THE ALIENATION EFFECT

Britain Made in Europe In the 1930s tens of thousands of central Europeans sought sanctuary from fascism in Britain While the rainy seemingly quaint island they discovered on arrival was a far cry from the dynamism of Weimar Berlin or Red Vienna it was safe and it became home Yet the émigrés had not arrived alone they brought with them new and radical ideas and as they began to rebuild their lives and livelihoods they transformed the face of Britain forever Drawing on an immense cast of artists and intellectuals including celebrated figures like Erno Goldfinger forgotten luminaries like Ruth Glass and a host of larger than life visionaries and charlatans the historian Owen Hatherley argues that in the resulting clash between European modernism and British moderation our imaginations were fundamentally realigned and remade for the better In casting what Bertolt Brecht called in a new German word a Verfremdungseffekt an alienation effect on Britain the aliens made us all a little bit alien too Provocative entertaining and meticulously researched The Alienation Effect opens our eyes to the influence of the émigrés all around us many of our most quintessentially British icons are the product of this culture clash and entreats us to remember