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21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
MEIN FLOPF, 28 Jul 2006
It was apparently in 1961 that a book alleged to be the second literary effort of Hitler was published in Munich. I recall seeing a very small news item around then to that effect in one of the British papers, and I recall the statement in that same item that the work had achieved no significant sales. As it started, so it seems to have continued. It surprises me still that a document of so much historical significance has had to wait more than 40 years for its first English edition, and I naturally wondered whether it could really be genuine under the circumstances. Apparently it is, but it still seems to be avoiding the best-seller lists, and I can't recall a great deal of critical discussion of it either. Nothing that I have seen has cast doubt on the work's authenticity, which I am therefore taking on trust. In attempting a review I am mainly concerned with the actual content of the volume. However in awarding a rating I have given regard only to the editorial work, and I imagine it would go without saying that this rating does not reflect any endorsement of the poisonous doctrines of Adolf Hitler.
The editor at least addresses the basic questions that I wanted to see addressed, namely -
Is the authorship firmly established? Is this (seemingly untitled) book definitely a later work than Mein Kampf? Why was it not published in Hitler's lifetime? He also ponders earnestly the question why an English edition should be published. Because most of us struggle a bit with German would be sufficient answer for me. The likelihood that this text might be inflammatory nowadays would have struck me as nil in any case even if I had not known about its poor sales record. As for the other questions, Weinberg's arguments are the only side of the case that I know, but they are at least plausible. His credentials as a scholar are not familiar to me, but he has written extensively about Hitler and any criticism of his work that I have spotted reads to me like standard academic niggling and infighting rather than anything that undermines my confidence in his conclusions here. As for internal evidence of authorship, I can assure you that the style possesses a conspicuous and frightful familiarity.
The book reads easily and fluently in English, and the translator Krista Smith has to get a great deal of credit for that. Whatever else he may have been, Hitler was supremely articulate and the text is not as prolix or repetitious as some comment might suggest. The reason he suppressed the book at the time of writing was apparently that it put some of his foreign-policy cards face upwards on the table, and he was not ready at the time to do that. We would have known about Lebensraum, but the blatancy of his endorsement of territorial conquest simply for the purpose of protecting the German food-supply is rather breathtaking. One of the things I slightly regret about the failure of this book to arouse general interest is that I would have liked to see some proper analysis by qualified economists of the quaintest economic reasoning I have ever read in my life. A strong nation, one gathers, must not rely in trade, imports, exports and such like to feed itself but must be self-sufficient in that regard. It would have made for a dull Speisekarte if it had even been achieved, I must say, but of course Hitler was vegetarian and his favourite gastronomic treat was Spiegeleier mit Kartoffeln. The rest of the text is mainly concerned with his attitude towards other European nations, France being seen as a traditional and irreconcilable foe, Italy and even England as potential allies. A surprising amount of space, and an even more astonishing level of emotion, is directed on to the strictly contemporary issue of the ownership of the South Tyrol, which he is happy enough to concede to Italy, at least pro tem, in the interests of securing an alliance with fascist Italy under his admired Mussolini. One reason for this unexpected emphasis is his concern to attack the enemy within, the bourgeois democratic traitors who were full of indignation over the trifling matter of the South Tyrol but failed to see the pressing need for large-scale territorial expansion.
Indeed Hitler is nothing if not candid in this work about the prime importance of carrying the sword to ensure his precious breathing-space. Economic superiority was in his view futile - a robust and healthy Germany should not shirk from the task, staringly necessary to him, of suppression of its neighbours by force of arms, the basic reasoning being that a nation that is not the hammer will end up being the anvil. The familiar enemies and bogies are paraded too - Jews, Marxists, freemasons, pacifists and the weak-kneed campaigners for a restoration of the pre-1914 borders of Germany, which seemed to Hitler a paltry substitute for the massive expansion of his dreams. The expression is articulate to say the least, the phraseology often vivid, and the racial perceptions, taken unquestioningly as fact, foul beyond description. The reasoning is specious, the perceptions are often acute and even brilliant, but the book is past its sell-by date for some very bad and sinister reasons. The ugly and unreasoned racism has not really gone away, and indeed is a deeply ingrained European characteristic. This book is no longer dangerous only because it needs no Hitler to put the message across to those who are happy to take it on board without him.
The edition fulfils what is expected of it quite well so far as I can see, except that the proof-reading leaves a little to be desired (notably a rash of misprints on pp 89/90), the frequent insertion of `[sic]' is fussy and excessive, and some of the words inserted to complete the sense of the unrevised text are occasionally in the wrong place. Necessary as history.
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7 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Hitler's 2nd Autobiography, 18 Jan 2005
By A Customer
I found this maybe a little hard to follow due to the traslation of the orginal text but that is no fault of the traslator as is it clearly put together a little haphazard, that said it is still a historical record in to the mind of well recognized political figure of the 20th century and well worth owning if you have a copy of Mien Kamph as a completion if you are interested in the dark history of the NSDAP.
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7 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
A bit suspicious, 7 Aug 2006
A book supposedly written by Adolf Hitler and someone going by the name of Weinberg??? I think this one is a bit iffy. And so is the content. The second author's name should tell you all you need to know about the real reason this false document was ever produced.
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