Customer Reviews

Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini: Totalitarianism in the Twentieth Century (European History Series (Arlington Heights, Ill.).)

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This is a great overview of Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini. In this book Pauley takes the reader through the evolution of the totalitarian dictators. He starts of by defining the terms under which each ideology fell: Nazism, Marxism-Leninism, and Fascism. From here he shows the reader how each personality gained, maintained and relinquished power. The outline of the chapters adds to readability as well as allowing for comparison and contrast of the three previously mentioned persons. This is an important topic not only to learn about the absolute control that these three wielded, but how they managed to manipulate the masses into not only following them but in some cases actually loving them; as scary as that may seem. There are important lessons to be learned in this study and Pauley has some good insight to get one thinking about them.

I was very impressed with this book. It is packed with great insights and was not as dry as other books on the subject. The comparisons are interesting and the writing is fantastic. If you want one small volume for a great overview of totalitarianism this is the one. I could not put it down. A+