Goebbels Eine Biographie

The life of Joseph Goebbels, the Mephistophelian genius of Nazi propaganda.

Ralf Georg Reuth's biography is meticulously researched, comprehensive, definitive. With unusual objectivity Reuth reconstructs history from eyewitness accounts, Goebbels's own diaries, and archival material--some of which was held by the East Germans and Russians and only recently became available. It is the story of a small, spindly, highly intelligent man with a clubfoot and an inferiority complex who rose to power with Hitler and was, of all the Nazis, the greatest advocate of the extermination of the Jews.

Reuth describes Goebbels's childhood in a strict, Catholic, lower-middle-class family; his poverty; his many affairs with women above his station; his political activity and intrigues in Berlin for Hitler; his career in the Third Reich; his wife and children; his suicide.

Written in an accessible, lucid style, Goebbels is at once an important document and the fascinating study of a monstrous human being.

From the original hardback edition.