Lying about Hitler

by Richard J. Evans

Book Overview

In ruling against the controversial historian David Irving in his libel suit against the American historian Deborah Lipstadt, last April 2000, the High Court in London labeled him a falsifier of history. No objective historian, declared the judge, would manipulate the documentary record in the way that Irving did. Richard J. Evans, a Cambridge historian and the chief advisor for the defense, uses this pivotal trial as a lens for exploring a range...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0465021530
• ISBN13: 9780465021536
• Release Date: April 2002
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.76 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.3" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Let's think about this for a moment

As far as I can tell, most of the negative reviews could easily have been writted by people who simply objected to a summary description of the book, even if that isn't the case. They all bemoan the silencing of someone who would "dare" to reexamine the official version of historical events. It seems that these people keep missing a rather obvious point. Irving was the PLAINTIFF in the trial, NOT THE DEFENDANT. No one put Irving on trial; rather, Irving was trying to destroy the career of a person who had dared to doubt HIS version of Holocaust events. So all of those reviews complaining that this book is yet another attempt to silence an historian who breaks from the official line are totally missing the point: it was Irving who was attempting to silence academic discourse. Which makes most of the defenses of him shown in these reviews completely moot. Had Irving respected the right of others to disagree with him, even to very vocally and bitterly disagree with him, his career would be intact and this book would never have been written. And to the reviewer who claimed that Evans only wrote the book to make money: How, exactly, do you think academics earn their living?

A Valuable and Necessary Book

This book is an outcome of the libel trial brought by David Irving against Penguin Books (in general) and Deborah Lipstadt (specifically). A historian and modern social commentator, Deborah Lipstadt had referred to Irving as a Holocaust denier (and a poor historian) three or four times in a nearly 600-page book. Irving took exception and sued her for libel. He waited to sue her in England where the burden of proof is on the defendant, not the Plaintiff. Evans was one of the many historians asked, by the defense, to prove that Lipstadt was not committing libel when she called Irving a Holocaust denier. Evans has consequently built up a massive body of evidence to show that Irving continually, and with knowledge, suppressed historical facts and documents to support his position. Evans presents both the process of his investigation and the conclusions that he reached. Evans makes a formidable case. He points successfully to incident after incident where Irving knew that information was incorrect and still used it. Evans also points out that Irving's "mistakes" were all in one direction, not chaotic as one might expect from a researcher that didn't have enough time on his hands or was uncertain about his material. Lying About Hitler clarifies a number of issues, the first being that Irving was not the defendant (I thought so when I first heard about the case). Irving was suing Lipstadt, not the other way around. It was Lipstadt's freedom of speech (and Penguin Books') that was under attack. If Irving had won, he and others like him would have been able to stop (or attempt to stop) anyone who called them liars or disagreed with their position. Another issue Evans deals with is the "but history is so hard to interpret" argument. Evans points out, again and again, that this trial was not about the interpretation of historical facts but the misuse of historical documentation (either invented or avoided). Evans' chapter on Irving's research of the bombing of Dresden is fascinating in this regard. This kind of book confirms the importance of historical research for its own sake. History is so easily (and so often) manipulated for political purposes (on both sides of the fence). It is so much more important to figure out what happened and why as objectively as possible than to "prove" political agendas. Recommendation: Buy it in paperback or hardcover. If you don't have the cash, take it out of the library. It is definitely worth a read.

