The Tomb of the “True German”: Kuno Francke and the American Rejection of a German Ideal

From the time of Goethe and Schiller, much has been written on the question of “What is Germany?” and “Who are the Germans?” Kuno Francke was a German-born professor of Germanic languages and literatures at Harvard, who because of the fact that he lived outside Germany was able—or so he thought—to detect the essence of the “true German.” The present article explores Francke’s concept of the “true German” and claims that America ultimately rejected what Francke believed to be the contribution of the “true German” to civilization.