When it became clear that the Nazi were losing control of the air space above Germany and Austria, their heartland, they decided to build so-called “Flak Towers”, named after the abbreviation of “FLiegerAbwehrKanone” (air-defense cannon).
Not that it helped much, and they knew it wouldn’t help, but those monumental (and monumentally ugly) structures of concrete were at least impressive, looked mighty, in other words, it was propaganda again.
Vienna has six of them in three pairs, and this is one of the the two in “Augarten”, an otherwise beautiful baroque garden in Vienna’s 20th district.
Eight such pairs were built, three in Berlin, three in Vienna and two in Hamburg. They are ugly as hell, but they were constructed to withstand massive bombardment, thus it would be almost impossible to tear them down, and so they stand and remind us of Nazi barbarism.
I have no idea if Tolkien knew those towers, but if so, Orthanc and Barad-dûr may well have been inspired by them.
For illustrative purposes I’ve added three JPEGs fresh from the camera. Enjoyment would be the wrong word 😄
The Song of the Day is “Grown So Ugly” from the 1966 album “Safe As Milk” by Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band. Well, the Captain always had a peculiar voice. Hear it on YouTube.
Juha Haataja (2011-10-20)
What it is that both you and Mark Hobson referred to Tolkien almost simultaneously? Anyway, the main photograph above made me smile. Mark also made me smile, with his quote "a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world". I had never known about the other book Krugman wrote about, Atlas Shrugged. There is a difference between fantasy and fantasy...
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