Skip to content
Lecture

Trudy Gold
Walter Rathenau: The Tragic Hero and Jewish Identity

Thursday 14.11.2024

How to watch

This lecture starts on 14 November at 5:00pm (UK).

Summary

Walter Rathenau (1867–1922) was one of the most fascinating characters in the extraordinary story of German Jewry. Born into great wealth, he was a reluctant industrialist and advisor to governments, a writer, a philosopher, and later, foreign minister in the Weimar Republic. This brilliant, complex character desperately wanted to belong to Germany and was held back by his Jewish origins. He gave so much to his country and yet in 1922 he was assassinated as an elder of Zion by a group of mystical right-wing fanatics as a sacrifice to the Nordic sun god.

Trudy Gold

An image of Trudy Gold

Trudy Gold was the CEO of the London Jewish Cultural Centre and a founding member of the British delegation to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). Throughout her career she taught modern Jewish history at schools, universities, and to adult groups and ran seminars on Holocaust education in the UK, Eastern Europe, and China. She also led Jewish educational tours all over the world. Trudy was the educational director of the student resources “Understanding the Holocaust” and “Holocaust Explained” and the author of The Timechart History of Jewish Civilization.