Twentieth-century Germany was characterised by extreme violence-unleashing war, genocide, and contrasting dictatorships of right and left. Dissonant Lives analyses the ways in which generations of Germans lived through this turbulent century and explores how, at different states of their lives, people interpreted, confronted, and responded to the multiple challenges of their times. In Volume one, Mary Fulbrook traces experiences of violence from Imperial Germany through the First World War to Nazism and the Second World War. Focussing particularly on the first 'war youth generation' and the 'Hitler youth generations', she explores the perceptions and responses of selected individuals, and examines how major historical events affected the course of their lives. In this way, Fulbrook provides a new understanding of the ways in which not only the structure of German society changed over the decades, but also the outlooks and character of Germans themselves. Book jacket.