Norman Ohler

Ohler was born in Zweibrücken, West Germany in 1970 and attended journalism school in Hamburg.

In 1995 he published Die Quotenmaschine, the world's first hypertext novel in German.{{cite web | url = https://wwik.dla-marbach.de/line/index.php/Die_Quotenmaschine | title = Die Quotenmaschine | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | publisher = DLA Marbach}}

His second novel, Mitte, was published in 2001 and praised by Der Spiegel as his 'masterpiece', followed by his third, Ponte City, in 2002.{{cite magazine | url = http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-21252114.html | title = Literatur: Traumhafter Trip | date = 21 January 2002 | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | magazine = Der Spiegel}} These three novels form Ohler's City Trilogy.

In 2004, Ohler was invited by the German Goethe-Institut to act as writer-in-residence in Ramallah. There, Ohler wrote about the life of the Palestinians in the West Bank and published the last interview Yassir Arafat gave, shortly before his death.{{cite web | url = http://www.zeit.de/2004/47/Arafat | title = Als Arafat mit mir den Brokkoli teilte | date=11 November 2004 | accessdate = 6 October 2016 | publisher = Zeit Online | author = Norman Ohler}} Ohler has also worked as writer-in-residence in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

In 2008, he co-wrote the movie Palermo Shooting with Wim Wenders, starring Dennis Hopper.{{cite web | url = https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1008017/ | title = IMDB: Palermo Shooting | date = 20 November 2008 | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | publisher = IMDB}}

In September 2015, Kiepenheuer & Witsch published Ohler's first non-fiction work, Der totale Rausch: Drogen im Dritten Reich; the book appeared in English as Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany in 2016.{{cite magazine | url = http://www.newsweek.com/story-behind-norman-ohlers-drug-heavy-nazi-history-565025 | title = The story behind Norman Ohler's drug-centric nazi history | date=8 March 2017 | accessdate = 25 March 2017 | magazine = Newsweek | author = Stav Ziv}}{{cite news | url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/sep/25/blitzed-norman-ohler-adolf-hitler-nazi-drug-abuse-interview | title = High Hitler: how Nazi drug abuse steered the course of history | date=25 September 2016 | accessdate = 6 October 2016 | newspaper = The Guardian | author = Rachel Cook}} Upon publication in the US, it became a New York Times bestseller.{{cite news | url = https://www.nytimes.com///books/best-sellers/2017/03/26/hardcover-nonfiction/?action=click&contentCollection=Books&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.co.uk%2Furl®ion=Body&module=CompleteListLink&version=Nonfiction&pgtype=Reference | title = New York Times Bestseller List | date=26 March 2017 | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | newspaper = New York Times}} In the book, Ohler researches what role psychoactive drugs, particularly stimulants such as methamphetamine, played in the military history of World War II, concluding that many of the German military and political leadership—especially Adolf Hitler—used psychoactive drugs during the war.{{cite news | url = http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/hitlers-drug-habit-laid-bare-in-norman-ohlers-book-blitzed-drugs-in-nazi-germany_uk_57f37a00e4b038eb7459d7e5 | title = Adolf Hitler's True Drug Habits Laid Bare By Norman Ohler In Blitzed: Drugs In Nazi Germany | date=4 October 2016 | accessdate = 6 October 2016 | work = Huffington Post UK | author = Sara C. Nelson}}{{cite magazine | url = http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/hitler-probably-spent-wwii-high-on-cocaine-and-oxycodone | title = Hitler Probably Spent WWII High on Cocaine and Oxycodone | date=26 September 2016 | accessdate = 6 October 2016 | magazine = Atlas Obscura | author = Eric Shilling}}{{cite news | url = http://news.nationalpost.com/news/hitler-was-on-cocaine-and-his-troops-were-on-meth-author-reveals-deep-influence-of-drugs-in-nazi-germany | title = Hitler was on cocaine and his troops were on meth: Author reveals deep influence of drugs in Nazi Germany | date=28 September 2016 | accessdate = 6 October 2016 | newspaper = National Post | author = Tristin Hopper}}

