I want to learn more about the political/cultural environment in late Weimar Republic – transition to Third Reich Germany. I'm particularly interested in learning about the specific narratives, stories, stances on issues, talking points, rhetoric, etc that were popular among conservatives and other right-wing Germans of the time as evinced in newspapers, newsletters, transcripts (speeches, radio personalities), etc. I am also interested in the specific stances/talking points popular among moderate and left-wing people at the time, thought it isn't my main focus at the moment.
If I wanted to get really research-y I could probably dive into archives of German newspapers at the time, but my big limitation here is that I don't speak German. So short of learning German, I figure my best chance is 1) some kind person lecturing to me on the topic or 2) some person(s) already wrote a book(s) on the topic.
I've read a couple books about the fall of Weimar Germany / rise of the Nazis in order to gain a better understanding of the situation. They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 by Milton Mayer did provide a lot of the very general type of insight I'm seeking, but that's a single book with a narrow focus (conversations with individuals) and one published in 1955 and lacking the context of the understanding of events and factors that has developed in the proceeding decades.
The Death of Democracy: Hitler's Rise to Power and the Downfall of the Weimar Republic by Benjamin Carter Hett was great for gaining a general understanding of what went down, but generally kept moving quickly through a sprawling narrative in order to best convey a complicated series of events in a reasonable amount of words and didn't spend much time dwelling on the specific stances, talking points, etc being circulated at the time in the political/cultural 'biome'/body of discourse of 'every day' right-wing Germans.
So I'm left wanting a fuller understanding of the cultural atmosphere - including specific, popular lines of thought, propaganda/media/media personality talking points, etc, as part of a larger effort of understanding the acceptance and/or endorsement of the nazis among the segments of the German population who did so. Like: what was the opinion section of the popular conservative newspapers like at the time? What sort of rhetoric was employed? And of the material that has been translated to English or can quickly be done so - where do I find it?
I realize that this is in itself a convoluted topic that would require a lot more than a comment on reddit to fully address. So any recommendations - books, articles, recorded lectures, or whatever other resource - related to this pursuit would also be greatly appreciated.
And as much as I'm currently interested in this particular angle, I also need to read more books about the Weimar-->Third Reich era, both generally and other more specific angles, so any recommendations along those lines would be appreciated as well.
Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope everybody is having a good weekend.
^(edit: improved formatting)
I suggest Richard Evans’s trilogy on the period, The Coming of the Third Reich, The Third Reich in Power and The Third Reich At War, but especially for your question, The Coming of the Third Reich. It’s been a while since I read it, but Evans (a historian of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Germany) covers these questions of the cultural and political atmosphere well.
As your question assumes, correctly, Nazism did not arise in a vacuum, but came about as the confluence of several social, cultural, political and economic ideas over many decades.
I suggest Richard Evans’s trilogy on the period, (The Coming of the Third Reich, The Third Reich in Power and The Third Reich At War), but especially for your question, The Coming of the Third Reich. It’s been a while since I read it, but Evans (a historian of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Germany) covers these questions of the cultural and political atmosphere well.
As your question assumes, correctly, Nazism did not arise in a vacuum, but came about as the confluence of several social, cultural, political and economic ideas over many decades.
I suggest Richard Evans’s trilogy on the period, (The Coming of the Third Reich, The Third Reich in Power and The Third Reich At War), but especially for your question, The Coming of the Third Reich. It’s been a while since I read it, but Evans (a historian of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Germany) covers these questions of the cultural and political atmosphere well.
As your question assumes, correctly, Nazism did not arise in a vacuum, but came about as the confluence of several social, cultural, political and economic ideas over many decades.