First published in Germany in 2013, HITLER: ASCENT 1889-1939 is a dense, scholarly work that looks at the dictator of the Third Reich from many perspectives, offering perhaps the most “human” view available in our times.

Volker Ullrich states that writing about Adolf Hitler is “without a doubt the most difficult task for a historian.” Hitler was, by the time of his suicide at the end of World War II, considered by all but a handful of his most fanatical followers to be a monster, and since then has been almost universally depicted as such. Thus a chapter entitled “Hitler as Human Being” reveals the author’s notable determination to present a responsible view of his complex protagonist. Ullrich chronicles Hitler’s early childhood, his adolescence as a rather dreamy school dropout and his service in World War I, up to the moment when he became the occupant of the German Chancellery, pivoting his country to the brink of all-out war.

"Admirably intent on presenting Hitler in an unbiased manner, Ullrich cannot help but paint a picture of an aberrant character devising and achieving an unprecedented rise to glorification."

Contrary to other accounts that suggest Hitler was the product of abuse, Ullrich asserts that the boy experienced an unremarkable childhood for the time and place. The young Hitler showed early academic promise but wound up with slipping grades, contempt for teachers and an autodidact’s love of solitary reading. Eschewing the intimacy of most romantic relationships, but not a sexual deviant, he purposely developed an uncommon ability to stifle personal sentiment and morph into an iron-willed leader with near superhuman charisma. His pale violet eyes were variously described as intense, hypnotic, unforgettable and unwavering. Though he had only average talent as a painter, his hands were cited as those of an artist, and he used them memorably in his highly dramatic speeches.

Admirably intent on presenting Hitler in an unbiased manner, Ullrich cannot help but paint a picture of an aberrant character devising and achieving an unprecedented rise to glorification. Hitler could cry at will, hide feelings of contempt behind a gracious persona, and had a prodigious memory --- but only for the facts he considered important. He could be both warm and cold, so extremely so that even his closest confidantes were perplexed when they thought back on it. And though anti-Semitism was rife in Germany after World War I, it was Hitler alone, in his distant and nuanced manner, who would cold-bloodedly predict, in 1939, “the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe.”

Ullrich’s thoughtful first volume of the Hitler biography immediately made the bestseller list in his native land. No stranger to exploration of the megalomaniacal personality, having written previously about Bismarck and Napoleon, Ullrich expresses his belief that by allowing Hitler some traces of normality, the deeds of the future Führer “will emerge as even more horrific.”