Berlin Diary: The Journal of a Foreign Correspondent, 1934-1941 by William L. Shirer (PDF)

Description

By the acclaimed journalist and bestselling author of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, this day-by-day, eyewitness account of the momentous events leading up to World War II in Europe is the private, personal, utterly revealing journal of a great foreign correspondent. CBS radio broadcaster William L. Shirer was virtually unknown in 1940 when he decided there might be a book in the diary he had kept in Europe during the 1930s–specifically those sections dealing with the collapse of the European democracies and the rise of Nazi Germany. Shirer was the only Western correspondent in Vienna on March 11, 1938, when the German troops marched in and took over Austria, and he alone reported the surrender by France to Germany on June 22, 1940, even before the Germans reported it. The whole time, Shirer kept a record of events, many of which could not be publicly reported because of censorship by the Germans. In December 1940, Shirer learned that the Germans were building a case against him for espionage, an offense punishable by death. Fortunately, Shirer escaped and was able to take most of his diary with him. Berlin Diary first appeared in 1941, and the timing was perfect. The energy, the passion, and the electricity in it were palpable. The book was an instant success, and it became the frame of reference against which thoughtful Americans judged the rush of events in Europe. It exactly matched journalist to event: the right reporter at the right place at the right time. It stood, and still stands, as so few books have ever done–a pure act of journalistic witness.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review ”The most complete news report yet to come out of war-time Germany.” –Time About the Author WILLIAM L. SHIRER (1904-1993) had a distinguished career as foreign correspondent, news commentator, and historian of the contemporary world. 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 bestsellers, Berlin Diary and The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, which has sold more copies for the Book-of-the-Month Club than any other book in the club’s history.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I downloaded this for Kindle, when considering whether to buy the Churchill Trilogy for Christmas. As a refresher for WWII and considering the current media reporting of the Far East (not much) I thought it might be a interesting look at war from the correspondents point of view. It is more than that, for history lovers and concerned current event followers, as it reads like a novel but gives much insider information that is gathered by a reporter, that either doesn’t get printed and written up in later history books and then current large newspapers and publications, even from inside a highly difficult and censored German and Europe preparing, than entering WWII.The author, reporter wrote his book from his journal, kept while living and traveling inside Germany before and during WWII. It amazed me what was known and actually published, after heavy censureship by the nazi regime, but also highlighted the difficulties getting both written and voice information through to American and English communications and publishers.One of the most revealing aspects to a me, as a child of the 40’s and grown child of a WWII Vet, and knowing how little many Americans knew of Germany before the war broke out, is how much and how accomodating, in some respects, the Germans were to reporters that they did censor, but allowed to stay. If indefinitely and seemingly capriciously. The interactions with Germans, Nazi’s, and others higher up the Command structure after living and working in country, seemed to be much more informal but usual than todays reporters, living in country or in the States, seems able to develop. Of course today from the President down to the lowest city manager, it seems everyone can afford a Public Information Officer who filters and translates the most minor facts and propaganda, ie talking points, with little personal observation or knowledge arriving in either print or media, except as the “annonomous source”.Shirer, author and reporter, first copyrighted the book in 1941 and it was renewed in “68” and again in 2011. He travels throughout Germany, Switzerland and France alone and with members of Hitlers Reich, and from 1934 through December 1940, only occasionally visits his wife in Switerland, and later wife and new baby, who also have trouble after war starts, getting back to America.I would have given this a five star, and probably should have. It reads fast and very easily, well organized by time throughout his assignment and the history as it unfolds in Germany, well documenting the total passiveness of the German people, in part because of the control of media from almost the beginning, by Hitler and company. Shirer is kind and writing in journal style, is rather amazed (my word) at the acceptance of events like poverty and stress, by the German people, when new cutbacks (our current terms) and limits on consumption are constantly ordered, due to Hitlers orders and war preparation. It seemed to me that Hitler was very adept at the very blame and justification for inconvenience, want, rationing, rationalization etc that most major politicians and media stations and papers perpetuate today in our correspondence and media. Instead of straight answers to the 5w’s and H questions, Hitler and goring were masters of blaming abuse of the German Race and nationality on any country that was inhabited by a former German, or was divided or impacted in any way by the Versaille Treaty. Of course as many know, Versaille did impose horrible restrictions on Germany, post WWI, but Shirer takes you alone with the insiders view and knowledge of how rational was transmitted to the German people with expanded irrational and expanded power and racism propaganda and ideology, through the day to day news “on the street” and from insiders who communicated but knew Shirer couldn’t transmitt or honestly write about what was really going on.The book is well worth the reading and price, and brings many questions to mind, when watching the quick soundbites and blips on news and world reports of events in other countries. Also, rather sadly, makes me wonder if our reporters, especially in the video’s and TV reports, can really report what they hear and see in the one minute sound bite and hope more of them are keeping diaries and journals, of their personal observations and knowledge. In other words, are todays reporters as open and connected in foreign lands, as these dedicated reporters of the 30’s and 40’s seem to have been? Will they ever be able to write about who, what, where, when and why with the same openess that Shirer seems to do, after he was able to smuggle most of his journal home to the U.S.A.? Lets hope so.With 1st amendment everywhere, hundreds if not thousands of outlets for communication, it still seems that the lesson from this book should be to question what do we actually know about foreign news and where are we getting it from? Most of us have favorite stations and many can’t or won’t seek out alternate views or papers and stations we don’t like, even to getting in ruts with internet and blogs. But one source can have many branches from the same root, and Shirers book is a good lesson in history from the insider or “boots on the ground” perspective and a lesson in gathering diverse facts and intelligence, if one would be fore-warned and fore-armed. That is my opinion not a actual conclusion of the author.The only reason I didn’t give this a five, is that I just finished the second but of the Churchill Trilogy The Last Lion: Volumne 2: by Manchester. Excellent also, but as it is about Churchill 1932-1940, the two books fairly march in step through pre war and war, but with my aging memory, all the politics and events in Great Britain often brought to mind some daily or weekly event in Berlin Diary, that I wished I could compare with a timeline or connect readily together. As an example, a speech or movement in Berlin with a political or apeasement move by Chamberlin, at the same time in London. The fault is mine, but it is the only reason for giving Berlin Diary a 4 star rating rather than 5.This is a older book and many people and historians have probably read it, but I hope others buy it and especially young reporters and correspondents or even Bloggers, who live or work in the Far East. It is hard to believe that leaders in N.Korea,Iran, Iraq, and Venezuela etc, quasi and outright Dictatorial regimes, and even those like Palestine who voted in a Hamas controlled government without Statehood, don’t use Hitler and the 3rd Reich as the primer for international and border manipulation and propaganda.One has to wonder if “leaders are born or taught” how to be good and evil managers of people. Shirer gives all the daily moves as he saw them, for the total takeover of Law, then Control of Germany, by using democracy and nationalism and religious words to his advantage, prior to election through democratic means. Words have meaning, and in many ways Hitler and the Reich were masters of using them to justify arousal, then support and lastly mollify the German people to do and withstand, just about anything the regime did.Sadly, as most know, reward and punishment for disagreeing with anyone in the National Socialist Party, quickly became a fear of the average person in the general public and the international news reporters, so Berlin Diary is a good read even if one hasn’t been interested in history, but is wondering how so much media can be controlled and biased today. That would be the words “command, control and fear”, words that are real and have varied meaning, even in our Democracy. Read this book and think about it. This isn’t about the camps or much about atrocities, but is the daily politics and man on the street society of Berlin prior to and during the take over of countries and boundaries, up to 1940’s, as the reporter who lived there reported and failed to report due to cenorship. Well worth the money.

