazi party lost two million votes from the previous July (“Hitler Comes to Power”). Adolf Hitler formed an alliance with the conservatives and after negotiating for months, Paul von
Undoubtedly, Nazi popularity placed pressure on government and on President Hindenburg to make Hitler Chancellor. Their astonishing rise in votes since 810 000 in 1928 to 13.75 million in July 1932 was extraordinary.
Due to the failure of the Weimar Republic and general public dissatisfaction arising from poor economic conditions exacerbated by the Treaty of Versailles, coupled with the 1929 Wall Street Crash, German citizens were understandably desperate for change. Until this point in time the Nazi party, and Hitler, had been essentially unpopular. However, the economic situation ensured Hitler’s increasing popularity as the people looked toward more extreme but non-communist ideals. The initial consolidation of Nazi power in 1933 arose from key events such as the support of the Nationalist Party with the Nazis to form a coalition government, implementation of the Enabling
According to Abc.News, Germany had signed the debts to pay 269 million gold marks and around 96,000 tons of gold in Treaty of Versailles during 1919. The debts were unaffordable for Germans since they had also lost a lot of properties during the Great War. Followed along the debts that they had to pay to the Allies, there were the Great Depression. During 1930, the Great Depression occurs. “The total number of German workers involved in the unemployment easily reaches four million”(20,000,000 Unemployed in World," Revolutionary Age). Germans were frustrated with the government. Germans were ravenous and overwhelmed. Under this circumstances, the hopeless Germans started to believe that Hitler was the man who could bring the glory of Germany back. The propaganda poster below has shown that people were tiresome of trusting the government. The German words translated into English was “Our Last Hope— Hitler”. It indicated that Hitler was the last person as a leader they were going to believe. The poster enlarged the name “Hitler” to emphasize his importance, to attract attention, and to encourage people to join the Nazi Party.
There was a power struggle in Germany after the 1932 election. Many of the political parties thought they could use Hitler's popularity to their advantage. The power struggle ended in the President asking Hitler to become Chancellor in January 1933. As chancellor, Hitler encouraged fear of communism and imprisoned thousands of his political opponents. In February 1933 the Reichstag building was set on fire and Hitler cleverly blamed the Communists, who were feared by many Germans. By August 1934 Germany was a single-party state and Hitler was dictator. Hitler used his power to reverse key decisions and limitations imposed by the treaty of Versailles.
During the 1930’s Germany was at an all time low as the worldwide economic depression hit Germany hard. The confidence in Germany from the people was lacking due to the fresh memory of their defeat in World War I. This caused great need of a new leader, someone who could give the people change, and Adolf Hitler knew he could do just that. His rapid rise to power began when he started to promise things that intrigued the German people. He promised the hopeless and needy a better life, and promised opportunities that were exactly what the people needed. This caught the attention of so many young unemployed and middle class people. His party, known as the Nazi Party, won 33 percent of the votes in the 1932 elections. And by January 1933, Hitler was appointed chancellor, which was the head of the German government. Germany started to feel like they might've found the leader they'd been so desperate for.
The Nazi group had a major impact on the government and influenced the decision for the next Chancellor of Germany. “...Paul von Hindenburg, had appointed Hitler Chancellor. Having won more than 37 percent of the vote in the previous year's legislative elections, Hitler's Nazi party had enough power to effectively paralyze Germany's democratic government, which had been in place since 1919,” Smith says (pg.15). This shows that Hitler's Nazi group was extremely powerful and explains how Hitler arose to power. This quote reveals that Hitler had the most power since 1919, which demonstrates how powerful Hitler will become in the future. “By the early 1930’s, Germany was in desperate shape. Its defeat in World War One and the harsh conditions imposed by the United States, Britain, and France in the 1919 Treaty of Versailles - included debilitating reparation payments to the victors - had left Germany humiliated and impoverished, with ruinous inflation eating away at its economy. The worldwide Depression that followed the 1929 U.S. stock market crash exacerbated the situation as banks
Expressionism can be described as a movement in the fine arts that emphasized the expression of inner experience rather than realistic portrayal, looking to obtain not objective reality, but the subjective emotions and responses that objects and events arouse in the artist. Several characteristics of expressionism are distortion, exaggeration, primitivism, and fantasy. “The Green Table,” a ballet by Kurt Jooss, 1932, is an ideal example of expressionism because it depicts the choreographer’s personal interpretation of war through the use of movement, music by Fritz Cohen and lighting by Hermann Mankard.
