The Greek crisis through Schaeuble’s memoirs

His political career lasted over half a century; it was full of crises, scandals, even an assassination attempt. But some of the most dramatic passages in the memoirs of Wolfgang Schaeuble (September 18,1942 - December 26, 2023) concern Greece.

All main actors of the financial crisis are sketched in his memoirs; the prime ministers and ministers with whom Schaeuble was called to resolve one of the most formidable challenges to the European project. Prime ministers George Papandreou, Antonis Samaras, Alexis Tsipras and finance ministers George Papaconstantinou, Evangelos Venizelos, Yanis Varoufakis and Euclid Tsakalotos are some of the persons subjected to the late German finance minister's ever-sarcastic narration; Schaeuble is aware of how hated a figure he had become to the Greeks.

The book "Erinnerungen" (Memoirs), subtitled "My Life in Politics" was published in...