Ian Kershaw is a British historian, renowned for his comprehensive biographies of Adolf Hitler. His work delves into the complexities of Hitler's life and the Nazi regime with analytical depth and critical insight. Kershaw examines the psychological motivations and historical forces that shaped the twentieth century. His research offers readers profound understanding of the pivotal events and figures that influenced modern history.
Following the enormous success of HITLER: HUBRIS this book triumphantly completes one of the great modern biographies. No figure in twentieth century history more clearly demands a close biographical understanding than Adolf Hitler; and no period is more important than the Second World War. Beginning with Hitler's startling European successes in the aftermath of the Rhinelland occupation and ending nine years later with the suicide in the Berlin bunker, Kershaw allows us as never before to understand the motivation and the impact of this bizarre misfit. He addresses the crucial questions about the unique nature of Nazi radicalism, about the Holocaust and about the poisoned European world that allowed Hitler to operate so effectively.
This one-volume edition of Kershaw's "superb biography" (Ian Buruma, "New York Times Book Review") of Hitler will be the final word on the most demonic figure of the 20th century. of photos.
Kershaw presents an understanding of Hitler and of the sequence of events which allowed a misfit to climb to the leadership of Germany. As Hitler's pitiful fantasy of being Germany's saviour attracted more and more support, Kershaw conveys why so many Germans adored and connived with him or felt powerless to resist him.
Ian Kershaw's biography of Hitler is a definitive work that combines a personal history of the dictator with an analysis of the forces that enabled his rise to power. Kershaw explores Hitler's impact and the context of Nazi Germany, providing a vivid account of his ascent and the resulting atrocities of World War II.
'Superb ... likely to become a classic' Observer In the summer of 1914 most of Europe plunged into a war so catastrophic that it unhinged the continent's politics and beliefs in a way that took generations to recover from. The disaster terrified its survivors, shocked that a civilization that had blandly assumed itself to be a model for the rest of the world had collapsed into a chaotic savagery beyond any comparison. In 1939 Europeans would initiate a second conflict that managed to be even worse - a war in which the killing of civilians was central and which culminated in the Holocaust. To Hell and Back tells this story with humanity, flair and originality. Kershaw gives a compelling narrative of events, but he also wrestles with the most difficult issues that the events raise - with what it meant for the Europeans who initiated and lived through such fearful times - and what this means for us.
This is a a fascinating and original exploration of how the Third Reich was willing and able to fight to the bitter end of World War II. Countless books have been written about why Nazi Germany lost World War II, yet remarkably little attention has been paid to the equally vital question of how and why it was able to hold out as long as it did. The Third Reich did not surrender until Germany had been left in ruins and almost completely occupied.
As an exploration of the interpretational issues that eddy around the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw's The Nazi Dictatorship has become a classic account. But if its core remains unchanged, its contents must necessarily reflect both new public controversies and the onrush of fresh research. In the fourth edition there are many changes of detail to accommodate this need and substantial rewritings of two chapters. No subject among those dealt with in earlier editions has been the subject of such intensive research - and bringing such rapidly changing interpretations - as `Hitler and the Jews' and, accordingly, that chapter has been considerably changed. The book's final chapter has also undergone significant revision, to take account of the `Goldhagen phenomenon', and to glance back over the changing trends of research on the Third Reich as, with the passing of the generations, Hitler and his regime themselves pass into history.
From one of Britain's most distinguished historians and the bestselling author
of Hitler, this is the definitive history of a divided Europe, from the
aftermath of the Second World War to the present. After the overwhelming
horrors of the first half of the 20th century, described by Ian Kershaw in his
previous book as having gone 'to Hell and back', the years from 1950 to 2017
brought peace and relative prosperity to most of Europe. Enormous economic
improvements transformed the continent. The catastrophic era of the world wars
receded into an ever more distant past, though its long shadow continued to
shape mentalities. Europe was now a divided continent, living under the
nuclear threat in a period intermittently fraught with anxiety. Europeans
experienced a 'roller-coaster ride', both in the sense that they were flung
through a series of events which threatened disaster, but also in that they
were no longer in charge of their own destinies: for much of the period the
USA and USSR effectively reduced Europeans to helpless figures whose fates
were dictated to them by the Cold War. There were striking successes - the
Soviet bloc melted away, dictatorships vanished and Germany was successfully
reunited. But accelerating globalization brought new fragilities. The impact
of interlocking crises after 2008 was the clearest warning to Europeans that
there was no guarantee of peace and stability. In this remarkable book, Ian
Kershaw has created a grand panorama of the world we live in and where it came
from. Drawing on examples from all across the continent, Roller-Coaster will
make us all rethink Europe and what it means to be European.
