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Summary: This book is compelling --It must be read twice!
Review: Gitta Sereny -- Your book is wonderful. Thank you for your prodigious effort!!! Ever since visiting Germany in 1978, I have become one of the many trying to understand how the WWII Nazi crimes against humanity could occur in such an educated and advanced society. I have read most of the books on Nazi Germany, Hitler and the like but none more compelling than Gitty Sereny's book. Her years of research; dozens of interviews; understanding of the magnitude of Hitler's crimes have brought forth a book I could not put down or stop reading. As one reviewer mentioned, Ms. Sereny's transitions are often abrupt but her style is most readable. The second reading provides much more insight into Albert Speer. By then, the reader is familiar with the people surrounding Speer that Ms. Sereny interviewed and introduces throughout her book. I thank Gitta Sereny for giving the world a fairly unbiased look at a most remarkable man, Albert Speer and I believe she finds the truth about his guilt. READ IT TWICE!
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Summary: Must read of World War II history buffs.
Review: Gitta Sereny has produced one of the best biographies I have read in a long time. Readers of any of Albert Speer's books (especially "Inside the Third Reich") will find it an essential addition to their library.
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Summary: Masterful unmasking of Albert Speer
Review: Gitta Sereny is not only a prodigious researcher, she also writes beautifully. This is an amazing book, the product of years of interviews with Speer, who heretofore had been regarded as a sort of "good Nazi." Sereny exposes the truth: that he knew about Nazi genocide and was the mastermind behind German's brutal slave labor between 1941-45.Sereny beautifully weaves her story, throwing in wonderful ancillary observations about the Nazi hierarchy. She includes Speer's disingenuous criticisms of Hitler (whom he actually worshipped), as well as his opinions on Goering, Goebbels and Hitler's other minions. Sereny includes details of Speer's love affair late in life with a much-younger blonde woman and the dumping of his long-suffering wife after 50 years of marriage. Most important was Speer's assiduous and desperate attempt to disguise the fact that he knew about Auschwitz and successfully (until Sereny) hid it from the world. Sereny deserved the Pulitzer for this book. Read it and you won't be able to put it down.
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Summary: Serenys Saint, Speer the Sinner
Review: Gitta Sereny writes about Albert Speer in this biography as a deeply honest, moral, misled person trying to come to terms with the evil he has become embroiled in. Some simple facts that have come to light since Speers death show this to be a fallacy.
The details of Speers diary from his time working on Berlins regeneration hid his complicity in the removal of Jewish inhabitants and his use of concentration camp labour for munitions projects is now well documented. Despite this, many were fooled by the "repentant" Speer attemting to cleanse his soul of any knowledge of evil. Most historians tried to push Speer into admitting some knowledge of attrocities that he may have subconciously buried and this is Serenys self-appointed task. Few looked at the possibility that Speer may be as guilty as Saukel or Kaltenbrunner and more guilty than Streicher, Jodl or Keitel as a perpetrator of peoples suffering.
Serenys book does have its good points. This is the best book for showing the public Speer, the semi-private Speer and in a few unguarded moments, the private Speer as he cannot be observed now.
Sereny herself is quite an interesting charachter. She made her name writing a book similarly posthumously of Franz Paul Stangl, commondant of Treblinka, the Speer book after his death and just after the death of his personal secretary, Annemarie Kempf fourteen years later (fourteen years preperation?) and caused controversy here in Great Britain when she wrote the story of a child murderer ("Cries Unheard"), Mary Bell. The great controversy was because Mary Bell may get royalties from the book and profit from her crime.
Sereny should stick to dead people, they don't argue!
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Summary: One of the Absolute Best Works on Nazi Germany Ever!
Review: Gitta Sereny's monumental work 'Abert Speer: His Battle with Truth,' is a book of major importance about a man and an era that the world must never forget. Albert Speer, first Hitler's architect and later his Minister for Armaments and War Production, will remain forever an enigma. Did he know about the Holocaust? To what extent was his involvment? Should he have been hanged at Nuremburg? Was his apologetic manner in later years sincere? These are the questions that Sereny asks and attempts to answer, often arriving at conclusions that make even the reader uncomfortable, forcing him or her to realize that the Nazi system, at the time, could have held as much appeal for them as it did for Speer and for all of Germany. Sereny's intervews with Speer, her numerous interviews, and her exhaustive research all contribute to this masterful book. Of particular interest are the people whose lives were affected most by the madess of Hitler. Sereny's talks with the son of Martin Bormann are both chilling and incredibly moving. I do feel as though this book, along with Speer's own works, 'Inside the Third Reich,' and 'Spandau: the Secret Diaries,' (his thrid book, 'Infiltrator,' is one to be missed,) are essential reading for any serious student of Nazi Germany.
