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This elegant and sobering (New York Times) history reveals how Germany's fractured republic gave way to the Third Reich, from the breakthrough of the Nazi party to the rise of Hitler
Amid the ravages of economic depression, Germans in the early 1930s were pulled to political extremes both left and right. Then, in the spring of 1933, Germany turned itself inside out, from a deeply divided republic into a one-party dictatorship. In Hitler's First Hundred Days, award-winning historian Peter Fritzsche offers a probing account of the pivotal moments when the majority of Germans seemed, all at once, to join the Nazis to construct the Third Reich. Fritzsche examines the events of the period--the elections and mass arrests, the bonfires and gunfire, the patriotic rallies and anti-Jewish boycotts--to understand both the terrifying power the National Socialists exerted over ordinary Germans and the powerful appeal of the new era they promised.
Hitler's First Hundred Days is the chilling story of the beginning of the end, when one hundred days inaugurated a new thousand-year Reich.
On January 30, 1933, hearing about the celebrations for Hitler's assumption of power, Erich Ebermayer remarked bitterly in his diary, We are the losers, definitely the losers. Learning of the Nuremberg Laws in 1935, which made Jews non-citizens, he raged, hate is sown a million-fold. Yet in March 1938, he wept for joy at the Anschluss with Austria: Not to want it just because it has been achieved by Hitler would be folly.
In a masterful work, Peter Fritzsche deciphers the puzzle of Nazism's ideological grip. Its basic appeal lay in the Volksgemeinschaft--a people's community that appealed to Germans to be part of a great project to redress the wrongs of the Versailles treaty, make the country strong and vital, and rid the body politic of unhealthy elements. The goal was to create a new national and racial self-consciousness among Germans. For Germany to live, others--especially Jews--had to die. Diaries and letters reveal Germans' fears, desires, and reservations, while showing how Nazi concepts saturated everyday life. Fritzsche examines the efforts of Germans to adjust to new racial identities, to believe in the necessity of war, to accept the dynamic of unconditional destruction--in short, to become Nazis. Powerful and provocative, Life and Death in the Third Reich is a chilling portrait of how ideology takes hold.
Why did ordinary Germans vote for Hitler? In this dramatically plotted book, organized around crucial turning points in 1914, 1918, and 1933, Peter Fritzsche explains why the Nazis were so popular and what was behind the political choice made by the German people.
Rejecting the view that Germans voted for the Nazis simply because they hated the Jews, or had been humiliated in World War I, or had been ruined by the Great Depression, Fritzsche makes the controversial argument that Nazism was part of a larger process of democratization and political invigoration that began with the outbreak of World War I. The twenty-year period beginning in 1914 was characterized by the steady advance of a broad populist revolution that was animated by war, drew strength from the Revolution of 1918, menaced the Weimar Republic, and finally culminated in the rise of the Nazis. Better than anyone else, the Nazis twisted together ideas from the political Left and Right, crossing nationalism with social reform, anti-Semitism with democracy, fear of the future with hope for a new beginning. This radical rebelliousness destroyed old authoritarian structures as much as it attacked liberal principles. The outcome of this dramatic social revolution was a surprisingly popular regime that drew on public support to realize its horrible racial goals. Within a generation, Germans had grown increasingly self-reliant and sovereign, while intensely nationalistic and chauvinistic. They had recast the nation, but put it on the road to war and genocide.
In this inventive book, Peter Fritzsche explores how Europeans and Americans saw themselves in the drama of history, how they took possession of a past thought to be slipping away, and how they generated countless stories about the sorrowful, eventful paths they chose to follow.
In the aftermath of the French Revolution, contemporaries saw themselves as occupants of an utterly new period. Increasingly disconnected from an irretrievable past, worried about an unknown and dangerous future, they described themselves as indisputably modern. To be cast in the new time of the nineteenth century was to recognize the weird shapes of historical change, to see landscapes scattered with ruins, and to mourn the remains of a bygone era. Tracing the scars of history, writers and painters, revolutionaries and exiles, soldiers and widows, and ordinary home dwellers took a passionate, even flamboyant, interest in the past. They argued politics, wrote diaries, devoured memoirs, and collected antiques, all the time charting their private paths against the tremors of public life. These nostalgic histories take place on battlefields trampled by Napoleon, along bucolic English hedges, against the fairytale silhouettes of the Grimms' beloved Germany, and in the newly constructed parlors of America's western territories. This eloquent book takes a surprising, completely original look at the modern age: our possessions, our heritage, and our newly considered selves.
The essential guide to caring for a happy, healthy hamster!
Small, soft, and completely adorable, the hamster has long been a favorite pet for children (and adults) for decades. But it's important for pet owners to understand exactly what they need to do to keep their hamster happy and well-cared for. This pet book provides readers with comprehensive and accessible information on hamsters, including:
Written by a pet specialist and featuring high-quality photos and instructive line art, this hamster bible is exactly what every animal lover needs!
Franz Göll was a thoroughly typical Berliner. He worked as a clerk, sometimes as a postal employee, night watchman, or publisher's assistant. He enjoyed the movies, ate spice cake, wore a fedora, tamed sparrows, and drank beer or schnapps. He lived his entire life in a two-room apartment in Rote Insel, Berlin's famous working-class district. What makes Franz Göll different is that he left behind one of the most comprehensive diaries available from the maelstrom of twentieth-century German life. Deftly weaving in Göll's voice from his diary entries, Fritzsche narrates the quest of an ordinary citizen to make sense of a violent and bewildering century.
Peter Fritzsche paints a deeply affecting portrait of a self-educated man seized by an untamable impulse to record, who stayed put for nearly seventy years as history thundered around him. Determined to compose a symphony from the music of everyday life, Göll wrote of hungry winters during World War I, the bombing of Berlin, the rape of his neighbors by Russian soldiers in World War II, and the flexing of U.S. superpower during the Reagan years. In his early entries, Göll grappled with the intellectual shockwaves cast by Darwin, Freud, and Einstein, and later he struggled to engage with the strange lifestyles that marked Germany's transition to a fluid, dynamic, unmistakably modern society. With expert analysis, Fritzsche shows how one man's thoughts and desires can give poignant shape to the collective experience of twentieth-century life, registering its manifold shocks and rendering them legible.
A must-have guide for Golden Hamster owners!
While Golden Hamsters don't get along with other hamsters and can't be kept in pairs, they make wonderful companions. Docile and friendly, these distinctively colored hamsters are ideal as family pets. This hamster guide, written by a specialist, offers thoughtful, easy-to-understand advice on:
Including high-quality photos and helpful line art, this hamster book is a useful pet guide for any animal lover who wants to learn how to take better care of their Golden Hamster!
Hamsters make delightful and engaging pets for both kids and adults--a point that pet expert Peter Fritzsche emphasizes as he discusses every aspect of hamster ownership and care. In addition to advice on feeding, housing, and health maintenance, this book shows hamsters at play, suggests cage accessories and toys to keep them active and alert, and discusses the breeding and care of newborn hamsters. Titles in the My Pet series of pet care books are especially focused to answer the questions and meet the needs of inexperienced and soon-to-be animal owners. My Pet books combine detailed instruction and advice in a somewhat larger format than B.E.S. popular Pet Owner's Manuals and Pet Handbooks. They also feature more than 250 color photos, eye-catching and informative sidebars, and colorfully illustrated cover flaps. The text is clearly written, and accessible both to adults and older children.