The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William L. Shirer
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William L. Shirer
3 Rating(s)
List: $49.95 | Sale: $34.97
Club: $24.97

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

Author: William L. Shirer

Narrator: Grover Gardner

Unabridged: 57 hr 12 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 07/08/2010

Synopsis

Since its publication in 1960, William L. Shirers monumental study of Hitler's German empire has been widely acclaimed as the definitive record of the twentieth century's blackest hours. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich offers an unparalleled and thrillingly told examination of how Adolf Hitler nearly succeeded in conquering the world. Shirers unforgettable account of the pivotal characters and events of that critical era benefits from his many years as a reporter and his own personal recollections, as well as from the mass of historical documents retrieved from the German Foreign Office. The result is a brutally objective account of how Hitler wrested political control of Germany and managed to take the country with him on his mad sixyear quest for world domination, only to see it go down in flames in the end.

About William L. Shirer

William L. Shirer (1904–1993) was an American journalist and war correspondent. He wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, a history of Nazi Germany that has been read by many and cited in scholarly works for more than fifty years and was #1 New York Times bestseller. Originally a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune and the International News Service, he was the first reporter hired by Edward R. Murrow for what would become a CBS radio team of journalists known as “Murrow’s Boys.” He reported from Berlin for the Universal News Service and for CBS on the rise of the Nazis, and he covered their fall as a war correspondent. Out of these reports grew his other New York Times bestsellers Berlin Diary, The Nightmare Years, End of a Berlin Diary, Midcentury Journey, and The Collapse of the Third Republic. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich sold more copies for the Book-of-the-Month Club than any other book in the club’s history.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Julie on September 01, 2012

Three years ago I implemented a personal tradition: to read a "Monster Classic" each year. This is my term, referring to a piece of writing that is great in reputation and girth. The how and when of it is to begin the Monster mid-summer and read it in fits and starts over the course of several month......more

Goodreads review by Wyatt on June 01, 2019

Well, I did it. After two years, I have finally finished this beast. The first 600 or so pages are pretty slow, but it flies after that... We all know the story- a misanthropic, racist, vegetarian, megalomaniac failed artist writes a book that taps into age-old German prejudices, seizes power, and em......more

Goodreads review by Mark on May 20, 2025

This is quite a dry book full of technical detail about the state of Germany, of its politics, and, as promised, the rise of the Nazis. Buried deep inside is a brief section (copied below) that looks up from the statistics of the holocaust to give this harrowing eye-witness account, which has stayed......more

Goodreads review by Nandakishore on September 23, 2017

Whew! After six months of exhilarating yet exhausting reading, I have finally managed to finish this massive tome - William L. Shirer's definitive account of the rise and fall of the Third Reich under the evil and mad genius, the warlord Hitler. Hitler expected that the Reich will last for a thousan......more

Goodreads review by Erik on April 05, 2013

This was the first, really serious grownup book I ever read. My sole brother being almost eight years younger and no cousins being in the States, I was virtually an only child, condemned to the weekly dinner parties of my parents and paternal grandparents and their friends, most of them held elsewher......more

Add to Cart
Add to Wish List