Ex Bibliotheca

The life and times of Zack Weinberg.

Monday, 17 November 2003

# 4 PM (GMT+1)

Today Dara and I tried to go to the various museums on "Museum Island", only to discover that they are all closed on Mondays. Instead we visited the Berliner Dom, a Lutheran cathedral commissioned by Friedrich Wilhelm IV (but not actually built until the reign of Wilhelm II). A Lutheran cathedral sounds like a contradiction in terms, but there it is. Because there was renovation going on, we had to get in via the crypt, where all of the Hohenzollern kings are interred, in big freestanding stone coffins with crowns balanced on top. The interior looks not unlike a Catholic cathedral, except the statues are of Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, and other Protestant elders, instead of Catholic saints.

If you climb two hundred and sixty-seven steps you get to an observation platform on the outside of the dome. Since it was drizzling or raining all day, we had this to ourselves. The cathedral is not very far from Alexanderplatz and the TV tower. You can see most of the same things from the cathedral, only you are not so high up and therefore you can make out more detail.

After this we paid the obligatory visit to the preserved segment of the Berlin Wall. It is easy to see how this bleak slab of concrete became such a symbol of division. Even with the artwork and graffiti painted on it, roads cut through it, U-bahn lines running over it, and so on, what's left is still grim and daunting. It's got this black cylindrical cap, to make climbing harder, possibly once had razor wire on it; somehow that little touch makes the whole far harsher.

In places, the wall is disintegrating under the relentless force of erosion. Frost heaves have exposed the rebar, which is rusting and expanding and cracking the concrete further. Weeds and moss are growing in the cracks. In an hundred years, this wall will only exist in history books and old archives. Time conquers both our glorious achievements and our ignominous ones.

I shall link to a complete transcript of the late President Kennedy's speech on the occasion of his visit to Berlin in June, 1963. You've all heard the sound bite, but read the whole speech.

Dara was tired so I went on to the Bauhaus-Archiv by myself. This is a fairly small exhibit of artworks, furniture, and architectural models done by various Bauhaus residents. It is, unfortunately, not as interesting as the real thing must have been; it seemed only the shell of the movement.