Berlin Diary

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title: "Berlin Diary" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1941-non-fiction-books", "books-by-william-l.-shirer", "works-about-nazi-germany", "world-war-ii-memoirs", "diaries", "books-about-nazism", "alfred-a.-knopf-books"] description: "Book by William L. Shirer" topic_path: "history" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Diary" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Book by William L. Shirer ::

::data[format=table title="infobox book | "]

Field	Value
name	Berlin Diary
image	Berlin Diary.JPG
caption	Cover of the first edition
author	William Shirer
country	United States
language	English
publisher	Alfred A. Knopf
release_date	June 20, 1941
media_type	Print
::

| name = Berlin Diary | title_orig = | translator = | image = Berlin Diary.JPG | caption = Cover of the first edition | author = William Shirer | cover_artist = | country = United States | language = English | series = | publisher = Alfred A. Knopf | release_date = June 20, 1941 | media_type = Print | pages = | isbn = | preceded_by = | followed_by = Berlin Diary ("The Journal of a Foreign Correspondent 1934–1941") is a first-hand account of the rise of Nazi Germany and its road to war, as witnessed by the American journalist William L. Shirer. Shirer covered Germany for several years as a radio reporter for CBS. Feeling increasingly uncomfortable as the Nazi press censors made it impossible for him to report objectively to his listeners in the United States, Shirer eventually left the country. The identities of many of Shirer's German sources were disguised to protect these people from retaliation by the German secret police, the Gestapo. It provided much of the material for his subsequent landmark book The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.

The book was published in New York by Alfred A. Knopf on June 20, 1941, almost six months before Germany declared war on the United States, and simultaneously in Canada by Ryerson Press, when Canada was already at war with Germany. and sold almost 600,000 copies in the first year of its publication. The book was widely praised by academics and critics at the time of its publication. A recent literary study comparing the original diary in Shirer's literary estate with the published text revealed that Shirer made substantial changes, such as revising his early favourable impressions of Hitler. Much of the text about the period before the war (1934 to 1938) was written retroactively.

In 1947, End of a Berlin Diary continued the story of the Third Reich, from July 20, 1944, to the Nuremberg Trials.

References

References

1. (29 December 1993). "William L. Shirer, Author, Is Dead at 89". The New York Times.
2. Shirer, William L.. (June 20, 1941). "Berlin Diary". Alfred A. Knopf.
3. Ken Cuthbertson. (2015-05-01). "The Long Night: William L. Shirer and the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich". McGill-Queen's Press.
4. Ken Cuthbertson. (2015-05-01). "The Long Night: William L. Shirer and the Rise and Fall of the Third Reich". McGill-Queen's Press.
5. (2013). "Writings of History: Authenticity and Self-Censorship in William L. Shirer's Berlin Diary". German Life and Letters.

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