[quote=@DepressedSoviet] Okay wow, I'm impressed, a whole day and NOBODY'S insulted my cultural heritage by posting the Communist Manifesto. Well done, spam. [/quote] How about some bashable literature then? CHAPTER I AT HOME FODAY I consider it my good fortune that Fate de- 1 signated Braunau on the Inn as the place of my birth. For this small town is situated on the border between those two German States, the reunion of which seems, at least to us of the younger generation, a task to be furthered with every means our lives long. German-Austria must return to the great German mo- therland, and not because of economic considerations of any sort. No, no: even if from the economic point of view this union were unimportant, indeed, if it were harmful, it ought nevertheless to be brought about. Common blood be- longs in a common Reich. As long as the German nation is unable even to band together its own children in one com- mon State, it has no moral right to think of colonization as one of its political aims. Only when the boundaries of the Reich include even the last German, only when it is no longer possible to assure him of daily bread inside them, does there arise, out of the distress of the nation, the moral right to acquire foreign soil and territory. The sword is then the plow, and from the tears of war there grows the daily bread for generations to come. Therefore, this little town on the border appears to me the symbol of a great task. But in another respect also it looms up as a warning 4 MEIN KAMPF to our present time. More than a hundred years ago, this insignificant little place had the privilege of gaining an immortal place in German history at least by being the scene of a tragic misfortune that moved the entire nation. There, during the time of the deepest humiliation of our fatherland, Johannes Palm, citizen of Nurnberg, a middle- class bookdealer, die-hard 'nationalist, 1 an enemy of the The idealism of the Wars of Liberation, waged by Prussia against Napoleon, is reflected in the career of Johann Phillip Palm, Nurnberg book-seller, who in 1806 issued a work en- titled, Deutschland in seiner tiefsten Erniedrigung (Germany in the Hour of Its Deepest Humiliation). This was a diatribe against the Corsican. Palm was tried by a military tribunal, sentenced to death, and shot at Braunau on August 26, 1806. During the centenary year (1906) a play in honor of Palm was written by A. Ebenhoch, an Austrian author. It is possible that Hitler may have seen or read this drama. Leo Schlageter, a German artillery officer who served after the World War in the Free Corps with which General von der Goltz attempted to conserve part of what Germany had gained by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, was found guilty of sabotage by a French military tribunal during the Ruhr invasion of 1923. He had blown up a portion of the railway line between Dusseldorf and Duisburg, and had been caught in the act. The assertion that he was 'betrayed* to the French is without historical foundation. It was the policy of the German govern- ment to discountenance open military measures and to place its reliance upon so-called 'passive resistance.' Karl Severing, then Social Democratic Minister of the Interior in Prussia, was a zealous though cautious patriot whose firm defense of the democratic institutions of Weimar angered extremists of all kinds. He was thus a favorite Nazi target. The governments oi the Reich and of Prussia made every effort to save Schlageter. The Vatican intervened in his behalf, and it is generally sup- posed that the French authorities would have commuted the sentence had it not been for a sudden wave of opposition to AT HOME 5 French, was killed for the sake of the Germany he ardently loved even in the hour of its distress. He had obstinately refused to denounce his fellow offenders, or rather the chief offenders. Thus he acted like Leo Schlageter. But like him, he too was betrayed to France by a representative of his government. It was a director of the Augsburg police who earned that shoddy glory, thus setting an example for the new German authorities of Heir Severing's Reich, t In this little town on the river Inn, gilded by the light of German martyrdom, there lived, at the end of the eighties of the last century, my parents, Bavarian by blood, Aus- trian by nationality : the father a faithful civil servant, the Poincar6's policy in the Chamber. That induced the govern- ment to make a show of firmness. Schlageter, whose last words are said to have been, 'Germany must live,' was executed on May 26, 1923. Immediately he became a German national hero. His example more than anything else hallowed the tradition of the Free Corps in the popular mind and thus strengthened pro- militaristic sentiment. One of the first cultural activities of the Nazi regime was a tribute to Schlageter. Hitler's family background has been a subject for much re- search and speculation. The father, Alois Hitler (1837-1903), was the illegitimate son of Maria Anna Schicklgruber; and it is generally assumed that the father was the man she married Johann Hiedler. Until he was forty, he bore the name of his mother, being known as Alois Schicklgruber. Then on January 8, 1877, he legally changed the name to Hitler, which had been that of his maternal grandmother. His third wife was Klara Poelzl (1860-1908), who on April 20, 1889, gave birth to Adolf Hitler. There may have been a brother or half-brother if reports current in Nazi circles are to be credited. At any rate, Hitler has a living sister and a half-sister. The first has lived in retirement, but the second a woman of considerable charm and ability is known to have exercised no little influence at times. 