Screening Twentieth Century Europe: Television, History, Memory (Palgrave European Film and Media Studies)

This book offers a comparative study of historical television genres in Europe, with a special focus on Germany and Great Britain and their way of narrating twentieth century European history. The book analyses our common European past and memory through central historical television narratives. Each chapter looks at how historical TV genres, fictional and documentary, have dealt with the most salient and defining periods, events and changes in the twentieth century-- an age of extremes. Bondebjerg offers unique theoretical and analytical insight into the role of television in mediating and shaping the past. The book explores television's creation of transnational cultural encounters across Europe in relation to our common and national past. The book addresses how television has influenced our understanding of history, collective memory and public debate over the twentieth century. It is fundamentally a book about the importance of the past in present day Europe and the centrality of media for transnational understanding. -- Provided by publisher Acknowledgments Contents List of Figures 1 Introduction: Mediating European History Our Embodied Mind and Mediated Cultural Encounters An Age of Extremes At the Dawn of a New Century Historical Views of Europe in the Twentieth Century History in Our Culture and Minds: Historical Genres, Mediated Cultural Encounters Screening Twentieth-Century Europe: Outline of the Book References 2 History as Mediated and Embodied Narratives Mediating History: National and Transnational Dimensions History and Our Narrative Mind History and Memory Historical Narratives and the Psychological and Cultural Dimensions of Reception Memory: Social and Subjective Dimensions References 3 Historical Genres on Television: The Broader European Picture Basic Historical Genres Impact and Importance of Historical Fiction and Docudrama Frozen Cultures: Historical Drama in Eastern Europe Challenged Democracies: Southern Europe Creative Encounters and Structures of Co-production: Western and Northern Europe Imagining and Narrating Twentieth-Century Europe: Focus and Perspectives References 4 The Meaning of Small Things: Everyday Drama and History from Below The Embodiment of History Heimat: A Reflexive and Symbolic Narrative of Everyday Life Heimat 1: A Symbolic and Realist Story of Home and the World Beyond Reitz and the Visual and Narrative Language of Memory The Village: The English Heimat Series with a Difference Gender, Class, Sex and the Roaring Twenties Everyday Drama: Impact, Reception and the Dimensions of Memory References 5 History from Above: Historical Biopics German Biopics: The Bad and the Good Characters Biopics as Multi-Layered Docudrama: The Case of Heinrich Breloer The Complex Cultural, Historical Biopic: Breloer and the Mann Family The Crown: An Intense Story of Queendom and Personal Freedom The Crown: A Story of the Transformation of Post-War Britain The Crown: A Story of Everyday Life and Mediated Politics Lived Lives, Living History: Biopics and Historical Debate References 6 Grand Illusions and the Great War: World War I Narratives The End of an Era: British and German Period Dramas War and the Changing Map of Europe Realities and Memories First World War Documentaries: Memories, Experiences and Factual Narratives Documentary War Narratives: Multiple Voices and Narrative Strategies German and Transnational European War Documentaries British War Period Drama Parade’s End: Heritage Toryism and Cloud-Cuckoo Land A War that Changed Europe Forever References 7 Living on the Edge: The Roaring Twenties and World Crisis Fragile Democracies and Radicalized Political Cultures Singing and Dancing on the Volcano: Life in the 1920s Documenting the Past Through Personal European Stories: Clash of Futures as Transnational Memory Drama The Weimar Years: Crisis, Political Chaos and the Cultural Avant-Garde German Noir: Babylon Berlin as Period and Crime Drama Between Two Wars: Class and Culture in British Period Drama Down Dark and Sunny Lanes: Dennis Potter, Realism and Dreams of Popular Culture The Stuff that Dreams Are Made of: The Imaginary and Enchanting Dimension A Creative, Chaotic, Violent and Divisive Period References 8 Hell on Earth: World War II Narratives The Most Mediated War in Modern European History World War II Documentaries: Explanation, Imagination and Narrative World War II and Popular British Fiction Series Memory, Guilt and German Docudramas A New Generation of German War Drama Beneath a Frozen Past: Moral Complexities and the German War Generation World War II as European War: Mediated Transnational Cultural Encounters and Memories References 9 Post-war Europe: A Social and Cultural Revolution Better Times: Welfare Societies and Cultural Revolution Living on a Thin Line Between Germany East and West Dancing in Berlin: Mothers, Daughters and a New Way of Life Leaving Heimat: Reitz’s Story of the Youth Revolution in Germany The Complicated Way Back Home: Negotiating the Past and a New Present Social and Cultural Dynamics in British Post-war Period Dramas Tradition and Change: British Generational Period Drama The Changing World of Women: Call the Midwife and the Post-war Social Revolution A Changing Europe? Dreams and Realities References 10 Europe 1989 and Beyond: Towards a New Millennium Coming to Terms with the Post-1989 German Past: Memories and Realities Reitz’s Heimat 3: A Chronicle About the Change of a Century Dreams and Realities of Unification A Unification Symphony in Many Parts and with Many Voices The New Millennium: Symbolism and the Dialectic of Past and Present Rough Realism and Dystopian Narratives: British Post-1989 Narratives Reality or Nothing: Dennis Potter’s Dystopian Far Future Look at the Past Between Utopia and Dystopia: Post-1989 Europe References 11 Conclusion: History on Our Minds and the Forms of Mediated History Mediated Cultural Encounters, History and Memory Historical Genres and Twentieth-Century History The Past in the Present Quo Vadis Europe? the Twentieth Century and Beyond References Index 1. Introduction. A Century of Extremes and Profound Changes: Mediating European History.- 2. Memory and History as Mediated and Embodied Narratives.- 3. Historical Genres on Television: The Broader European Picture.- 4. The Meaning of Small Things: Everyday Drama and History from Below.- 5. History from Above: Historical Biopics.- 6. Grand illusions and The Great War: WW1 Narratives.- 7. Living on the Edge: The Roaring Twenties and World Crisis.- 8. Hell on Earth: WW2 War Narratives.- 9. Post-war Europe: Cold War, Welfare and Cultural Revolution.- 10. Europe 1989 and Beyond: Towards the New Millennium.- 11. Conclusion: History on Our Mind - the Forms and Functions of Mediated History