I am currently in a WW2 kick and this book is something that I never could really get into for some reason (tried it and set it down a few times). I think I have figured out why, and I have this question.
Comparing it to say John Toland's biography of Hitler I realized that since Shirer writes it as sort of a first person narrative the whole book is sprinkled with editorializing and judgement (he calls Ernst Röhm a sexual pervert, Von Papen was a snake in not so many words and Kurt von Schuschnigg "narrow minded") where Toland's book is a straight historical recounting.
My question for the experts here is how much stock do you place in the Rise and Fall book as a historical source? Is it a generally solid book even with all the opinion?
Mods, if this isn't within the rules, please delete...I couldn't find a reason not to post it here but I have been known to be wrong a time or two. If not, I look forward to reading the opinions in here. Thank you very much!
So I think how William Shirer tends to be treated these days is as a primary source, rather than a secondary one. Which is to say that his account has historic value for his personal observations of Nazi Germany and his interactions with important political figures and ordinary Germans, but a lot of care needs to be given to contextualize his observations and care needs to be given to his biases and opinions. Which is to say, Shirer is almost invariably quoted by historians of World War II and Nazi Germany (two who come to mind are Richard Evans and Stephen Kotkin), but Shirer is used as just one of very many primary sources in these histories. Which is to say, that reading Shirer's book as a history in and of itself of Nazi Germany is probably the wrong way to approach the topic, as opposed to reading a current academic work. Even if you start getting into primary sources from the period, Shirer isn't bad, but reading something like Victor Klemperer's published diary is probably more useful and more interesting.
I'd probably place William Shirer's work in the same sort of realm as John Reed's Ten Days That Shook The World or even David Remnick's Lenin's Tomb. All of them are journalists, who were reporting on what they saw (or more usually what they heard through contacts or in interviews). All were pretty clear about their opinions. None are full histories, let alone scholarly histories.
I guess Rise and Fall is a bit different from the other two in that it's based on Shirer's earlier reporting that he reworked years later into a more comprehensive history of Nazi Germany, and he leans pretty heavily into things like Sonderweg which are not really accepted by academic historians. I should also clarify that Shirer's reporting does get cited in other histories, but not any of his historical arguments or theories.