The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany

Shirer’s authorship of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich introduces an important context. There are two significant reasons for this.

First, as a newspaper and radio correspondent, Shirer adopts the narrative approach of a reporter eager to convey the details of a story. His journalistic background allows him to reconstruct crucial episodes in the history of the Third Reich, in some cases hour-by-hour. It means, however, that certain topics worthy of extensive analysis, such as Nazi ideology or the Holocaust, appear only in single chapters or parts of chapters.

Second, unlike most writers of history, Shirer met many of the individuals and witnessed many of the events he describes. While The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich never reads like a memoir, it does feature Shirer’s own first-hand observations and conclusions. In June 1940, for instance, when France surrendered to Germany at Compiegne, Shirer stood only a few yards away from Hitler, whose face Shirer describes as “grave, solemn, yet brimming with revenge” (742). Elsewhere in the book, Shirer notes the Nazi dictator’s appearance and demeanor on important occasions, such as Reichstag speeches and Nazi Party rallies at

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