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janetl69 's review for:
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany
by William L. Shirer
I FINALLY FINISHED THIS BOOK!!!! It took me over a month, but I finally finished it! This was for the 2023 PopSugar Challenge category of "the longest book on your To Read Shelf" and it was something I've wanted to read for a while, there's just a LOT to it.
I generally don't read forwards or introductions to books, I just jump right in, which is what I did with this one, but then went back and read the intro at the end, which explained why there were somethings left out here. This was originally published in 1960 (with several updates since then) and I'm reading this in 2023 so there is a lot we've learned about since then, that the author didn't know either.
As someone who has read, watched, learned an immense amount about WWII & the nazi regime, there was not a lot of data in here that I wasn't aware of. What was interesting were his own, personal observations from actually being there in person and seeing events as they happened. It's similar to Erik Larson's In the Garden of Beast with the personal letters from the Dodd family in Berlin in the 30s.
Some personal observations...I wish this had maps in here. There were times that I had to stop and look things up because I couldn't remember where they were in relation to X or Y and maps would have helped. Several people were noted to be "man of limited intelligence" and yet that applied to SO MANY in the nazi party. The more I hear about Hitler's behavior and mood swings the more I think he was (aside from being a psychopath) he also had severe depression and was possibly bi-polor. To think, if they knew then, what we know now & he had been treated, the Holocaust would never have happened.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of observations in here that I'm also seeing in the current political climate here in the US. A couple sentences stood out to me: "...sometimes in casual conversation with a stranger, I would meet with the most outlandish assertions from seemingly educated and intelligent persons. It was obvious they were parroting some piece of nonsense they had heard or read." Social media is making this much worse and I do not understand how people cannot see the parallels between Hitler and Trump and it's the same thing (except Trump is somehow, more pathetic).
We all know that hindsight is 20/20, but it's still amazing how there are times where you can pinpoint where the future changed. I have to wonder if in 1924, if Heinrich Held had not lifted the ban on the nazi party & their newspapers, if any of this would have come about.
There's a LOT of data in here and for "non-readers" they will probably never even attempt to read it, but this is still a good account of events that occurred during the rise & fall of the third reich and if one fells up to the task, to give it a read.
I generally don't read forwards or introductions to books, I just jump right in, which is what I did with this one, but then went back and read the intro at the end, which explained why there were somethings left out here. This was originally published in 1960 (with several updates since then) and I'm reading this in 2023 so there is a lot we've learned about since then, that the author didn't know either.
As someone who has read, watched, learned an immense amount about WWII & the nazi regime, there was not a lot of data in here that I wasn't aware of. What was interesting were his own, personal observations from actually being there in person and seeing events as they happened. It's similar to Erik Larson's In the Garden of Beast with the personal letters from the Dodd family in Berlin in the 30s.
Some personal observations...I wish this had maps in here. There were times that I had to stop and look things up because I couldn't remember where they were in relation to X or Y and maps would have helped. Several people were noted to be "man of limited intelligence" and yet that applied to SO MANY in the nazi party. The more I hear about Hitler's behavior and mood swings the more I think he was (aside from being a psychopath) he also had severe depression and was possibly bi-polor. To think, if they knew then, what we know now & he had been treated, the Holocaust would never have happened.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of observations in here that I'm also seeing in the current political climate here in the US. A couple sentences stood out to me: "...sometimes in casual conversation with a stranger, I would meet with the most outlandish assertions from seemingly educated and intelligent persons. It was obvious they were parroting some piece of nonsense they had heard or read." Social media is making this much worse and I do not understand how people cannot see the parallels between Hitler and Trump and it's the same thing (except Trump is somehow, more pathetic).
We all know that hindsight is 20/20, but it's still amazing how there are times where you can pinpoint where the future changed. I have to wonder if in 1924, if Heinrich Held had not lifted the ban on the nazi party & their newspapers, if any of this would have come about.
There's a LOT of data in here and for "non-readers" they will probably never even attempt to read it, but this is still a good account of events that occurred during the rise & fall of the third reich and if one fells up to the task, to give it a read.