6 MEIN KAMPF mother devoting herself to the cares of the household and looking after her children with eternally the same loving kindness. I remember only little of this time, for a few years later my father had again to leave the little border town he had learned to like, and go down the Inn to take a new position at Passau, that is in Germany proper. But the lot of an Austrian customs official of those days frequently meant 'moving on.' Just a short time after- wards my father was transferred to Linz, and finally retired on a pension there. But this was not to mean * rest' for the old man. The son of a poor cottager, even in his childhood he had not been able to stay at home. Not yet thirteen years old, the little boy he then was bundled up his things and ran away from his homeland, the Waldviertel. Despite the dissuasion of 'experienced' inhabitants of the village he had gone to Vienna to learn a trade there. This was in the fifties of the last century. A bitter resolve it must have been to take to the road, into the unknown, with only three guilders for traveling money. But by the time the thirteen- year-old lad was seventeen, he had passed his apprentice's examination, but he had not yet found satisfaction. It was rather the opposite. The long time of hardship through which he then passed, of endless poverty and misery, strengthened his resolve to give up the trade after all in order to become something 'better.' If once the village pastor had seemed to the little boy the incarnation of all obtainable human success, now, in the big city which had so widened his perspective, the rank of civil servant became the ideal. With all the tenacity of one who had grown ' old ' through want and sorrow while still half a child, the sev- enteen-year-old youth clung to his decision . . . and became a civil servant. The goal was reached, I believe, after nearly twenty-three years. Now there had been realized the premise of the vow that the poor boy once had sworn, not to return to his dear native village before he had become something. AT HOME 7 Now the goal was reached, but nobody in the village remembered the little boy of long ago, and the village had become a stranger to him. When he retired at the age of fifty-six, he was unable to spend a single day in 'doing nothing.' He bought a farm near Lambach in Upper Austria which he worked himself, thus returning, after a long and active life, to the origin of his ancestors. It was probably at that time that my first ideals were formed. A lot of romping around out-of-doors, the long trip to school, and the companionship with unusually 'ro- bust 1 boys, which at times caused my mother much grief, made me anything but a stay-at-home. Though I did not brood over my future career at that time, I had decidedly no sympathy for the course my father's life had taken. I believe that even then my ability for making speeches was trained by the more or less stirring discussions with my comrades. I had become a little ringleader and at that time learned easily and did very well in school, but for the rest I was rather difficult to handle. Inasmuch as I received singing lessons in my spare time in the choir of the Lambach Convent, I repeatedly had an excellent opportunity of intox- icating myself with the solemn splendor of the magnificent church festivals. It was perfectly natural that the position of abbot appeared to me to be the highest ideal obtainable, just as that of being the village pastor had appealed to my father. At least at times this was the case. For obvious reasons my father could not appreciate the talent for ora- tory of his quarrelsome son in the same measure, nor could he perceive in it any hope for the future of the lad, and so he showed no understanding for these youthful ideas. Sadly he observed this dissension of nature. Actually, my occasional longing for this profession dis- appeared very quickly and made way for aspirations more in keeping with my temperament. Rummaging through MEIN KAMPF my father's library, I stumbled upon various books on mili- tary subjects, and among them I found a popular edition dealing with the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71. These were two volumes of an illustrated journal of the period which now became my favorite reading matter. Before long that great heroic campaign had become my greatest spiritual experience. From then on I raved more and more about everything connected with war or with militarism. Since Hitler's outlook and policies are rooted in Austrian ex- perience (it is sometimes said that he 'made Germany an Aus- trian's province') some remarks on the general situation in his home land may be helpful. The Austria-Hungary of the last three decades of the nineteenth century was only the remnant of a Habsburg Empire that had once included most of western Europe. It was a 'dual monarchy,' the crown belonging to the monarch as Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary. Since most of Germany had been welded together (1871) by Bis- marck in an empire ruled by the Hohenzollern kings of Prussia, the Germans who remained in Austria-Hungary constituted a minority, even though most of the important bureaucratic positions were still in their hands. The position obtained by Hungary made their lot no easier. For soon every ' nationality ' wished to secure comparable advantages for itself. The monarchy itself had suffered many a reverse. Under Frederick the Great and Bismarck, the Prussians had inflicted several major defeats upon their Austrian rivals. While the revolutionary liberalism of 1848 was successfully put down at the cost of severe fighting, the power of the bureaucratic State was none the