This course provides historiographical discussions of exemplary German works from the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century, including poems, prose, drama, essays, visual art, architecture, and films. These will be examined in the context of important historical events in modern Germany, such as the end of the Kaiserreich, urbanization, World War I, the Weimar Republic, and the rise of National Socialism, as well as through the lens of both contemporary and later historical discourses and debates. We will also work intensively on spoken and written German, with emphasis on stylistic nuances.