MATERIALS FOR THE STUDY OF THE WORK AND THOUGHT
OF ARNOLD J. TOYNBEE
by Teodoro Tagliaferri (University of Naples Federico II)
No. 28 (September 22nd, 2023)
WRITINGS ON THE EMPIRES IN WORLD HISTORY, XXIV
Arnold J. Toynbee, The «Central Europe» Idea – The Reverse Side of the Shield, in «The Nation», XVIII, 20 (February 12, 1916), pp. 698-699. «Communication», dated «February 10th, 1916».
Toynbee’s communicated article was a reply to The Mid-Europe Idea (ibid., 19, February 5, 1916, pp. 675-676), an anonymous review of Friedrich Naumann’s Mitteleuropa (Berlin, Georg Reimer, 1915). See Appendix 1. See also the reviewer’s rejoinder, The Central-Europe Idea, in «The Nation», XVIII, 2, February 19, 1916, p. 730, dated «February 15th, 1916» (Appendix 2). Central Europe was the title given to the English translation of the book, which was published later in the same year (F. Naumann, Member of the Reichstag, Central Europe, with an Introduction by W.J. Ashley, translated by Christabel M. Meredith, London, P.S. King, 1916).
“Sir, you published in your last issue a review of Friedrich Naumann’s Mitteleuropa, which succeeded admirably in conveying the attractiveness of this remarkable book. It is difficult, indeed, not to sympathize with Herr Naumann. He is idealistic, he is imaginative, he is liberal-minded. He comes not to destroy but to fulfil – to blend the centripetal structure of the Prussian State and the centrifugal structure of the Austrian in the grander economic superstructure of «Central Europe». Under the magic influence of economic co-operation, nationalistic intolerance is to be transcended after the war of 1914, as intolerance of creed was transcended after the Wars of Religion. The book breathes a most un-German spirit of harmony and forbearance, which is all the more gracious because it is a surprise.”
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