This book offers a comparative study of historical television genres in Europe, with a special focus on Germany and Great Britain and their way of narrating twentieth century European history. The book analyses our common European past and memory through central historical television narratives. Each chapter looks at how historical TV genres, fictional and documentary, have dealt with the most salient and defining periods, events and changes in the twentieth century¿ an age of extremes. Bondebjerg offers unique theoretical and analytical insight into the role of television in mediating and shaping the past. The book explores television¿s creation of transnational cultural encounters across Europe in relation to our common and national past. The book addresses how television has influenced our understanding of history, collective memory and public debate over the twentieth century. It is fundamentally a book about the importance of the past in present day Europe and the centrality ofmedia for transnational understanding.

Develops an innovative understanding of mediated cultural encounters in Europe, of how historical television drama shapes our understanding of twentieth century European history, and how the past is still a very important part of present European cultures and societies, a place where national and transnational dimensions cross and the way we see ourselves and others is shaped

1. Introduction. A Century of Extremes and Profound Changes: Mediating European History.- 2. Memory and History as Mediated and Embodied Narratives.- 3. Historical Genres on Television: The Broader European Picture.- 4. The Meaning of Small Things: Everyday Drama and History from Below.- 5. History from Above: Historical Biopics.- 6. Grand illusions and The Great War: WW1 Narratives.- 7. Living on the Edge: The Roaring Twenties and World Crisis.- 8. Hell on Earth: WW2 War Narratives.- 9. Post-war Europe: Cold War, Welfare and Cultural Revolution.- 10. Europe 1989 and Beyond: Towards the New Millennium.- 11. Conclusion: History on Our Mind - the Forms and Functions of Mediated History