The book was praised by some historians: Antony Beevor calls Blitzed 'a remarkable work of research. Ohler's account makes us look at this densely studied period rather differently'; Ian Kershaw describes it as 'very good and extremely interesting ... a serious piece of scholarship very well-researched' and Hans Mommsen, one of Germany's leading historians, refers to Blitzed as 'changing the overall picture'.{{cite news | url = http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/hitlers-drug-habit-laid-bare-in-norman-ohlers-book-blitzed-drugs-in-nazi-germany_uk_57f37a00e4b038eb7459d7e5 | title = Adolf Hitler's True Drug Habits Laid Bare By Norman Ohler In Blitzed: Drugs In Nazi Germany | date = 4 October 2016 | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | work = The Huffington Post | author = Sara C Nelson}}{{cite web | url=http://www.normanohler.de/blitzed | title=Blitzed | publisher=Norman Ohler | accessdate=8 December 2016}}{{cite news | url = http://www.fr.de/kultur/nachruf-hans-mommsen-unbequemer-blick-auf-die-ns-zeit-a-404830 | title = Unbequemer Blick auf die NS-Zeit | date = 5 November 2015 | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | newspaper = Frankfurter Rundschau | author = Hans Mommsen}}

However, other historians disagreed with Ohler's approach. German historian, Nikolaus Wachsmann wrote that Ohler "appears to mix fact and fiction. [...] He spices up the evidence, throws in pop culture references (“Teutonic Easy Riders"), and garnishes it with snazzy puns ("High Hitler"). It remains to be seen if this recipe will appeal to anglophone readers. To borrow Ohler's style: will they experience a big buzz, or a bad trip?".{{cite news | url = https://www.ft.com/content/3989c0b2-9132-11e6-a72e-b428cb934b78 | title = Was Nazi Germany a 'land of drugs'? | date=14 October 2016 | accessdate = 19 September 2019 | magazine = Financial Times | author = Nicholaus Wachsmann}} Dagmar Herzog expressed the view that 'Ohler's analysis does not withstand close scrutiny. (…) Anyone seeking a deepened understanding of the Nazi period must be wary of a book that provides more distraction and distortion than clarification.'{{cite news | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/books/review/blitzed-drugs-third-reich-norman-ohler.html?emc=edit_bk_20170331&nl=book-review&nl_art=&nlid=60002645&ref=headline&te=1&_r=0 | title = Hitler's Little Helper: A History of Rampant Drug Use Under the Nazis | date=27 March 2017 | accessdate = 4 April 2017 | newspaper = The New York Times | author = Dagmar Herzog}} James Pugh judged that while the book is an 'engaging and entertaining piece of journalistic history', it was 'troubling based on its tone, scholarship and engagement with the literature'.{{cite journal|last1=Pugh|first1=James|title=Norman Ohler, Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany|journal=British Journal for Military History|date=2017|volume=3|issue=3|page=162|url=http://bjmh.org.uk/index.php/bjmh/article/view/178/151}} Richard J. Evans, Regius Professor of History at the University of Cambridge from 2008 to 2014, author of History of the Third Reich, called Blitzed 'a crass and dangerously inaccurate account'.{{cite news | url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/nov/16/blitzed-drugs-in-nazi-germany-by-norman-ohler-review | title = Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany by Norman Ohler review – a crass and dangerously inaccurate account | date=16 November 2016 | accessdate = 25 March 2017 | newspaper = The Guardian | author = Richard J. Evans}} He also wrote that the book is 'morally and politically dangerous', because it implies that Hitler was not responsible for his actions. Ohler rejected this claim.{{cite news | url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/02/i-had-an-intimate-knowledge-of-hitler-norman-ohler-blitzed | title = 'I had an intimate knowledge of Hitler's drug habit that no one else possessed' | date = 2 May 2017 | accessdate = 18 May 2017 | newspaper = The Guardian | author = Norman Ohler}} Evans replied: "′Blitzed′ belongs not in the world of serious history, but in the new landscape of ‘post-truth’ and ‘alternative facts’".{{cite web | url = http://conspiracyanddemocracy.org/blog/hitler-and-the-nazis-were-high-on-drugs-a-theory-for-the-age-of-alternative-facts/ | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170610170637/http://www.conspiracyanddemocracy.org/blog/hitler-and-the-nazis-were-high-on-drugs-a-theory-for-the-age-of-alternative-facts/ | url-status = usurped | archive-date = 10 June 2017 | title = Hitler and the Nazis Were High on Drugs – a Theory for the Age of 'Alternative Facts'

