From the Brecht-Weill Threepenny Opera to the Warburg Institute, from the Bauhaus to The Magic Mountain, the Weimar Republic (1918-1933) has become a legend for its intense creativity during a time of political upheaval. In this vivid account, the distinguished historian Peter Gay traces the rise of the artistic, literary, and musical culture that bloomed so briefly in the 1920s amid the chaos of Germany's tenuous post-World War I democracy and crashed violently in the wake of Hitler's rise to power.