Life in the Third Reich: Daily Life in Nazi Germany, 1933-1945

Life in the Third Reich draws extensively on interviews, letters and diaries from the earliest days of the Nazi Party to the final hours of the thousand-year Reich to reveal how the Hitler cult influenced and corrupted every aspect of life, from education, health, business, the press, the judicial system and the Church to sport, culture, work and the family. It reveals the stark contrast between the myth of 'One People, One Fuhrer' perpetuated by Nazi propaganda and the harsh realities of life in a dictatorship. Life in the Third Reich challenges the popular view of Nazi Germany as a nation united behind their despotic leader and asks 'What would you have done? Would you have behaved any differently if you had lived in Hitler's Germany?' For Germans in the late 1920s and early 1930s, the allure of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party's promises for a better, brighter future promised so much. The reality was vastly different... Germany was a deeply divided nation when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party came to power in 1933. As the shadow of the swastika lengthened, its citizens quickly came to realize that the Nazis' brutal programme was not optional. Everyone was expected to play their part in "national revival", especially those chosen as sacrificial victims. Much has been written about daily life during World War II from the perspective of the Allied nations, but little about life in Germany during the Third Reich. With the benefit of hindsight, questions have been raised as to why a civilized, cultured nation stood by and let the Nazi Party impose their rule in such inhumane fashion, and why so few individuals made any attempt to rebel. Life in the Third Reich draws on the recollections of those who actually experienced the rise and fall of this brutal and vicious regime: from the indoctrination of children to the disappearance of family, friends and neighbours and the effect of Kinder, K ü che und Kirche [Children, Kitchen and Church] on the female population, to the defiance of the 'swing kids' and the resulting deprivation of the Nazi policy of 'Guns, not butter'. These are the stories of ordinary Germans caught up in an extraordinary time.