less seriously undermined and the eventual triumph of 'constitutionalism* in 1860-61 was assured. In addition the unification of Italy was achieved at the cost of Austrian prestige and possessions. And though the Partition of Poland had added Galicia to the Habsburg domains, it was always doubtful who ruled the province the Poles or the Austrians. Galicia was also the home of large Jewish com- munities, from which strong contingents moved to Vienna and other important cities. AT HOME 9 But this was to prove of importance to me in another direction as well. For the first time the question confronted me I was a bit confused, perhaps if and what differ- ence there was between those Germans fighting these bat- tles and the others. Why was it that Austria had not taken part also in this war, why not my father, and why not all the others? -< Are we not the same as all the other Germans? Do we not all belong together? This problem now began to whirl through my little head for the first time. After cautious questioning, I heard with envy the reply that not every German was fortunate enough to belong to Bis- marck's Reich. This I could not understand. I was to become a student. From 1880 onward, the problem of * nationalities' dominated Austrian life. On the one hand, the Hungarians were concerned lest the Slavic groups Czechs, Croats, Poles, etc. extend their demand for autonomy to the point where the Empire would become a * federation' of States, and therefore made common cause with the Germans on issues affecting the status quo. But a good many Germans, for their part, felt aggrieved at having been excluded from the Bismarckian Empire and saw no future for themselves in a predominantly Slavic State. On the other hand, the Czechs and kindred 'nationalities' con- tinued to urge the idea of a federation, and to insist upon the right to foster their own languages and cultures. The Habs- burg rulers had no choice save recourse to continual compro- mise. In the Austrian parliament common national interests, for example the army, were always being subordinated to hotly debated matters of domestic 'nationality' policy. Doubtless there was no way out except the establishment of a federation. To this idea Franz Ferdinand, the Crown Prince whose murder at Saravejo was the immediate cause of the World War, seems to have committed himself. 10 MEIN KAMPF Because of my entire nature, even more because of my temperament, my father thought he was right in concluding that attendance at the humanistic Gymnasium would not be in keeping with my ability. He thought that the Real- schule [a German secondary school for modern subjects and sciences] seemed more suitable. This opinion was strength- ened by my obvious talent for drawing; this subject, he thought, had been neglected in the Austrian schools. Per- haps his own lifetime of hard work was a decisive factor and made him appreciate humanistic studies to a lesser degree, for to him they appeared impractical. As a matter of prin- ciple, he was determined that like himself his son should, nay must, become an official. It was natural that the bitter experiences of his own youth made his later achievements appear so much greater, especially since they were exclu- Some Germans protested strongly against these tendencies. Nevertheless, the effort to create a party openly favorable to the separation of German Austria from the Austro-Hungarian Empire and its merger in the Bismarckian State was far less successful than might have been anticipated. The early Na- tionalists of the iSSo's eventually gave rise to the Grossdeutsch Partei of Hitler's youth, which was violently critical of the Habsburgs and of all concessions made to the Slavs during the years 1879-1900. Perhaps it would have gained more ground if Bismarck had been vitally interested in the problem. But in addition to the dynastic question of the status of the Habsburgs, he had after 1871 to avoid giving the impression that Prussia was an expansion-hungry State. He also realized that the Vienna monarchy was a source of unity in the chaotic south- east of Europe, in the affairs of which he did not wish to involve Germany. Accordingly, the Grossdeutsch people got little sympathy from him. When he was dismissed from his post by Emperor Wilhelm II, the sole group remaining in Germany that could have given much support to the separationist move- ment in German Austria was the AUdeutscher Verband (Pan- AT HOME 11 sively the result of his own industry and energy. It was the pride of the self-made man which moved him to endeavor to bring his son to a similar position in life, if not a better one, and all the more since he hoped to make things easier for the child through his own industry. It was unthinkable that that which had become the con- tent of his whole life could be rejected. Thus the father's decision was matter-of-fact, simple, exact, and clear, quite comprehensibly in his own eyes. His domineering nature, the result of a lifelong struggle for existence, would have thought it unbearable to leave the ultimate decision to a boy who, in his opinion, was inexperienced and irrespon- sible. What is more, this would have been inconsistent with his idea of duty, a wicked and reprehensible weakness in exercising his paternal authority as he saw it in his respon- sibility for the future of his son. German League), an organization of chauvinists and expan- sionists. They, however, looked upon Austria-Hungary as a powerful ally and as a diving-board for the plunge eastward which they looked upon as the German destiny. In Austria itself the Grossdeutsch elements adopted a policy calculated to insure failure. They sponsored a little Kultur- kampf (religious war) of