Holocaust Books for Teachers

The Holocaust is one of the most complex and delicate subjects to address in class. It requires knowledge, commitment, and teaching skill, along with extensive reading by teachers who want to correctly cover the various aspects of the tragedy and properly convey its scope. The objective of this article is to recommend a few essential books that could be read by teachers to better equip themselves to teach students.

The Holocaust is a multifaceted historical event; the books recommended below are on varied but connected subjects, such as the persecution of the Jews before the war, the extermination process, and the perpetrators of the Holocaust. Let’s start by assessing three books pertaining to the oppression of Jews before World War II.

First, I would recommend Saul Friedländer’s Nazi Germany and the Jews: The Years of Persecution, 1933–1939. This magisterial book, for which its author received numerous awards, contains abundant details on the vicissitudes of Jewish life in Nazi Germany. It exposes the events that led to the dehumanization of Jews in the eyes of Germans and highlights the criminal intent of the NSDAP (The Nazi Party).

David Cesarani’s Final Solution: The Fate of the Jews, 1933- 1949 is also important. Based on lifelong research and newly available Soviet archives, it aptly describes the milestones in the elaboration of the Final Solution from the Nuremberg Laws to Auschwitz.

Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews is also an important book as its author, German historian Peter Longerich, is one of the leading scholars on the subject.

Concerning the extermination process of European Jews, I would suggest reading three publications.

The first would be Raul Hilberg’s The Destruction of the European Jews because it is still one of the most insightful accounts of the Holocaust. It puts the emphasis on the German side of things and assesses the way the Third Reich organized mass murder on an industrial scale. Bureaucracy, technology, and ideology are shown to have been the decisive factors of that genocide.

Saul Friedländer’s Nazi Germany and the Jews: The Years of Extermination, 1939-1945 explains the ins and outs of the Nazi extermination policies and concludes Friedländer’s magnum opus that he started with The Years of Persecution discussed above.

Nikolaus Wachsmann’s KL: A History of the Nazi Concentration Camps offers a panoptic overview of the history of the Nazi concentration camps from their inception through 1945; it will soon be considered a classic. But be warned: it goes in depth in its description of the modus operandi of the camps and the everyday experiences of the inmates. Some passages are quite disturbing. Yet, for teachers, this study is the best there is to truly learn about the camps and their place in Hitler’s dictatorship.

It is impossible to study the Holocaust without precisely knowing about certain actors that made these unprecedented crimes possible. Educators should focus on three Nazis: Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, and Reinhard Heydrich.

As is to be expected, many biographies have been written about Hitler since his infamous suicide in 1945. However, one stands out: Hitler by Ian Kershaw. Made up of two bulky volumes, it’s the result of decades of research. If no new source material is ever found, Kershaw could certainly boast that he wrote the definitive biography of Adolf Hitler.

Another very relevant book pertaining to Hitler is The Unwritten Order: Hitler’s Role in the Final Solution. In this small book of 160 pages, Peter Longerich explores the central role played by Hitler in the radicalization of the Jewish policy of Nazi Germany.

Longerich also wrote the best book on Heinrich Himmler: Heinrich Himmler. It is thought-provoking because it links Himmler’s personality to the structural history of the Third Reich insofar as its author proves that Himmler moulded the SS to fill his personal interests as much as the regime he was serving.

Lastly, to read about Reinhard Heydrich, Heydrich: The Face of Evil by Mario R. Dederichs is advocated. This meticulously researched biography documents the life of Reinhard Heydrich as the instigator of the Einsatzgruppen, the ruthless chief of the RSHA (Reich Main Security Office), the Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, the partner in crime of Himmler and an organizer of the Holocaust. Lesser known than Himmler, he was nonetheless a crucial figure in the destruction of European Jews.

In this brief overview, the ten books that are presented encompass various aspects of the Holocaust. All can be useful to the educator who wants to learn more before attempting the daunting task of teaching the Holocaust.

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Martin Destroismaisons
Martin Destroismaisons holds a B.A. in Education and has been teaching in Quebec for two decades. He presently teaches at the Collège Saint-Louis (Montreal) and at the UTA of the Université de Sherbrooke. He also holds an M.A. in History with a specialization in German history and attended the Yad Vashem International School for Holocaust Studies (Jerusalem) and the Arthur and Rochelle Belfer National Conference for Educators (USHMM in Washington, D.C.).

Editor’s Note: A new podcast launched on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, January 27, in collaboration with The Walrus Lab—“The Hidden Holocaust Papers: Survival. Exile. Return.”—is a six-part documentary podcast hosted by Canadian author Timothy Taylor, offering a deeply personal exploration of his family’s hidden Holocaust history. https://lnkfi.re/thehiddenholocuastpapers

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This article is featured in Canadian Teacher Magazine’s Winter 2025 issue.