Bismarck and the Founding of the Zukunft

Abstract

The signature Apostata which Harden began to attach to his Gegenwart articles in July, 1890, meant no sudden change in his relations with the press, but in politics it signalled a fundamental break in his career. Before this time he had seldom discussed purely political themes in his essays, though because he “lived and spun in Berlinish-progressive views,” as he later wrote, he had occasionally ventured satirical remarks about Chancellor Bismarck. His regular readers must therefore have been surprised to find in the article Phrasien, which appeared in July, 1890, a confession of admiration for the recently dismissed Chancellor. This was the change that Harden had wished to symbolize in adopting the pseudonym Apostata.¹