⭐What a wonderful book,When people read history books, it’s about PAST EVENTS; the author knows what happened afterward. So she can explain/educate the reader on what’s going on. And that is good. This book is a diary. Shutter didn’t know anything about the future. He was writing down his impressions of things AS THEY HAPPENED.An extraordinary book. The man can write! (Not surprising, given he wrote Rose and Fall of the Third Reich!!).Reading the first part of the book is like watching a train wreck in slow motion. It highlights the mistakes and mishaps that led to WWII. Extraordinary reading.

⭐Loved the details provided by this book.It is a great insight to what was going on in Germany. I suggest you read prior to the Rise and Fall.

⭐This journal provided a wonderful first hand detailed history of the years leading up to the second world war and indeed the first year of the war itself. The correspondent was at all the important events.

⭐This is a great book, especially if you don’t already know much about the subject and want something enjoyable to read. I don’t know if it adds much to what others wrote, but being published in 1941 means no revisionism. Probably a dozen or two of the diary entries are unique; information that probably can’t be found elsewhere. Several of the entries were obviously touched up in post, but the vast majority are likely unedited, which is beautiful. Shirer did a good job expressing the hopelessness of interwar Europe.

⭐I ran across the existence of this book totally by accident and I have to say that I am in no way unhappy that I did. The insights that it gives into that time and the question that always seems to be asked as to how the German people could have allowed someone like Hitler to come to power are incredibly shocking and eye opening. I recommend it to anyone who is looking for an unflinching, unvarnished view of what happened during that time.

⭐William Shirer captured the evil core of the Nazi regime from the years leading up to WWII. Find out why Hitler was a teppichfresser

⭐I have read several of Shirer’s books and this audio book doesn’t disappoint. Shifter is very detailed and his books are well sourced and accurate. Shifter was one of the best writers dealing with Germany before, during and after the Second World War. Highly recommended.

⭐Saw this referenced in James Mustich’s “1,000 Books to Read Before You Die” and bought it on the strength of Mustich’s recommendation. (Aside: rush out and buy Mustich immediately. It is wonderful and has increased by about 100 titles my must-read list).Berlin Diary: I strongly recommend this. It has an easily-read journalistic style that retains a certain 1940s literary rigour while not being contaminated by today’s slang and clichés. It’s quite informal, is full of information and insights and the pages (all 600 of them) zip by. Shirer peppers his account of the Nazi rise with many insightful vignettes on the principal Nazi thugs from AH down — and he doesn’t hesitate to refer to them as such. It’s also repeatedly his observation that your next German citizen absolutely did not want war in 1939, only acquiescing glumly and, presumably, out of fear of the consequences of resisting. It’s current history without the perspective of time having passed, but very accurate and perceptive for all that. Mr Shirer also displays a quite modern sense of repugnance at the Nazis and all they stand for — and compassion for their victims. Very good indeed.One thing leads to another…. I was sufficiently impressed by the content and style of Shirer’s ‘Diary’ that I went and got his 1,250-page Rise and Fall of the Third Reich — 2011 fiftieth-anniversary hardcover version. This also seems excellent.

⭐William L Shirer was an American journalist who played a major role, alongside Ed Murrow, in waking his fellow countrymen up to the dangers of Nazism and the impossibility of US neutrality in the face of the existential threat to the liberal democratic world posed by Hitler. His most famous work is The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, in my view one of the best works of narrative history/journalism ever written. This book contains his diaries from when he was correspondent in Berlin, initially for two of Randolph Hearst’s wire services, then for CBS. He arrives in the German capital at a time when “Hitler and the Nazis have lasted out a whole year in Germany and our friends in Vienna write that fascism, both of a local clerical brand and of the Berlin type, is rapidly gaining ground in Austria”. World war is still of course, well over five years away, but Shirer is more prescient than many.He chronicles the rise of fascism and collapse of social democracy in Austria, then the familiar litany of Hitler’s advances, the Rhineland, Austria, the Sudetenland, the rest of Czechoslovakia, and finally Poland before Britain and France wake up to the threat and finally abandon appeasement and stand up to Hitler. He is an excellent writer and brings home clearly the drama and horror of events as they unfold, in the sheer rapidity of the German advance into Poland and of the Blitzkrieg across northern and western Europe in 1940, which year covers half of the entire text of the book. Reading this account as the events unfold is very different from reading a historical account written with the hindsight knowledge of Nazi defeat in 1945.While Shirer acknowledges that Hitler could never totally control Europe as long as Britain remained free, he thinks it plausible that Hitler could effectively control the world: “I am firmly convinced that he does contemplate [invading the USA] and that if he wins in Europe and Africa he will in the end launch it unless we are prepared to give up our way of life and adapt ourselves to a subservient place in his totalitarian scheme of things”. He marks the contrast between the old world and the new in these striking words: “How dim in memory the time when there was peace. That world ended, and for me, on the whole, despite its faults, its injustices, its inequalities, it was a good one. I came of age in that one, and the life it gave was free, civilized, deepening, full of minor tragedy and joy and work and leisure, new lands, new faces—and rarely commonplace and never without hope. And now darkness. A new world. Black-out, bombs, slaughter, Nazism. Now the night and the shrieks and barbarism”.Despite this bleakly pessimistic vision, he thinks that “even if Germany should win the war it will lose its struggle to organize Europe”. This derives from his belief that, contrary to the assertions of some that Hitler and the Nazis imposed their creed on a wholly unwilling populace, “the Nazi regime has expressed something very deep in the German nature and in that respect it has been representative of the people it rules”. He believes that “the German…….is incapable of organizing Europe. His lack of balance, his bullying sadism when he is on top, his constitutional inability to grasp even faintly what is in the minds and hearts of other peoples, his instinctive feeling that relations between two peoples can only be on the basis of master and slave and never on the basis of let-live equality—these characteristics of the German make him and his nation unfit for the leadership in Europe they have always sought and make it certain that, however he may try, he will in the long run fail”. So while he accepts that only Hitler made this appalling war possible, in doing so the dictator was, in the author’s view, drawing on the dark side of the nature of a critical mass of German people who craved submission and who had “almost joyfully, almost masochistically, …… turned to an authoritarianism which releases them from the strain of individual decision and choice and thought and allows them what to a German is a luxury—letting someone else make the decisions and take the risks, in return for which they gladly give their own obedience”. At the same time, this weakness caused Germany to underrate the infuriating stubbornness of British resistance, as the latter “won’t admit they’re licked. [The Germans] cannot repress their rage against Churchill for still holding out hopes of victory to his people, instead of lying down and surrendering, as have all of Hitler’s opponents up to date”.Shirer finally leaves Berlin towards the end of 1940 when the censorship has got so bad once Hitler has abandoned his plans to invade Britain and the Nazis are for the first time not having everything their own way, that he is virtually restricted to reading out the communiques of the High Command verbatim, without analysis or comment. He can do no more to raise the awareness of his American audience to the realities of Nazism. He concludes his diaries as follows:”I stood against the rail watching the lights recede on a Europe in which I had spent all fifteen of my adult years, which had given me all of my experience and what little knowledge I had. It had been a long time, but they had been happy years, personally, and for all people in Europe they had had meaning and borne hope until the war came and the Nazi blight and the hatred and the fraud and the political gangsterism and the murder and the massacre and the incredible intolerance and all the suffering and the starving and cold and the thud of a bomb blowing the people in a house to pieces, the thud of all the bombs blasting man’s hope and decency.”Superb writing and just a brilliant piece of narrative of these world-shattering events. 5/5

