SOURCE: "In Love with Hitler," in The New York Review of Books, Vol. XXXV, No. 12, July 21, 1988, pp. 14-16.

In the following essay, Lukacs analyzes Goebbels's characteristics as a man and writer.

The diaries of Joseph Goebbels are an extraordinary find, for many reasons, including their size and their history. Goebbels was a truly compulsive writer as well as speaker—an unusual combination. He began to write a regular diary in July 1924 (there are indications of an irregular diary even earlier) at the age of twenty-six. The last entry is probably that of April 9, 1945, three weeks before his suicide along with his wife and children, and the complete collapse of the Third Reich. The total of the retrieved hand- and typewritten material may amount to more than 60, 000 pages. When completed, their publication will comprise ten large volumes, of which the first four have now been published by the Institut...