Customer Reviews

Atlas Nazi Germany: Political Social Anatomy (2nd Edition)

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This book tries to do a lot in a short amount of time. However, the effective use of visual aids, including charts and tables, helps to make the presentation much more effective.

Although the subject matter may be considered "dry" by some...this is not the stuff of Cornelius Ryan describing battles, etc...the book is quite effective in giving the reader a very good "bird's eye" view of Nazi culture.

Highly recommended for those who truly wish to understand Nazi culture, economics, etc.

I must admit to a bias here. I have never really liked graphs and charts. This atlas is filled with them from start to finish. Want to know about agricultural output in the Reich? There's a chart for that. How about foreign trade? That's included as well. Armaments production? That too.

Of course these things are important for the serious scholar, and I can't say they shouldn't be included, but sadly the writing is as dry as the charts. Open any chapter and one will discover either that they already know the material or that they don't care to learn about it. Even the section on the holocaust is dull and statistical. I understand that a book of this kind can't be written in the manner of Shirer, but a better job of stimulating the reader could have been attempted.