The prospect of the Germans may cause even the devoted xenophobe to break stride. Viewed by some as a nation of square-jawed robots whose language sounds like something awful in the drains, whose cars outperform all others and whose football team seldom loses, the Germans seem unassailable.
But behind the facade lies a nation distinctly uncertain about where it is, where it is going, even how it got there. Seeking refuge from the worlds uncertainties, on the one hand they rely on order and system,the State and the Bundesbank; on the other they retreat into the Angst of the soul, psychoanalysis and high culture.