The last time I was in Germany was in 2004, to film a documentary series called Road to Berlin, which detailed the last 11 months of the war in Europe. Everywhere we went in Germany was to do with the war or the Nazis: Nordhausen, the underground V-weapons factory; the site of Hitler's bunker in Berlin; Bergen-Belsen. Eventually, fascinating as this stuff was, it was becoming obvious to me that there had to be so much more to the place than these British tropes and the events of what was, after all, a 15-year period in the country's history.
It is often stated that Germany was the most cultured country in the world (so how on earth did Nazism happen?), but I think it's fair to say we aren't that sure of what that culture was. And anyway, once you begin to look into it, it becomes clear that there wasn't any such place until pretty recently. Strictly speaking, Germany didn't exist until unification in 1871 (and there have been several Gemanies since).
So earlier this year we went to Germany to look beyond the lazy and comfortable, almost Pavlovian stereotypes we have of this country, and discovered one thing more than anything else. I say "we" because every time I have been to Germany (save one trip 18 years ago to go to Köln Comedy Festival) I've been with a film crew and, as was the case this time, the crew is entirely tangled up with my impression of the place; my perception of Germany has been through the prism of the programme we're making.
First, the place is enormous. While we were not supposed to be thinking about the Nazis, the sheer size of the country makes you scratch your head at the idea of Lebensraum (Hitler's expansionist policy into countries in the east). We spent many long hours on the autobahn, complete with terrifyingly fast drivers, and there were times when it seemed we'd never get to Berlin.
What gradually revealed itself as we travelled around investigating German culture was the imaginative grip that the idea of Germany exerted over its writers, musicians and architects. But also how much the place looked outwards for inspiration.
We started our journey in Heiligendamm, a Baltic beach and spa resort almost as far north as you can go in Germany. While this may well be the perfect holiday resort in the summer, we were there in February. There were ice floes out to sea, the wind was whipping in off wherever it is that's very cold that the wind whips in off, and it seemed like we were off to an entirely hare-brained start. But Heiligendamm is a Regency-era resort, the buildings reminiscent of Brighton, and it was the seaside getaway for European princes and playboys – the Tsar had his own place there. The elegance of its white buildings echoes northern Germany's sophisticated and wealthy past.
Also in Heiligendamm we found the first hint of a stereotype coming true: rather than watching their deck chairs get blown away into the Baltic, the locals stayed put by the beach thanks to the local invention of the strandkorb – literally beach basket. These huge two-person wicker monsters are half sedan chair, half sofa – a sort of 4x4 deck chair. They smack of German engineering and efficiency (as we, the British, see them); but as the wind whipped in from wherever, they just seemed sensible. And again and again, as we ventured south, the stereotypes fell away, and as usual, really said more about us than them.
Hamburg, as we all know, gave us the Beatles. But it was also where Brahms grew up, playing with his father in pubs and bars, some of which could be described as dodgy. Just don't tell the Brahms scholar that. Germany is well suited to a cultural whistlestop tour because everywhere you go there are arts centres, lovingly restored birthplaces, archives, bilingual (thank God) scholars. In Liverpool they knocked down the original Cavern Club (just saying).
Brahms – when he wasn't oozing melancholy in the direction of Clara Schumann – was deeply concerned with the idea of what German music might be, and how to make it purely German. In a cultural setting such as this the idea seems almost benign, and he spent a large part of his career embroiled in a row with Wagner about this very issue (I wasn't much of a fan of Wagner's music, and the more you get to know about him the less you like him; a couple of stirring tunes aside, he comes across as a truly ghastly man). Whether Brahms achieved his aim of creating purely German music I don't know – it seems to me to be suffused in melancholy more than anything else, and looking at his life of romantic yearning maybe that's more him than German-ness.
Berlin seems as unlike Hamburg as London is unlike Paris. When trying to re-establish Berlin after the Thirty Years' War (and so much of what has happened in Berlin happens in the aftermath of war) the Prussian Elector Frederick William embraced religious tolerance as a way to get people to come and live there. French Huguenots fleeing persecution in France came to the city. Further east than you think, Berlin very much has the sense of being somewhere in the middle of Europe and caught in the political currents that have flowed through it. The politics feel raw: there are the distinctly different buildings in the eastern part of the city, not to mention the outline of the Wall, the Holocaust memorial, the site of Hitler's bunker (which is in what can be best described as a dog-shit car park). It's almost impossible not to be bludgeoned by history in Berlin.
Leaving the north the tone changes again – on our way to Munich we visited Dresden, which, rather than being the smoking ruin of my foolish imagination, has been restored to its historic glory. But it was Munich – nearer Italy than Hamburg – where another Germany revealed itself: Catholic, alpine, a place where the tragic story of "Mad" King Ludwig II marks Bavaria's end and the beginning of the era of unification and the Kaiser.
Ludwig became king in 1864 when he was 18, but also at the point when the crown's power had pretty much dwindled away. So he set about the business of being kingly, styling himself on Louis XIV, building palaces, riding around in gaudy golden sleighs with electric lights – in other words, being generally fabulous. He borrowed vast sums, sponsored Wagner (who saw in the young king a great fleecing opportunity) and gave money to people on the streets. His palaces at Linderhof and Neuschwanstein are spectacular (if a little over the top), built with all the latest mod cons, such as central heating. However, Ludwig's romantic pursuit of being the perfect German prince didn't sit well in the age of the Iron Chancellor, and he came unstuck – deposed, declared mad and dying in mysterious circumstances. Ludwig's end coincides with an end to romantic frivolity in German culture and the assimilation of the search for national identity into mainstream politics. And we all know where that ended up.
The three weeks we spent in Germany were fascinating. It staggers me, for a country with a German royal family, how uninterested we are in the place. Over 21 days, and two films, we managed not to mention the war (well, I mentioned it once but I think I got away with it). It's a huge, diverse, energetic place, and one that I really, really must visit without a film crew and have time to take in.
Al Murray's German Adventure will be shown on 1 December at 9pm on BBC 4