Ideologue Masquerading As Historian

"Lying About Hitler", by Professor Richard J. Evans is a powerful, meticulous, and deeply troubling summation of his preparation for, and testimony at the David Irving Trial. The idea that a trial was needed to prove that the Holocaust did take place despite the writings of the rabid anti-Semite David Irving is almost beyond belief. The fact that the trial was brought by a suit initiated by David Irving is astounding. For while his life has been consumed by creating History as he wanted it to be, reading his words as he impales his ideas and himself would have been pathetic were his victims History at all questionable. However here his public and professional suicide was appropriate.What is very disturbing is that even after he was exposed for nothing more than an ideologue that twisted facts when he needed to, and created them from thin air when there was nothing to twist, is that his peers did not ostracize him completely and without exception. By peers I refer to legitimate Historians whose work is accurate and can be verified. History can certainly be revised when new facts are learned, but never when they are the creation of a fertile yet fetid mind. This was not a blow to free speech as some have suggested. Free speech does not grant the right to create and represent as true, that, which the writer knows to be false, or worse, information that the writer has conjured. The only Historians that should feel threatened by this trials' outcome should logically be those who are concerned as to how well their work is documented, and free of ludicrous speculation.Professional Historians must be held to a much higher standard than other writers. Through their work they document our History and serve as custodians of the past. We must be able to rely upon them, and also on their peers to see that writers of hate-based novels like those of David Irving never reach a courtroom. His fictions must be marginalized to those of his kind who have made the decision to retreat from what is true and create their own hate-filled version of the world.Professor Evans is also to be commended for discussing the fact that while the Jews were unquestionably the primary target of Hitler and his sociopaths, there were also hundreds of thousands of non-Jews who were slaughtered together alongside the Jews in the camps. The survivors of the crimes of World War II are becoming fewer in number every day. As they pass and their numbers decline so will the power of the advocacy they can summon. This is the challenge moving forward, to ensure the record remains accurate and free from the diseases that are David Irving and his ilk.This is a wonderfully readable book that sets out what History is, and what it is not. As long as there are men and woman who are willing to dedicate their time and skills to the destruction of these falsifiers, these deniers, both our History and our Future are safe.

This book should be translated into Japanese

After I started reading Richard J. Evans’ LYING ABOUT HITLER, I couldn’t put it down. This is a well-organized, thoroughly researched account, intellectually stimulating and yet entertaining. Based on his "expert report" as one of the expert witnesses for the defense in the Irving vs. Penguin Books/Lipstadt case, the Cambridge historian Prof. Evans meticulously shows how the British author David Irving has falsified, distorted, misinterpreted, and misrepresented historical evidence to fit it with his special agendas. Proved as a problematic "historian," a racist, and a Holocaust denier in the British High Court, Irving lost the libel case in which HE had sued the American scholar Deborah Lipstadt (and her publisher), who had accused him of being an abuser of history and a "denier" in her 1993 book. LYING ABOUT HITLER not only explains how the author proved Irving’s intentional distortion of historical evidence, but also interweaves the reactions to the trial among the media and professional historians.[....]This book includes seven chapters and detailed notes (good historians always use notes). Chapter 1 discusses the reputations of Irving’s works among professional historians and journalists, while explaining how Evans got involved in the case as an expert whose job was to prove Irving’s abuse of historical record. The chapter shows that although some historians have already pointed out the problems in Irving’s methodology, there are other scholars and journalists who have praised Irving’s works.In Chapters 2, 3, and 5, Evans proves how Irving has deliberately falsified and distorted historical evidence. In order to support his favorite themes (e.g. Hitler tried to stop violence against the Jews), Irving intentionally manipulated primary sources. His methods include: claiming something that the source did not say; ignoring unfavorable parts within a document; using untrustworthy witnesses (e.g. Hitler’s sympathizers); doubting the authenticity of a document that did not support his thesis; and even using forged documentation. It was a challenging and painstaking job to examine Irving’s works (about 30 books) along with thousands of pages of documents and many other materials. Yet, Evans succeeded his task in court and in this book.Chapter 4, "Irving and Holocaust Denial," first defines what the Holocaust deniers (they call themselves "revisionists") are trying to prove in order to minimize or smash the significance of the Holocaust. Then, mainly by examining Irving’s public speeches, Evans verifies Irving’s association with deniers, especially a group in California, the "revisionist" center of the US. Evans informs us that the group started with Holocaust-bashing agendas, backed by extreme right-wing figures and organizations, and has maintained itself so since.Chapter 6, "In the Witness Box," is quite entertaining. It includes how Evans presented his findings in court and how Irving responded in cross-examination (he represented hi