As the Minister for Propaganda and Culture, Joseph Goebbels shaped the German people’s perception of the Nazi Party, drumming up public support for anti-Semitism and the war effort through films, speeches, and restrictions on the press and other media. This biography covers his life and the progression of his career from a brilliant young student prejudiced against Jews to a powerful leader who worshipped Hitler and fervently supported the Holocaust. Goebbels’ legacy as a master of propaganda is explored, while sidebars include features on Holocaust remembrance events and the seventy-fifth anniversary of Kristallnacht.

Joseph Goebbels was one of Adolf Hitler’s most loyal acolytes. But how did this club-footed son of a factory worker rise from obscurity to become Hitler’s malevolent minister of propaganda, most trusted lieutenant and personally anointed successor? In this definitive one-volume biography, renowned German Holocaust historian Peter Longerich sifts through the historical record – and thirty thousand pages of Goebbels’s own diary entries – to answer that question. Longerich paints a chilling picture of a man driven by a narcissistic desire for recognition who found the personal affirmation he craved within the virulently racist National Socialist movement – and whose lifelong search for a charismatic father figure inexorably led him to Hitler. This comprehensive biography documents Goebbels’ ascent through the ranks of the Nazi Party, where he became a member of the Führer’s inner circle and launched a brutal campaign of anti-Semitic propaganda. Goebbels delivers fresh and important insight into how the Nazi message of hate was conceived, nurtured, and disseminated, and shreds the myth of Goebbels’ own genius for propaganda. It also reveals a man dogged by insecurities and – though endowed with near-dictatorial control of the media – beset by bureaucratic infighting. And, as never before, Longerich exposes Goebbels’s twisted personal life – his mawkish sentimentality, manipulative nature, and voracious sexual appetite. This complete portrait of the man behind Hitler’s message is sure to become a standard for historians and students of the Holocaust for decades to come.

Traces the life and career of the Nazi propaganda minister, describing how he became a member of Hitler's inner circle as well as unusual aspects of his character, including his all-consuming jealousy of his rivals and his obsession with sex.

Reveals the daily occurrences in the history of the Third Reich, and the disintegration of the Nazi High Command, through the eyes of Goebbels, one of Hitler's closest confidants

Joseph Goebbels, born in 1897, aspired to be an author, obtained a Ph.D from the University of Heidelberg in 1921. He joined the Nazi Party in 1924, After the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry quickly gained and exerted controlling supervision over the news media, arts, and information in Germany. In 1943, Goebbels began to pressure Hitler to introduce measures that would produce "total war," including closing businesses not essential to the war effort, conscripting women into the labor force, and enlisting men in previously exempt occupations into the Wehrmacht. Hitler finally appointed him as Reich Plenipotentiary for Total War on 23 July 1944, whereby Goebbels undertook largely unsuccessful measures to increase the number of people available for armaments production and the Wehrmacht. As the war drew to a close and Nazi Germany faced defeat, his wife Magda and their children joined him in Berlin. They moved into Hitler's bunker. Hitler committed suicide on April 20, 1945. In accordance with Hitler's will, Goebbels succeeded him as Reichschancellor; he served one day in this post. The following day, Goebbels and his wife committed suicide, after poisoning their six children with cyanide. Stephen R. Pastore is a novelist, playwright, poet and literary biographer/bibliographer. Born in New York City, he is the author of The Art of Adolf Hitler, The Complete Paintings of Adolf Hitler, Adolf Before He Was Hitler and is the editor of Mein Kampf: A Descriptive Bibliography.