their own, attacking the clergy and the Church; they disassociated themselves from all social re- form and all concessions to other groups; and they were given to rabid attacks on the monarchy. As a consequence, the Ger- man group was more seriously divided than ever. These mis- takes all made, as is evident from the text of Mein Kampf , a deep and lasting impression upon Hitler. Just as he was dis- gusted with the wrangling about 'nationality' problems that characterized the Austrian parliament, so was he conscious of the mistakes which the pro- Prussia leaders had made. He never disassociated himself from the principles adopted by those leaders, but he learned to look askance at their methods. The extent of Austrian yearning for incorporation in the 12 MEIN KAMPF And yet the course of events was to take a different turn. For the first time in my life, I was barely eleven, I was forced into opposition. No matter how firm and deter- mined my father might be in carrying out his plans and intentions once made, his son was just as stubborn and obstinate in rejecting an idea which had little or no appeal for him. I did not want to become an official. Neither persuasion nor ' sincere ' arguments were able to break down this resistance. I did not want to become an official, no, and again no! All attempts to arouse my inter- est or my liking for such a career by stories of my father's life had the opposite effect. The thought of being a slave in an office made me ill ; not to be master of my own time, but to force an entire lifetime into the filling-in of forms, t What ideas this must have awakened in a boy who was anything but ' good ' in the ordinary sense of the word ! The ridiculously easy learning at school left me so much spare German Empire or, after 1918, the German Republic, is a moot question. Prior to the War, anti-Prussian sentiment was probably just as vigorous among the people generally as pro- Habsburg sentiment. After the defeat there was a general feeling that the little independent State of Austria could not survive. Even so it is very doubtful whether the demand for Anschluss was as 'elemental 1 as Hitler says it was. Some Austrians notably Professor Ludo Hartmann sponsored it with vigor and eloquence. A few unofficial plebiscites were held in Salzburg and elsewhere and seemed to show that senti- ment was overwhelmingly in favor of Anschluss; but individu- ally and collectively they have little value as evidence. Other sources of information (e.g., records of party deliberations) give a different impression. Undoubtedly the desire for union grew during the following years, but it is none the less doubtful whether an honest plebiscite in 1938 would have favored ab- sorption of Austria into the Third Reich. AT HOME 13 time that the sun saw more of me than the four walls of my room. When today my political opponents examine my life down to the time of my childhood with loving attention, so that at last they can point with relief to the intolerable pranks this 'Hitler 1 carried out even in his youth, I thank Heaven for now giving me a share of the memories of those happy days. Woods and meadows were the battlefield where the ever-present 'conflicts' were fought out. My attendance at the Realschule, which now followed, did little to deter me. But now it was a different conflict that had to be fought. This was bearable as long as my father's intention to make an official of me was confronted by nothing more than my dislike of the profession on general principles. I could restrain my private views and, after all, it was not always necessary for me to contradict. My own firm intention not to become an official was sufficient to set my mind at rest. This decision, however, was irrevocable. The question be- came more difficult as soon as my father's plan was met by one of my own. This took place when I was twelve years old. I do not know how it happened, but one day it was clear to me that I would become a painter, an artist. My talent for drawing was obvious and it was one of the reasons why my father had sent me to the Realschule, but he never would have thought of having me trained for such a career. On the contrary. When, after a renewed rejection of my father's favorite idea, I was asked for the first time what I intended to be after all, I unexpectedly burst forth with the resolve I had irrevocably made; in the meantime my father at first was speechless. 'A painter? An artist?' He doubted my sanity, he did not trust his own ears or thought that he had misunderstood. But when it had been explained to him and when he had sensed the sincerity of my intentions, he opposed me with the resoluteness of his 14 MEIN KAMPF entire nature. His decision was quite simple, and any con- sideration of those actual talents that I might have pos- sessed was out of the question. 'An artist, no, never as long as I live/ But as his son had undoubtedly inherited, amongst other qualities, a stubborn- ness similar to his own, he received a similar reply. Only its meaning was quite different. So the situation remained on both sides. My father did not give up his 'never* and I strengthened my 'nevertheless/ Obviously the consequences were not very enjoyable. The old man became embittered, and, much as I loved him, the same was true of myself. My father forbade me to entertain any hope of ever becoming a painter. I went one step farther by declaring that under these circumstances I no longer wished to study. Naturally, as the result of such 'declarations' I got the 'worst of it,' and now the old man relentlessly began to enforce his authority. I remained silent and turned my threats into action. I was certain that, as soon as my father saw my lack of progress in school, come what may he would let me seek the happiness of which I was dreaming. I do not know if this reasoning was sound. One thing was certain : my apparent failure in school. I learned what I liked, but above all I learned what in my opinion might be necessary to me in my future career as a painter. In this connection I sabotaged all that which seemed unimportant or that which no longer attracted me. At that time my marks were always extreme depending upon the subject and my evaluation of it. ' Praiseworthy ' and ' Excellent ' ranked with 'Sufficient' and ' Insufficient. 