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Sunday, January 15, 2012

Mein Kamph by Adolf Hitler

I was surprised (and yet not surprised) that I had a really hard time believing anything he wrote about.  Not just because of the person we know him to be because of WWII, but because why would he write something bad about himself?  It is really hard for people to be honest and real about their mistakes and their past and it seemed to me that Hitler "buttered" himself up.  Not necessarily his life because he mentions hard things he went through and his frustrations-but he always blamed them on someone else.  Everything was always someone else's fault in his opinion.  Even when his dad died he was bitter and upset that his dad would be so selfish as to leave him and his mother-whom he loved.  His mother later died and he wasn't as bitter about that but because of their deaths he felt like he had to be involved in politics in order to become anything in life.  He really wanted to be an artist...at least that is what he says.

The thing that had me most fascinated was the translation from German into English.  I was constantly thinking "I don't know how someone could translate this kind of writing."  Hitler seemed to go on and on and his sentences were dragging-and then out of no where he would become extremely angry!  The part of the book I liked the best was the translators introduction.  Which can be read here if you would like.  Though the written word is best, you might want to check out that part online if you can't get a hold of the book itself.

Don't be shocked when I say this: I did agree with some things he said.  One example is that he felt that the media had so much negative affect on the youth and that they were introduced to things at such young ages.  He thought that the youth were involved in things that they shouldn't even know existed. So true now.  Even more so now than then.  It was the way he handled everything that I did not agree with.  Very socialistic.  If we just make people do this or that, if we spy on them , if we terminate them....that is the opposite way that God would handle any situation.

There are lots of people who want this book to be unavailable, but I do think it is important that his way of thinking and handling anything needs not be forgotten.  We should learn from history and not forget it!  Though it is sad to learn about the things that happened because of Hitler and the Nazis I do not wish to forget them- i just repeated myself, but I think that is so important.

I admit that I couldn't finish the whole thing, partly because it was during the holidays that I was reading this book and it turned out to be such a downer for me and partly because his writing style was so boring to me and hard to follow with all those sentences running on and on and on and on and on and on....

1 comment:

  1. Thanks, Jamee! Man, when I saw this book on the autobiography and memoir list I was excited to read it. I haven't yet. That's cool that you did. I want to check it out now.

    It's interesting how he thought that the media had so much negative influence on the youth and that he thought that they were introduced to things at such young ages. Um, what did he think Hitler Youth was?

    Thanks for your review. Did you read Little Women?

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