John brown brief biography of adolf hitler

American writer John Toland’s 1976 biography of Adolf Hitler is the second book I’ve read about the Nazis/Third Reich (the first being Mein Kampf). As a biography it is comprehensive and accessible. It functions also, necessarily, as a chronology of events during Hitler’s lifetime. In that respect, too, the book successfully grounds and orients a reader unacquainted with this epoch. Events are related in adequate detail, and mostly chronologically – a monumental feat in itself, given that the roots of most of the trends and events during the Third Reich are decades or centuries deep. But what makes Adolf Hitler particularly valuable is the book’s tone: utterly dispassionate, and free of judgment.

What holds true of good fiction applies also to nonfiction – the writer’s job is to narrate events, show character, and leave the reader to judge for himself. I would argue that this holds particularly true for a figure like Adolf Hitler. When I read/hear a writer/expert interviewee flinging epithets at an historical figure, reminding me exactly what I must think, I feel put off, and perversely inclined to champion the opposite view. When I’m reading a biography, I want to know who a person was, what they did and why, how they justified their actions, what people around them thought and felt, and what the consequences of those actions were. These details Toland’s biography shows clearly and without comment. It is a crucial public service when a historical inquiry shows us who a problematic person is.

For contrast, I’m currently reading William Shirer’s The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1969). This impressively-researched, monumental tome weakens its effect by abusing, at every opportunity, Hitler/other Nazis – as “homosexual perverts” (re: Rohm and some other S.A. leaders), as “disreputable” characters (the professions of some followers being butcher or nightclub bouncer or, in one instance, pornographer), or as “dull-witted” (re: Ribbentrop and some other

Dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945

"Hitler" and "The Führer" redirect here. For other uses, see Hitler (disambiguation) and Führer (disambiguation).

Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 until his suicide in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then taking the title of Führer und Reichskanzler in 1934. His invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 marked the start of the Second World War. He was closely involved in military operations throughout the war and was central to the perpetration of the Holocaust: the genocide of about six million Jews and millions of other victims.

Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn in Austria-Hungary and moved to Germany in 1913. He was decorated during his service in the German Army in World War I, receiving the Iron Cross. In 1919, he joined the German Workers' Party (DAP), the precursor of the Nazi Party, and in 1921 was appointed leader of the Nazi Party. In 1923, he attempted to seize power in a failed coup in Munich and was sentenced to five years in prison, serving just over a year. While there, he dictated the first volume of his autobiography and political manifestoMein Kampf (My Struggle). After his early release in 1924, Hitler gained popular support by attacking the Treaty of Versailles and promoting pan-Germanism, antisemitism, and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and Nazi propaganda. He frequently denounced communism as being part of an international Jewish conspiracy. By November 1932, the Nazi Party held the most seats in the Reichstag, but not a majority. Former chancellor Franz von Papen and other conservative leaders convinced President Paul von Hindenburg to appoint Hitler as chancellor on 30 January 1933. Shortly thereafter, the Reichstag passed the Enabling Act of 1933, which began the

This bibliography of Adolf Hitler is a list of some non-fiction texts in English written about and by him.

Thousands of books and other texts have been written about him, so this is far from an all-inclusive list: Writing in 2006, Ben Novak, an historian who specializes in Hitler studies, estimated that in 1975 there were more than 50,000 books and scholarly articles while these numbers rose to 120,000 in 1995, amounting to some 24 books and articles every day, also adding that such "number is growing exponentially."

The list has been arranged into groups to make it more manageable.

Written by Adolf Hitler

Co-written by Hitler or containing words by Hitler

Hitler's speeches

Main article: List of speeches given by Adolf Hitler

Books from the Adolf Hitler Library

The bulk of Adolf Hitler's library (approximately 1,200 titles) is in the Third Reich Collection at the Library of Congress.

Brown University Library has 99 titles that are connected to locations where Adolf Hitler lived or worked.

Leonard Hitler Collection (1945) Quentin B. Leonard, Class of 1944, mailed 2 magazines to Prof. Raymond Archibald. The letter Mr. Leonard included with the package is dated 13 August 1945 and reads, "On Saturday afternoon I mailed to you a folder containing a couple of magazines printed in German. These magazines came from one of the buildings at Hitler's Berchtesgaden residence. I picked them from the rubble when I visited there last May. They are totally worthless, except for their souvenir value."

Aronson Hitler Collection (1986) The 80 books in this collection were retrieved by Colonel Albert Aronson from Hitler's bunker in May of 1945. They were donated to Brown in 1986.

Smyth Hitler Collection (January 2020) From a collection of books retrieved from Adolf Hitler's Munich apartment in 1945 by Lieut. Craig Hugh Smyth. The books were donated to the John Hay Library by sculptor Ned Smyth in 2020.