Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition
Today the University of Göttingen. The pictures accompanying this article were all taken by Xinhua News Agency reporter Shan Yuqi except for the signature
Today the University of Göttingen.
Auditorium of the University of Göttingen. Photo by Xu Meide
Today the library of the University of Göttingen.
Exterior view of Judd's house at 3 Planckstraße Göttingen.
At the former residence of Zhu De at 3 Planck Street, Göttingen, there is an exquisite marble commemorative plaque on the wall, on which the words "Zhu De, Marshal of the People's Republic of China" are engraved in German.
The University of Göttingen is located in the southern part of the German state of Lower Saxony and is one of the most famous university towns in Germany. In the 1920s, in search of a new way to save the country, Judd studied at the University of Göttingen, where he left his revolutionary footprints.
Explore the footprints of revolution
In October 1922, Jude arrived in Germany, where the workers' movement was flourishing. He first settled in Berlin, where he met Zhou Enlai, who had arrived in Europe and was carrying out revolutionary activities in Berlin at the time, and with the help of Zhou Enlai, Zhu De joined the Chinese Communist Party.
On 4 May 1923, Jude arrived in Göttingen to begin his studies, initially living at 88 Vinde Langt Road and later moving to 3 Planck Street.
Today, at 3 Planck Street, where Judd lived at the time, you can see an old German building made of red brick with an elaborate marble commemorative plaque embedded in the wall, engraved in German with the words "Zhu De, Marshal of the People's Republic of China" and so on.
In 1986, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Jude's birth, the city of Göttingen held a grand ceremony here, and the then mayor personally unveiled the commemorative plaque.
The story of Jude's studies at the University of Göttingen is familiar to generations of Chinese students who have studied at the university. Jude's register is still preserved in the school library, and in the Göttingen City Archives, there is also a registration card for Jude to register as a resident at that time.
According to the archives, Zhu De organized and participated in many social activities outside of schoolwork. According to the relevant archives, it has been recorded that the Chinese Students' Union in Göttingen applied to the police for a march and distributed leaflets entitled "What Happened in China?" It introduced the "May Thirtieth Massacre" and its historical background, as well as the tragic living conditions of the Chinese working class, and expounded the significance of the anti-imperialist and anti-colonial struggle of the Chinese people. During his stay in Germany, Zhu De was arrested twice for participating in revolutionary activities such as the Shanghai strike after the May Thirtieth Massacre. In 1925, he was forced to leave Germany due to changes in the situation.
Helga Maria Kuhn, former director of the Göttingen Archives, pointed out in his article "Chinese Guests in Göttingen" that Jude was more committed to discussing political and military topics with Chinese compatriots during his study in Germany.
Sometimes, locals also confuse Zhou Enlai and Zhu De. In the winter when I first arrived in Göttingen, I met a professor in the department of forestry because I was looking for a part-time job, and promised the professor to clear the snow for him during Christmas. But after Christmas, it didn't snow in Göttingen. When I met with the professor again and chatted, he talked about Zhou Enlai's study at the University of Göttingen, and the author corrected that it should be Zhu De.
Walk into the old university
On the website of the China Federation of Students at the University of Göttingen, you can still see a brief introduction to Zhu De's study abroad. It has been more than 90 years since Zhu De studied at the University of Göttingen, and more and more Chinese students are studying at the university.
Looking back at history, in the development process of the University of Göttingen for more than 280 years, the most well-known to the world are the Grimm brothers, the compilers of Grimm's fairy tales, the poet Heine, and the "iron-blooded prime minister" Bismarck, which can be described as brilliant stars and celebrities.
In the war-torn era, the University of Göttingen was fortunate enough to avoid the bombing of the Old Town, and many of Göttingen's old buildings are intact compared to the reconstruction of many German cities after ruins. This is not only a great blessing for architectural scholars, but also a blessing for students.
Speaking of the achievements of the University of Göttingen, there are 45 Nobel laureates in the fields of physics, chemistry and medicine, and the universities in the German-speaking region are among the best. The university basically concentrated the first-class scholars of the time, such as Max Planck, Gauss, Riemann, David Hilbert and so on. Today's science campus is located in the northwest of the central campus, including the School of Physics, the School of Chemistry, and so on. However, the old mathematics department and physics department are in the outer ring of the city hall, across the street from the gauss and Weber statues.
In addition to being well known for science, the University of Göttingen has also made great achievements in the liberal arts, in addition to the regular colleges, there are many departments that are not considered "popular", which together form a "humanities college", such as Egyptology, Coptic studies, ancient Orientalism, Indian Studies, Iranian Studies and so on. These "unpopular" departments have very few students who study as the first major of undergraduates, resulting in the situation of two or three students in one class. Sometimes for these reasons, some majors are closed by universities after the chair professor retires.
In addition to Zhu De, from 1935 to 1945, Ji Xianlin, a famous scholar in China, studied and studied at the University of Göttingen for 10 years, majoring in Indology, learning Sanskrit and Pali, and making outstanding contributions in the professional academic field.
History and reality merge
Since Göttingen is a university town, there are departments of the University of Göttingen throughout the city. The old library is not far from the old town hall, while the new university and the Lower Saxony State Library are in the new campus area. Entering from the library is a large square surrounded by the Seminary, the Faculty of Economics, the Faculty of Law, and the Central Refectory. Located one street away, the German department, the philosophy department and other departments are located. Across the street are the locations of the Department of Indian Studies, the Department of Turkish and Central Asian Studies, and the Italian canteen next to it.
In October 2010, I arrived at the University of Göttingen, an academic holy city, and initially studied for an undergraduate degree in Indic studies and ancient Greek language, which was extremely stressful, such as I was the only foreigner in the Sanskrit class. In addition to the author in the ancient Greek latin class, there was also a Japanese student studying philosophy at that time. However, the teachers will take care of foreign students, such as in the Introduction to Indian Studies class in the Department of Indian Studies, and the teacher will send us the lecture script for final review. The atmosphere in the department is excellent, and every morning, Teacher Forna will come to each office to ask everyone for an early morning. In the afternoon, students from different countries often drink coffee and eat cake together in the department's small kitchen. In addition to teachers and students, there are also many citizens who are patronized by science, and they often go in and out of university classrooms, watch movies, enjoy cultural facilities such as theaters with students.
There is a famous bronze statue of the "Shepherd Girl" in the square in front of the old town hall of Göttingen, surrounded by various bars, restaurants, clothing stores, and every afternoon, many people drink coffee and beer in the open air. On Saturdays, there is an endless stream of people coming, and the annual Christmas market is also full of tourists.
In the pen of brothers Grimm, the "goose shepherd girl" is a princess, after being manipulated by witches, forced to go to herding geese, and later experienced various hardships, finally reunited with the prince and lived a happy life. There is this beautiful meaning, so Göttingen has a tradition, that is, every year after the doctoral thesis defense, prospective doctors can sit on a float, by relatives and friends banging gongs and drums to the square, and then the "parties" present the flowers prepared in advance in the department, and kiss the "shepherd girl" in the attention of the teacher and friends and the music next to them. The author had the privilege of experiencing it once in the company of my mentor, and I still think about it like yesterday.
(The author is a PhD from the University of Göttingen, Germany)