In the lead up to the depression the Nazis had 12 seats and just two years later in the peak of the economic crisis the Nazis had 107 seats. This reflects the dissatisfaction that was shown in the present government and the fact that Hitler was the only person who promised the solutions that they people wanted. Many historians have stated that if Stressman had not died in 1929 then Germany may have recovered to its former strength and Hitler may never had the chance at gaining power. From 1930 onwards the country is being ruled by presidential decree through the use of Article 48, so therefore no party could gain a majority for the German economy to get back on its feet. Hitler took advantage of these times of hardship and promised these desperate people what they wanted, employment and a way out of these poverty times. Hitler was the only option left, and is desperate time people look for desperate politics to solve these problems. Weimar
By 1924, after years of crisis management and attempts at tax and finance reform, the economy was stabilised with the help of foreign, particularly American, loans. This relative "golden age" was reflected in the strong support for moderate pro-Weimar political parties in the 1928 elections. However, economic disaster struck with the onset of the world depression in 1929. The American stock market crash and bank failures led to a recall of American loans to Germany. This development added to Germany's economic hardship. Mass unemployment and suffering followed. Many Germans became increasingly disillusioned with the Weimar Republic and began to turn toward radical anti-democratic parties whose
The Wall Street Crash was another important reason or the Nazi Party gaining support in the years 1923-33. The Wall Street Crash happened in 1929 and left Germany’s economy crippled. As Germany was dependant on loans from America, when America stopped giving these loans to Germany the
The Great Depression played a big role in helping the Nazi Party capture power. Many nations were suffering from the Great Depression in 1930, including Germany who had to pay for the war reparations. During this period of economic and politic crisis, the country had been easily influenced by the politics parties. They wanted someone who is capable and had what it takes to be their leader to lead them through the huge crisis that they were facing. Most Germans who are in desperate state as they wanted Germany to be like once, able to be proud of and not in such a state where they had to struggle to fulfill the almost impossible terms of the Treaty of Versailles. They considered that period as a disgraceful decade in their history. Due to
<br>The stock market crash of 1929 effected practically every nation in the world. Germany was already suffering a post-war depression and was greatly effected. Hitler used the suffering of the masses to gain political support. He gained a strong following from the
In 1933 Adolf Hitler was chosen as Chancellor of Germany by president Paul von Hindenburg. With this, the Nazi party came to power. Originally called the National Socialist German Workers party (Nazi for short), the Nazi party emphasized how Laissez-faire capitalism, economic liberalism, and democracy failed in government. The National Socialists stressed the importance of the impeccability of the German race. Although they had very determined ideas, The Nazi party began as a relatively small group in 1918. But coming into the 1930’s this was not the case. The widespread use of propaganda and radio broadcasting were instrumental to the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party.
The depression hit Germany in 1930. Hitler spoke many speeches promising to get rid of the communists and other "enemies." In 1933 Hitler became chancellor of Germany. There were two other Nazi in the cabinet, Goering and Wilhelm Frick.
Unemployment was on the rise and personal income on the fall. The government’s budget was in the negatives and industrialists were insisting on lower taxes for employers and capital, while also insisting on higher taxes on the working class. It was this new tax that led to the dissolve of the coalition of the parties of the Weimar Republic. The Reichstag was dissolved soon after. The new head of the Weimar Republic enacted more taxes to push the working class further into poverty. The election in 1930 show the correlation between economic crisis and political radicalism. The right-wing parties, with their traditional voter base of Protestants and the middle class, no longer had sufficient support and their voters went to Hitler’s party, the National Socialists. This sudden rise of support for National socialism was the result of the radicalization of the middle class (Frey, Bruno S. Effect of the Great Depression, 410). The unemployed, and the employed who felt their jobs were not secure, in a last-ditch effort to save their social status, took to supporting radical parties. There was also a large number of first-time voters without party affiliations who were easy targets for the