| date=30 May 2017 | accessdate = 11 July 2017 | publisher = Conspiracy and Democracy Project | author = Richard J. Evans}}

In 2020, Ohler's second non-fiction book appeared: The Bohemians – The Lovers who led Germany’s Resistance against the Nazis. "A detailed and meticulously researched tale about a pair of young German resisters that reads like a thriller“, writes The New York Times.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/books/review/the-bohemians-norman-ohler.html|title = Young, in Love and Trying to Bring Down the Third Reich|newspaper = The New York Times|date = 14 July 2020|last1 = Neumann|first1 = Ariana}}

• Die Quotenmaschine (1998)
• Mitte (2001)
• Ponte City (2003)
• Die Gleichung des Lebens (2017)

• Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany[https://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/buecher/themen/rezension-der-totale-rausch-drogen-im-dritten-reich-von-norman-ohler-13799639.html High Hitler] Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 13 September 2015[http://www.zeit.de/2015/47/der-totale-rausch-sachbuch-norman-ohler Wenn das der Führer wüsste…] Die Zeit, 3 December 2015 (2016), {{ISBN|0241256992}}

• The Bohemians – The Lovers who led Germany's Resistance against the Nazis (2020), {{ISBN|1328566307}}

• Tripped: Nazi Germany, The CIA and the Dawn of the Psychedelic Age (2024), {{ISBN|978-0-358-64650-1}}

• Palermo Shooting, screenwriter[http://www.festival-cannes.fr/assets/Image/Direct/025899.pdf Festival de Canne: Palermo Shooting] Cannes Film Festival, 6 October 2016{{cite magazine | url = https://variety.com/2008/film/markets-festivals/palermo-shooting-1200522084/ | title = Review: 'Palermo Shooting' | date=25 May 2008 | accessdate = 6 October 2016 | magazine = Variety | author = Todd McCarthy}} (2008)

{{Reflist}}

• {{official|http://www.normanohler.de/}}
• {{DNB-Portal|118048228}}

• The German Granddaddy of Crystal Meth, article by Fabienne Hurst, Der Spiegel, 2013{{cite magazine | url = http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/crystal-meth-origins-link-back-to-nazi-germany-and-world-war-ii-a-901755.html | title = The German Granddaddy of Crystal Meth | date=30 May 2013 | accessdate = 2 May 2017 | magazine = Der Spiegel | author = Fabienne Hurst}}
• Was Hitler ill?, by Henrik Eberle & Hans-Joachim Neumann, Polity, 2012, {{ISBN|978-0745652221}}
• Hitler's drugged soldiers, article by Andreas Ulrich, Der Spiegel, 2005{{cite magazine | url = http://www.spiegel.de/international/the-nazi-death-machine-hitler-s-drugged-soldiers-a-354606.html | title = Hitler's Drugged Soldiers | date=6 May 2005 | accessdate = 25 March 2017 | magazine = Der Spiegel | author = Andreas Ulrich}}
• Nazis on speed, by Werner Pieper, The Grüne Kraft, 2002, {{ISBN|978-3930442393}}
• Hitler: diagnosis of a destructive prophet, by Fritz Redlich, Oxford University Press, 1998, {{ISBN|978-0195057829}}

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Category:1970 births

Category:Living people

Category:German journalists

Category:German screenwriters

Category:German male screenwriters

Category:Historians of Nazism

Category:People from Zweibrücken

Category:Film people from Rhineland-Palatinate