⭐I found this a fascinating read. William Shirer was in the heart of Europe during the rise of Nazism and the first two years of the Second World War.Despite knowing the history, knowing what happened, I was still caught up by the events he described in his diary. Day after day, week after week, month after month, Shirer catalogued the unstoppable Nazi war machine as Hitler turned his attention to one European country after another. Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, France and so on, Shirer criss-crossed the continent to report on events for American radio.It was fascinating too to see the Second World War in Europe through the eyes of an American. I’m British, so reading Shirer’s thoughts on the people, strategies and characters of my country was very interesting. So too was his description of the Germans and the German populations reactions to Hitler, the Nazis, the war and their views of other countries. Some of the blatant lies the Nazis peddled as propaganda are simple staggering.Shirer’s diary showed me a view of the war that I’ve never seen before. I found it to be quite the page turner despite knowing what was coming. Definitely worth a read if you’re at all interested in the Second World War.

⭐This is just fantastic. Shirer was a war correspondent based in Germany before and during the war. After the war he wrote the first classic history “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich”. But this diary is almost better. It is his day by day notes of living and surviving in Europe as Hitler came to power. In his broadcasts he may be a carefully censored war correspondent, but in these private notes he rages against the Nazi’s and Hitler and the arrogant power of Germanism. He cannot believe the stupidity of the allies failing to see the coming threat. He bemoans the hollow-chested bespectacled insurance clerks from Liverpool, captured by the physically superior blonde Aryan youth. He despairs. He sees defeat. He bitterly complains about Churchill’s lack of courage in not coming to the aid of the Norwegians. The balanced broadcaster is left behind. Here we have the coruscating criticism of a very angry man who has to report on the war and survive in Berlin with his wife and baby.It is so readable. Read it!

⭐Read this in a very few sittings – its full of incidental details of life in Berlin and occasionally elsewhere in Western Europe in the run-up and early stages of WW2 (a running battle with the Nazi censors, dodging shrapnel, just who bombed the library…). It is a diary rather than a historical study and so is a personal view from a personal standpoint and you have to read it as an appendix to any study of the time. It is also written by a journalist/radio reporter and so it would be interesting to know exactly how much was added with hindsight: I’m not convinced he’d know of the Nazi death camps in 1941 when the diary ends yet makes a reference to them. Sadly his almost prescient judgements are somewhat suspicious but if he had only half the insights at the time then a most remarkable observer.

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