In his new, magisterial biography of Berlin – a city, often dubbed “the capital of the 20th century” – and of its inhabitants, bestselling British historian Sinclair McKay sheds new light on well-known characters – from idealistic scientist Albert Einstein to Nazi architect Albert Speer – and draws on never-before-seen first-person accounts to introduce us to people of all walks of Berlin life.

How did the ideologies – fascism and communism – come to flower so fully here? And how did their repercussions continue to be felt throughout Europe and the West right up until that extraordinary night in the autumn of 1989 when the Wall – that final expression of totalitarian oppression – was at last breached? Drawing on a staggering breadth of culture – from art to film, opera to literature, science to architecture – McKay’s latest masterpiece shows us this hypnotic city as never before.

The talk will be in English

Host: Marc-Christoph Wagner