War and Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust (Critical Issues in History) | 
|  | | | Title: | War and Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust (Critical Issues in History) | | Author: | Doris L. Bergen | | Publisher: | Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. | | Type: | Book / Paperback | | Publication Date: | 01 February, 2003 | | ISBN / ISBN-13: | 0847696316 / 9780847696314 | | List Price: | $22.95 | | You Save: | $2.30 | | Amazon Price: | $20.65 | |
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Product Description
In examining one of the defining events of the 20th century, Doris Bergen situates the Holocaust in its historical, political, social, cultural, and military contexts. Unlike many other treatments of the Holocaust, War and Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust discusses not only the persecution of the Jews, but also other segments of society victimized by the Nazis: Gypsies, Homosexuals, Poles, Soviet POWs, the Handicapped, and other groups deemed undesirable. With clear and eloquent prose, Bergen explores the two interconnected goals that drove the Nazi program of conquest and genocide-purification of the so-called Aryan race and expansion of its living space--and discusses how these goals affected the course of World War II. Including first hand accounts from perpetrators, victims, and eyewitnesses, the book is immediate, human, and eminently readable.
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Customer Reviews:
• Thoughts On Doris Bergin's "war And Genocide....." 04 November, 2006
I thought that the book was exactly what it said it was, namely, "A Concise History of the Holocaust." My only problem with it was that it was a little too concise. I think it could have used another 10 or 20 pages, perhaps as an epiogue, to bring out the horror of this event. I read this book as a potential textbook for a high school history course that I would love to teach. With additional handouts, I think this book would do very well as a textbook.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A16RP35571V2SI
• War And Genocide: A Concice History Of The Holosaust 14 October, 2008
The item I purchase was in great condition and was sent to me within a reasonable time frame which I appreciate.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A3FDJKE313PUO
• Helpful Overview For Students Of The Holocaust 17 September, 2007
This is a great little book for anyone who wants a concise but detailed and interesting overview of the Holocaust. It is easy to read, well laid out, and provides enough historical information for students and the general public alike. Any high school or college student who is studying modern European history will find this extremely useful.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AQXLWA5H5I97P
• Brief But Comprehensive 30 November, 2004
Dr. Doris L. Bergen has been a history professor since 1991 at University of Vermont and the University of Notre Dame. Her research and written works on Nazism, the Third Reich, Christian antisemitism, and the Volksdeutschen have made her especially qualified to write this brief history of the Holocaust. There is no specific mention of any direct or familial involvement with the Second World War (Bergen 263). War & Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust has an extensive bibliography which covers the entire spectrum on this topic, including general and specialized secondary research, official records, and firsthand accounts in the form of diaries and journals.
While unbiased accounts are the goal in historical research, it is extraordinarily difficult to be without an anti-Nazi bias when writing on the Holocaust. Such a traumatic event in the course of human affairs is inherently and undeniably emotional. A dispassionate account of the Holocaust would not only be uninteresting, it would be inappropriate on many important levels. Bergen uses her talents of discretion to balance the work by making it accessible on an emotional level to even serious students of history while not letting her anti-Nazi bias destroy the validity of her research.
The book is intended to be a concise history of the larger events of the Nazi takeover of Europe and their extermination of "undesirables." Bergen accomplishes this by describing the major and pertinent events of the period with minimal digression. She also keeps the events of the Holocaust in context of the larger context of the war in such a way that the reader is not lost in the details. This book attempts to give a human face to the atrocities committed by human beings on their fellow men, women, and children; it attempts to give a palpable understanding of the driving forces that made ordinary men into murderers and monsters; and it attempts to make the reader pause and reflect on this nightmarish catastrophe in an attempt to keep such a Holocaust from happening again.
This book describes the origins and policies of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi) and is careful to display evidence that their rise to power was far from inevitable. According to Bergen, the Nazis didn't pick new or arbitrary groups to focus their hatred on, instead they "reflected and built on prejudices that were familiar" in pre-Nazi Germany (1). The book exposes the friendly forces in the Weimar government that contributed to Hitler's ride by pushing aside the laws that could have stopped the Nazi party. These laws that "were simply not enforced" (48) allowed Adolf Hitler, an Austrian convicted of treason, to escape a serious jail sentence, become a German citizen, and run for president. Bergen claims "Without Hitler, Nazism, World War II, and the Holocaust would have taken very different forms, if they had occurred at all" (31). In the course of supporting these claims, the book follows the events that destroyed tens of millions of lives. This book uses many highly personalized accounts of victims like Anne Frank, who hid in Amsterdam for two years, and of perpetrators like Adolf Eichmann, Hitler's expert in the transportation and deportation of Jews, to keep the book's personal focus.
War & Genocide was thoroughly researched and has a wealth of factual and statistical information that is vital in understanding the enormity of the atrocities of the war. The information was used with considerable discretion to promote the flow of the narrative. Bergen doesn't spare the reader from graphic accounts of killing and violence except for the most gruesome of details. The book is suitable as an introduction to the Holocaust because of its breadth of focus and narrative flow. The author's conclusions are strongly supported and are very much her own. She lets her own research and experience guide conclusions that often differ from some traditionally accepted rationalizations. She is weak on some of her conclusions regarding personal decisions and motivations of the perpetrators, instead leaving the reader to decide whether or not the evidence available supports their actions. I did not necessarily agree with all of Bergen's conclusions, especially concerning the personal motivations of individual Nazis. While the book did not include much new information, it made me reconsider some of my previously held notions.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1UICNCLX4UOF4
• Holocaust History 12 July, 2008
A very detailed chronology of the events leading upto, during and after the Holocaust in Europe.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1IROUJUFPB5X6
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