Professor Frank Trentmann has book shortlisted for Wolfson History Prize 2024
This year’s shortlist covers multiple centuries and countries, with a focus on major turning points in the histories of the Americas, Britain, Bangladesh, Germany, India, Pakistan and South Africa.
The Wolfson History Prize, the UK's most prestigious history writing prize awarded by the Wolfson Foundation, has today announced its shortlist for 2024, highlighting six of the best history books from the past year.
Frank Trentmann, Professor of History at Birkbeck, is one of the six authors shortlisted for his book, Out of the Darkness: The Germans, 1942-2022, which follows the German people from the Second World War to the present. It explores how the Germans emerged from and moved beyond Nazi Germany. From soldiers to pacifists, families and Churches, to migrants and populists, the book charts the moral transformation of the German people from Hitler to the present. Reflecting on complicity, compassion and conscience, the book places struggles about right and wrong at the heart of the story.
The judges’ commented on his book as “a wide-ranging and engaging portrait of Germany since World War II, highlighting the remarkable regeneration of its people in the post-Nazi era.”
Professor Frank Trentmann said: “I feel humbled and honoured. Several Wolfson Prize winners have been teachers and colleagues, and their books have been sources of inspiration – Simon Schama; Eric Hobsbawm; John Brewer; Joanna Bourke. They showed me that good history is argument and fun, and how we can bring the past to life with new questions and approaches. A lot of energy and emotion went into the writing of Out of the Darkness to take readers along the remarkable and often surprising journey of a complicated nation.
Frank Trentmann studied at the University of Hamburg, the London School of Economics and at Harvard University, and began teaching history at Princeton University. He is the author of Empire of Things and Free Trade Nation, and has been awarded the Whitfield Prize, a Moore Distinguished Fellowship at Caltech, the Austrian Science Book Prize, the Humboldt Research Award and, in 2023, the Bochum Historians’ Prize.
Out of the Darkness: The Germans, 1942-2022 was published simultaneously in English and German in November 2023 by AllenLane/Penguin (UK) and Fischer (Germany) and has been followed by an American edition by Knopf in February 2024, and forthcoming translations in French, Dutch, Russian and Chinese. It’s been named within 2024 ‘Books of the Year’ lists in The New Yorker, Der Spiegel and the Daily Telegraph.
Oliver Moody, Berlin Correspondent for The Times, wrote about the book as being “an impressive account of how Germany built a new identity for itself after the barbaric Nazi years ... terrifically insightful. This book runs to 838 pages, but barely a word is wasted. Trentmann is a skilful and unflashy storyteller with flickers of gentle irony.”
Now in its 52nd year, the Wolfson History Prize celebrates books that combine excellence in research with readability for a general audience, demonstrating the relevance of history and historical writing to society today. The most valuable history writing prize in the UK, the Wolfson History Prize awards a total of £75,000, with the winner receiving £50,000 and each of the five shortlisted authors receiving £5,000.
The overall winner of the Wolfson History Prize 2024 will be revealed at a ceremony in central London on Monday 2 December 2024.