An Unofficial 'The Rest Is History' Reading List

63. Hitler, with Ian Kershaw - part 1

June 14, 2021

Description

He was “the embodiment of modern political evil” according to historian Sir Ian Kershaw. In this first episode of a two-part investigation of the Nazi dictator, Sir Ian joins Dominic Sandbrook and...
Read more here

Books Referenced

Hitler: A Study in Tyranny

Author: Alan Bullock

Context:

Ian Kershaw mentions rereading Bullock's biography of Hitler when deciding whether to write his own biography. Referenced as 'reread Bullock.'

Hitler (biography)

Author: Joachim Fest

Context:

Ian Kershaw mentions rereading 'the leading German biography of Hitler by Joachim Fest' when considering writing his own Hitler biography.

Mein Kampf

Author: Adolf Hitler

Context:

Referenced multiple times in discussion of Hitler's ideology and development. Kershaw discusses what Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf about his realization he could speak, and about figures he admired like Georg Schoenner and Karl Lueger.

The Hitler Myth

Author: Ian Kershaw

Context:

Ian Kershaw mentions his own earlier book when discussing Hitler's belief in his own infallibility, particularly around the remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936.

Frederick the Great

Author: Thomas Carlyle

Context:

Dominic mentions that Hitler 'read Thomas Carlyle, or he had Thomas Carlyle's book on Frederick the Great' when discussing Hitler's sense of himself as a great man.