Mein Kampf

[Craig the cyclist]

Ein beschneidungswitz? Urkomisch

Warum Danke. Hitler hatte aber nur einen Hoden

 

[Craig the cyclist]

Now me and @AndyRM have taken the thread up market eh?

So Andy, do you speak German, or are you on Google translate?

 

[AndyRM]

Now me and @AndyRM have taken the thread up market eh?

So Andy, do you speak German, or are you on Google translate?

My German is OK, I speak a bit of Spanish and I'm fluent in French.

Trying to learn Greek, but I'm finding it tricky.

 

[The Crofted Crest]

Now me and @AndyRM have taken the thread up market eh?

Ahem, Andy and I, please.

 

[BoldonLad]

I haven’t read it, comments so far, do not encourage me to seek it out.

Presumably, it is a rather hate filled tome? Does anyone think it should be banned?

 

[Xipe Totec]

I haven’t read it, comments so far, do not encourage me to seek it out.

Presumably, it is a rather hate filled tome? Does anyone think it should be banned?

Banned? But it's a proper rib-tickler, a real laugh riot if you read it in its original language.

 

[Craig the cyclist]

Ahem, Andy and I, please.

Me and m'homie A. The A-Bombster.

 

[AuroraSaab]

I haven’t read it, comments so far, do not encourage me to seek it out.

Presumably, it is a rather hate filled tome? Does anyone think it should be banned?

I doubt it would find a publisher today; it would be rant on a blog. It shouldn't be banned though. It's a historical document and should be available for anybody to see the origins of Nazism first hand.

 

[AndyRM]

Fill your boots: https://archive.org/search.php?query=MEIN KAMPF AND mediatype:texts

 

[Unkraut]

I doubt it would find a publisher today; ... . It shouldn't be banned though. It's a historical document and should be available for anybody to see the origins of Nazism first hand.

My old history teacher said we could 'read a couple of hundred pages for a laugh'; it's so awful that no-one was likely ever to think Hitler wasn't so bad after all having read it. Quite the reverse. I have a vague recollection of reading a few pages.

After copyright expired about 5 years ago, with no publication of it since 1945, a heavily annotated edition was published here for students of history. I remember some of the controversy. There was a fear it might lead some back to the old Reich but I find it difficult to believe that more than a fringe could be that 'dumb'.

The modern concept of life as 'struggle' goes back to one Charles Darwin. Not only Hitler saw life like this, but communism too viewed life as an ongoing struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. The full title of Darwin's book was On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. The latter part of the title doesn't seem to be quoted very often these days, and I was very surprised when I saw it!

As for the origins of Nazism, it didn't come out of thin air just after WW1, but was based on ideas and thinking in the Kaiser's Reich, just taken to a greater extreme. This comes out of the literature of the period, which a long time ago I had to read. Something that struck me whilst doing that was just how similar much the thinking of Wilhelmine Germany was to that of Victorian Britain. The French were also very prone to this as well. I think the British were quicker to emerge from this than the continental countries.

 

[AuroraSaab]

I was trying to think of another book that had similar influence to MK. The Bible/NT obviously, long term, but I mean that had more of an immediate social and political impact in the few years after publication.

I could only think of Martin Luther's Theses, which kicked off the Reformation. Mao's Little Red Book perhaps. I don't know how much of a part Mein Kampf played in bringing people to Nazism. Did it convert people or did Germans feel obliged to buy it?

I always think something like Nazism wouldn't happen in the UK because we are quite cynical and don't like being told what to do, but I suppose it only needs a combination of particular circumstances to trigger these developments. Perhaps Mein Kampf met a thirst that was historically already there.

 

[BoldonLad]

I was trying to think of another book that had similar influence to MK. The Bible/NT obviously, long term, but I mean that had more of an immediate social and political impact in the few years after publication.

I could only think of Martin Luther's Theses, which kicked off the Reformation. Mao's Little Red Book perhaps. I don't know how much of a part Mein Kampf played in bringing people to Nazism. Did it convert people or did Germans feel obliged to buy it?

I always think something like Nazism wouldn't happen in the UK because we are quite cynical and don't like being told what to do, but I suppose it only needs a combination of particular circumstances to trigger these developments. Perhaps Mein Kampf met a thirst that was historically already there.

I wish I was confident of that

 

[Bromptonaut]

I could only think of Martin Luther's Theses, which kicked off the Reformation. Mao's Little Red Book perhaps. I don't know how much of a part Mein Kampf played in bringing people to Nazism. Did it convert people or did Germans feel obliged to buy it?

I might add Das Kapital too.

This thread led me to read up a bit on Mein Kampf; I guess people were at least obliged if not coerced into reading it.

 

[StuAff]

Mein Kampf was preaching to the converted. It's too badly written to appeal to anyone else.

 

[StuAff]

I might add Das Kapital too.

This thread led me to read up a bit on Mein Kampf; I guess people were at least obliged if not coerced into reading it.

Many of the sales were to Nazi party organisations (& members naturally) and business rather than the general public. And even then, it was a book to own & be seen to own rather than actually read.