The German Friend

In 1942 John W. Larson was a student at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota, when he befriended a visiting lecturer from Germany, Prince Hubertus Lowenstein, a prominent scholar whose anti-Nazi views forced him into exile after Hitler came to power.

Larson and Lowenstein began a correspondence that lasted throughout World War II and into the postwar era. In his letters, Lowenstein shares his thoughts on Nazism, German democracy, the Weimar Republic, life in exile, and his impressions of major events during the war. In 1946 Lowenstein returned to Germany, and his letters to Larson document the widespread starvation, unemployment, and destruction that he found there.

In "The German Friend," Larson compiles more than four hundred of Lowenstein's letters. Unlike his careful academic papers, the scholar's personal opinions shine through in his correspondence, and he shares views that, as a scholar, he would rarely express in his public writing.

Accompanied by Larson's editorial introductions and explanations of Lowenstein's developing thoughts, "A German Friend " is a unique and invaluable resource for scholars, students, and enthusiasts of World War II, as well as a revealing glimpse into the mind of one of Germany's more influential twentieth-century thinkers. "