Research Professor John Rohl (University of Sussex)
What are the roots of National Socialism and where do the origins of the Holocaust lie? Attention is beginning to turn to the attitudes and activities of the royals and aristocrats who dominated Germany's ruling elite prior to 1918. One key development has been the discovery of the depth of the last Kaiser's antisemitism, particularly during his long years of exile in Holland. The realisation has led to widespread recognition of the long strands of continuity reaching back from the Third Reich into the Imperial past. The lecture will assess the extent and nature of the Kaiser's antisemitism and explore its signifi cance for our understanding of German history in the fi rst half of the twentieth century.
John Rohl is Research Professor of German History at the University of Sussex, a position he has held since retiring from teaching in 1991. From 1979-1991 he was Chair of History at Sussex. He is the author of The Kaiser and His Court: Wilhelm II and the Government of Germany (1994), which won the Wolfson History Prize. He is currently working on the third volume of his biography of Kaiser Wilhelm II. The first two volumes published to date: Young Wilhelm. The Kaiser's Early Life 1869-1888 (Munich 1993, Cambridge 1998) and Wilhelm II. The Kaiser's Personal Monarchy 1888- 1900 (Munich 2001 and Cambridge 2004) have received international recognition. The biography was awarded the Gissings Prize in 2002.
