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Editorial Introduction 
 
 
Howard Louthan 
University of Minnesota 
 
 
We are delighted to introduce and share with you our third volume of the Central Europe 
Yearbook. In three short years the Yearbook has grown in significant ways. Though the 
Center for Austrian Studies at the University of Minnesota hosts the Yearbook, we are not a 
Minnesota publication, but one, as reflected both by our editorial board and contributors, 
that is decidedly international. This year’s edition includes the scholarship of gifted and 
dedicated students from seven countries and three continents! From Harvard University to 
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, we are presenting contributions this year 
from literally across the globe. We are also becoming the multilingual publication we had 
envisioned from our inception, as we feature articles in both English and German this year. 
The 2021 Yearbook also captures the geographic and cultural diversity of Central Europe. 
Though, as one would expect, there is treatment of the German-speaking lands of the 
continent, this year we also provide coverage of Bohemia, Transylvania, Poland, northern 
Italy, and the former Yugoslavia, while two of our articles stretch even further and consider 
North American connections with Central Europe.  
 
We are also developing into a multidisciplinary publication as we showcase an impressive 
range of research on Central Europe across a variety of academic fields. Our contributors 
examine the ephemeral art and architecture of eighteenth-century funerals and the poetry 
of German expressionists responding to the rapid urbanization of early twentieth-century 
society. In a special forum we take an in-depth look at one region in particular, early 
modern Transylvania. From vampires to religious radicals, our three authors consider the 
social and cultural particularities of this fascinating region caught between the Habsburgs 
and the Ottomans. We also feature a pair of articles that deal with cultural exchange and 
transatlantic diplomacy in two very different settings. We start with an investigation of 
Protestant immigrants from Salzburg and their encounter with native groups in 
eighteenth-century Georgia before moving later to Cold War America and a critical trade 
delegation to Yugoslavia in 1958.  
 
In this edition we also revisit old themes of the region from new perspectives. Nationalism 
is a thread that runs through many of our articles. We trace it in a more traditional manner 
with an investigation of Giuseppe Mazzini working for Italian unification against the 
backdrop of an Austrian state eager to quell patriotic sentiments in their territory. Two of 
our essays pair nationalism with a consideration of military developments. We explore the 
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and seek to understand how failed military reforms 
contributed to the collapse and ultimate disappearance of the state in the late eighteenth 
century. We then move to the nineteenth century and the Habsburg lands as we examine 



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how the army as a multiethnic institution actually contributed to the stability and longevity 
of the Habsburg state, a bulwark against swirling nationalist currents.  
 
Our authors also tackle some of the thorniest political questions of nineteenth- and 
twentieth-century Central Europe. In a fascinating investigation of one of the most iconic 
figures of the German past, Otto von Bismarck, we consider one of the most radical steps he 
undertook as chancellor. His 1885 expulsion of non-naturalized Poles and Jews from 
Prussian lands foreshadowed the more dramatic population transfers that would occur in 
the next century. Our edition also includes a thoughtful examination of Salzburg at the end 
of the World War I and the emerging influence of Austrian socialists. What tactics did 
Salzburg’s socialists adopt with the collapse of the Habsburg Monarchy? Were they leading 
a “revolution”? How did the term “revolution” itself take on different meanings and 
significance in the politically dynamic postwar period? 
 
Finally, a few words about our first two contributions that set the tone of this edition in 
important ways. We begin by commemorating the 350th birthday of one of the most 
celebrated figures of the Czech past, John Amos Comenius.  Comenius, the last bishop of the 
Bohemian Brethren, is best known for his contributions in the field of education. In a 
creative digital project that blends both Czech and English, we are introduced to two of 
Comenius’s great masterpieces: the Orbis pictus (Visible World in Pictures; 1658), the first 
illustrated children’s book and language primer, and the Labyrint světa (Labyrinth of the 
World; 1623), a powerful dystopia that chronicles the wanderings of a seventeenth-century 
pilgrim through a dark and distorted landscape eerily reminiscent of our planet today. 
Despite the dangers and deceptions of his world, Comenius ultimately has a message of 
hope that is equally relevant, one that embraces human dignity and worth.  
 
We hear echoes of Comenius in the opening interview of our edition where we feature a 
conversation with one of the most prominent scholars of Central Europe in North America 
today. Professor Mary Lindemann, former president of both the American Historical 
Association and the German Studies Association, reflects on her journey to the university 
and her subsequent career in academia. In words that could have come directly from 
Comenius, she offers an eloquent defense of the humanities and social sciences in our own 
time of crisis in this new age of COVID.