A Mighty Fortress: A New History of the German People by Steven Ozment - Book Report/Review Example

Ozment, in his four-chapter book, unlocks the chain that has shackled the history of Germany through chronological analysis of the origin of Germany and focusing on a trifecta of themes that bring light to the obscured and ignored history of Germany. The three main ideas and focus of the book are blindness Germany history by the public and even the accomplished historians second is the democratic retrogression of Germany and final, is the new and current Germany, change. First, on the blindness of Germany's history, Ozment criticizes the historians who have been writing on the biography of Germany to be either has been motivated by the grudge of being the victims of the era of Hitler to an extend they avoid the nitty-gritty look on the Germany history.

The notion that German history revolves around the Nazis, Jew and Hitler as pointed out by Ozment has been compounded and cemented by the media, public, and historians. Ozment tends to dispel this unfounded notion in his book. Another central focus in this book is the democratic retrogression of Germany. Ozment tries to point out the critical historians who cast blame on the role of the middle class on German politics of the time. From his book, the promising burgher, who are the middle class, failed to displace the Junkers who were the young German noble and member of the party in Prussia with militaristic and authoritarian character.

In fact, the middle class submitted to these Junkers and become their subject. These have been well demystified in this most embraced scholastic book on the history of Germany. Finally, Ozment has kept a tight focus on current Germany. In chapter four, he talks of Germany in the modern world. Here the changes from the times of Wilhelmine to the era of Weimer Germany are put into scrutiny and the changes that come with it. He also talks of what he refers to as “The barbarian prince” where a detailed explanation of the rising and fall of National Socialism is captured.

Here the role of European states did not have any impact to create immunity to what happened to Germany. Ozment downplays the assertion of other historians of anteroom Nazism as being the sympathetic reading of German history.