Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil

In Explaining Hitler, Ron Rosenbaum investigates the meanings and motivations people have attached to Hitler and his crimes against humanity. What does Hitler tell us about the nature of evil? In often dramatic encounters, Rosenbaum confronts historians, scholars, filmmakers, and deniers as he skeptically analyzes the key strains of Hitler interpretation.

A balanced and thoughtful overview of a subject both frightening and profound, this is an extraordinary quest, an expedition into the war zone of Hitler theories, “a provocative work of cultural history that is as compelling as it is thoughtful, as readable as it is smart” (New York Times).

First published in 1998 to rave reviews, Explaining Hitler became a New York Times–bestseller. This edition is an update of that classic and a critically important contribution to the study of the twentieth century's darkest moment.