Berlin: The Downfall 1945

Antony Beevor

ISBN 10: 0141803967 ISBN 13: 9780141803968

Publisher: Penguin, 2002

Synopsis

After the German's invasion of Russia in the summer of 1941, Soviet soldiers had many accounts to settle when they finally reached the frontiers of the Reich in January 1945.

Antony Beevor has reconstituted the experience of those millions caughtup in the nightmare crescendo of the Third Reich's final defeat. BERLIN is the unforgettable story of those men, women and children who suffered to the end from folly, cruelty and the naked exercise of power on a scale that is almost incomprehensible.

About this title

Review:

Military history, even at its best, can be a cold art. It's easy to lose sight of the fact that wars involve individuals, each with their own hopes, fears and desires. Berlin: the Downfall, 1945, is Antony Beevor's account of the bloody Götterdämmerung that brought the Second World War in Europe to an end, and in which he has fused the large and the small scale effects of war. Beevor paints the broad picture of Marshals Zhukov and Konev, competing for glory and Stalin's attention, as they race their armies towards Berlin. He gives the reader a gripping account of the brutal street-by-street fighting in the German capital and provides an unforgettable portrait of the last, insane days of Hitler and his entourage in the bunker.

His attention to emotional detail is what made his previous book Stalingrad such a magnificent work, combining a sweeping hisorical narrative with a remarkable sensitivity to human drama. Yet he also highlights the small details of ordinary people caught in the nightmare of history--the sick children evacuated at the last minute from a Potsdam hospital; the Soviet soldiers shaving themselves for the first time in weeks so that they would make appropriately presentable conquerors; and the Nazi Youth teenagers peddling their bikes in despairing, last-ditch attacks against the Red Army's tanks.

The story Beevor tells is an almost unremittingly terrible one--one of death, rape, hunger and human misery--but he tells it with both an epic sweep and an alertness to individuality. The result is a masterpiece of narrative history that is as powerful as Stalingrad. --Nick Rennison

Review:

'Fascinating, extraordinary, gripping' Jeremy Paxman

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0141803967
• ISBN 13: 9780141803968
• Binding: Audio Cassette