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Blitzed

Drugs in Nazi Germany

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Blitzed

By: Norman Ohler, Shaun Whiteside - translator
Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
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About this listen

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable, audiobook edition of Blitzed by Norman Ohler, read by Jonathan Keeble.

The sensational German bestseller on the overwhelming role of drug-taking in the Third Reich, from Hitler to housewives.

'Bursting with interesting facts' Vice

'Extremely interesting ... a serious piece of scholarship, very well researched' Ian Kershaw

The Nazis presented themselves as warriors against moral degeneracy. Yet, as Norman Ohler's gripping bestseller reveals, the entire Third Reich was permeated with drugs: cocaine, heroin, morphine and, most of all, methamphetamines, or crystal meth, used by everyone from factory workers to housewives, and crucial to troops' resilience - even partly explaining German victory in 1940.

The promiscuous use of drugs at the very highest levels also impaired and confused decision-making, with Hitler and his entourage taking refuge in potentially lethal cocktails of stimulants administered by the physician Dr Morell as the war turned against Germany. While drugs cannot on their own explain the events of the Second World War or its outcome, Ohler shows, they change our understanding of it. Blitzed forms a crucial missing piece of the story.

 Europe Germany Military War Thought-Provoking

Critic Reviews

German writer Norman Ohler's astonishing account of methamphetamine addiction in the Third Reich changes what we know about the second world war .. Blitzed looks set to reframe the way certain aspects of the Third Reich will be viewed in the future (Rachel Cooke)
A huge contribution... remarkable (Antony Beevor)
The picture he paints is both a powerful and an extreme one... gripping reading (Anna Katharina Schaffner)
Remarkable... energetic... retells the history of the war through the prism of the pill... it has an uncanny ability to disturb (Roger Boyes)
Very good and extremely interesting - a serious piece of scholarship very well-researched (Ian Kershaw author of Hitler and To Hell and Back)
The most brilliant and fascinating book I have read in my entire life (Dan Snow)
This book transforms the overall picture
Sensational
Bursting with interesting facts
Norman Ohler has written an illuminating account of the gobsmacking extent to which military strategy in the Third Reich relied on drugs. ... What you'll learn: Never trust a coked-up Nazi
All stars
Most relevant
I had little knowledge about the pervasiveness of amphetamines in WW2 Germany but the evidence is there. It provides an interesting perspective into the course of the war from the view of drug use and abuse. There’s good content there and it’s worth listening to. There’s a lot of overly harsh critiques of this work. Probably best to make up your own mind.

A new perspective

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This is a facinating book, brilliantly written and narrated, highly recommend it! truth truly is stranger than fiction.

brilliant book!

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Although mainly concerned with Hitler's private physician the book still casts an interesting light on WWII and the Germany of the time and how the war of drugs was paralleled by Hitler himself.

A good read, interesting throughout

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Absolutely love this audiobook. It’s a fascinating analysis about an unknown part of history from the darkest days of the modern world - it also makes fascinating conversation at dinner parties, 10/10 would recommend to the curious and the fact tweakers (sorry, not sorry lol) who love to get high on history.

Currently High on Knowledge!

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Very good! Some very interesting original research. Became a little bit tabloid, where the author makes some big leaps based on fairly thin evidence. Lots of polemic. What appears to be a massive oversight in a book that is half about the physiological state of Adolf Hitler and his drug use and parkinsons disease is the fact Hitler was gassed in WW1. Cannot believe this wasn’t mentioned!

Generally good book! Will keep your attention. Large overisght.

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