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Summary: Superb: The Best Biography of Speer to Date
Review: Gitta Sereny's"Albert Speer: His Battle with the Truth" is the most comprehensive biography of Hitler's architect and minister of armaments to date. Aside from Speer's own writings, which Sereny proves to be deliberately misleading in a few crucial areas, it is probably the most insightful account of Speer's life and of his involvement with the Holocaust. Sereny's investigation of Speer draws upon numerous interviews she conducted with Speer himself, his friends, family, colleagues, acquaintances and scores of other individuals and authorities. Although Sereny explores many fascinating aspects of Speer's life, such as his tormented childhood, his desperate need for Hitler's approval, his perspective of the infighting among key members of Hitler's inner circle, his genius for organization, and his surprising emergence as a possible successor to Hitler, the central focus of her investigation is Speer's knowledge of the Holocaust. Sereny provides overwhelming evidence that within months of Speer's becoming Hitler's minister of armaments it was impossible for him not to have been aware of Nazi genocidal policies including the murder of millions of Jews. Sereny concludes that during his years of service to Hitler, Speer did not "officially" know about the Holocaust, though in reality it was impossible for him not to have known. Speer managed to translate his official ignorance to a claim of actual innocence at Nuremburg, which saved his life. Meticulously researched and superbly written, Sereny's book is enjoyable as an historical analysis, a biography, a psychological study, and as an ethical investigation.
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Summary: What did he know and when did he know it ?
Review: Herr Sperr, a cultured and civilized German,came from a well to do German family and had a promising future as an architect.If this is true, why did this civilzed, cultured German become a Nazi and use slave labor to build Hitler's Third Reich.We are told that he sensed some things were wrong with Hitler's conduct of the war,but Herr Sperr maintained that sensing was not knowing. When Speer was asked to explain how the sudden influx of apartments belonging to the hundreds of Jews he saw at the train station became available,he said they were being sent abroad for the war effort. When asked to explain the miserable working conditions in his factories, he said he was not in charge of personel. The greatest hoax occurred during the trial when he convinced the world that he alone was guilty because he should have known the fate of the Jews.Had he not worked side by side with Hitler? Herr Sperr claims that he was overpowered by Hitler's personality and was unable to be free of his spell. The author's narrative is excellent,detailed and still allows the reader enough room to come to their own conclusions about Herr Sperr, the "good Nazi". I recommend this book.
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Summary: As good a portrait of Speer as you will find
Review: Historians and WWII seem to only paint Nazis, especially high ranking ones, with a few brushes. Sereny does a very good job of assembling a picture of Albert Speer from a variety of sources. These include personal interviews with Speer, his notes from Spandau, interviews with colleagues/friends/aquaintances and other historical sources. Where Inside The Third Reich is very much what Speer wants to tell you, Sereny's book often is not. I believe she liked Speer and in fact does not paint him as an evil man. Rather you get a picture of a man whoose morals were not strong enough to cast aside his ambition, Hitler's cult of personality and friendship, war, perspective and duty to country. It also shows many fo Speers good qualities, which many WWII historians like to forget. It is as complete a picture of Albert Speer as you are to find, save for perhaps reading his Spandau diary. A definite must for people seriously interested in WWII and who are prepared not to find ALL (save for Hitler, Goebbels, Himler and the like) Nazi's heroic or demonic, but simply people not unlike ourselves or people we might know.
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Summary: As good a portrait of Speer as you will find
Review: Historians and WWII seem to only paint Nazis, especially high ranking ones, with a few brushes. Sereny does a very good job of assembling a picture of Albert Speer from a variety of sources. These include personal interviews with Speer, his notes from Spandau, interviews with colleagues/friends/aquaintances and other historical sources. Where Inside The Third Reich is very much what Speer wants to tell you, Sereny's book often is not. I believe she liked Speer and in fact does not paint him as an evil man. Rather you get a picture of a man whoose morals were not strong enough to cast aside his ambition, Hitler's cult of personality and friendship, war, perspective and duty to country. It also shows many fo Speers good qualities, which many WWII historians like to forget. It is as complete a picture of Albert Speer as you are to find, save for perhaps reading his Spandau diary. A definite must for people seriously interested in WWII and who are prepared not to find ALL (save for Hitler, Goebbels, Himler and the like) Nazi's heroic or demonic, but simply people not unlike ourselves or people we might know.
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Summary: Interesting character study, but a bit flawed
Review: I found this book completely engrossing. Gitta Sereny manages, through intensive interview sessions, to provide readers with a peek into the fascinating mind of Albert Speer. I put this book down and felt as if I actually knew Speer, the man, the husband and father, the Nazi architect. The text and various interviews are well laid out and the overall structure of the book is near perfect. With that said, however, I did not feel that Gitta Sereny ever conclusively proved or illustrated that Speer knew about the holocaust. I felt there was too much guess work towards the end of the book and not enough hard proof. Gitta Sereny refers to ambiguous wartime documents, vague military communiqués and other literary works on the holocaust, but never proves, with hard evidence, that Speer had absolute knowledge of the existence of the extermination camps. Oddly, much of what Speer mentioned in his interviews, concerning his knowledge of the holocaust seems plausible. Gitta Sereny makes too many assumptions at the end of the book, and this devalued my overall judgement of her work. However, this book is so powerful and so well written, despite its flawed conclusion I would recommend it wholeheartedly.
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