Hitler

As Chancellor of Germany between 1933 and 1945, Adolf Hitler exercised unrestricted power over his country's social, political and economic life. Hitler's belligerent re-armament programme, his imposition of anti-Semitic legislation and his territorially aggressive policies led to genocide and worldwide conflict on an unprecedented scale. Although the subject of numerous biographies and fictional portrayals, there have hitherto been few succinct, factual narratives of Hitler's life. Hitler is a short chronicle of the Fuhrer's career, amplified with numerous rare photographs and artefacts from the period. Second World War expert Robin Cross offers a clear outline of Hitler's progress: from his unhappy childhood as the son of a minor Austrian official in Braunau, to his inglorious early occupation as a jobbing Viennese artist; from his formative experiences as a corporal in the First World War, to his emergence as leader of the National Socialist Workers' Party in the 1920s; from his extraordinary rise to supreme power in 1933, to his suicide amidst the ruins of Berlin in 1945. Commanding, informative and stylish, and written by a scholar who is steeped in knowledge of the period, Hitler is an essential companion for anyone with a fascination for the twentieth century, the Second World War or the age of dictators.