1 My best efforts were in geography and perhaps even more so in history. These were my two favorite subjects and in them I led my class.-* Now, after so many years, when I examine the results of that period, I find two outstanding facts of particular im- portance: AT HOME 15 First, / became a nationalist. Second, / learned lo grasp and to understand the meaning of history. Old Austria was a 'State of nationalities. 9 t A citizen of the German Empire, at that time at least, could hardly understand the bearing of this fact upon the daily life of the individual in such a State. After the amaz- ingly victorious campaign of the heroic German armies during the Franco- Prussian War, one had become more and more estranged from the Germans abroad, partly because one no longer knew how to appreciate them or perhaps because one was unable to do so. As far as the Austro German was concerned, it was easy to confuse the decadent dynasty with a people who were sound at heart. It was hard to understand that, were the German in Austria not actually of the best stock, he never would have been able to impress his mark upon a State of fifty-two mil- lion people in such a manner as to create even in Germany the erroneous impression that Austria was a German State. This was nonsensical, with the gravest of consequences, but brilliant testimony for the ten million Germans in the Ost- mark. Only a very few Germans in the empire had any idea of the continuous and inexorable struggle waged for the German language, the German schools, and the German mode of existence. Only today, when this misery has been forced upon millions of our people outside of the Reich proper, who, under foreign domination, dream of a common fatherland and in their longing for it strive to preserve their most sacred claim their mother tongue only today wider circles understand what it means to fight for one's nationality. It is now perhaps that the one or the other will be able to realize the greatness of the Germans abroad in the old East of the Reich who at first, dependent upon them- selves, for centuries protected the Reich in the East, and at last guarded the German language frontier in a war of 16 MEIN KAMPF attrition at a time when the Reich was greatly interested in colonies but not in its own flesh and blood outside its very doors. As everywhere and always, as in every struggle, there were also in the language struggle of the old Austria three groups: The fighters, the lukewarm, and the traitors. Even in school this segregation was apparent. It is sig- nificant for the language struggle on the whole that its ways engulf the school, the seed bed of the coming generation. The child is the objective of the struggle and the very first appeal is addressed to it: 'German boy, do not forget that you are a German.' 'German maid, remember that you are to be a German mother/ + Those who know the soul of youth will understand that it is youth which lends its ears to such a battle-cry with the greatest joy. In hundreds of forms, in its own way and with its own weapons, it carried on the battle. It refuses to sing non-German songs; the more one tries to estrange it from German heroic grandeur, the more enthusiastic it waxes; it stints itself to collect pennies for the fund of the grown-ups; it has an unusually fine ear for all that the non- German teacher says to it; it is rebellious; it wears the for- bidden emblem of its own nationality and rejoices in being punished or even in being beaten for wearing that emblem. On a smaller scale youth is a true reflection of its elders, but more often with a deeper and a more honest conviction. At a comparatively early age I, too, was given the oppor- tunity to participate in the national struggle of old Austria. Money was collected for the Sildmark and the school club; our conviction was demonstrated by the wearing of corn- flowers and the colors black, red, and gold; the greeting was 1 Heil ' ; ' Deutschland iiber alles f was preferred to the imperial anthem, despite warnings and punishments. In this man- AT HOME 17 ner the boy was trained politically at an age when a member of a so-called national State knows little more of his nation- ality than its language. It is obvious that already then I did not belong to the lukewarm. In a short time I had be- come a fanatical 'German nationalist/ a term which is not identical with our same party name of today. My development was quite rapid, so that at the age of fifteen I already understood the difference between dynastic 'patriotism* and popular 'nationalism'; at that time the latter alone existed for me. Those who have never taken the trouble to study closely the internal situation of the Habsburg monarchy may not be able to understand the full meaning of these events. In this State the origin for this development was to be found in the lessons in world history taught in the schools, since there is practically no specific Austrian history as such. The conservative cabinet headed (1879-1893) by Taafe at- tempted to solve the problems of the Empire by winning the support of the Slavic groups. In 1895-1897 Count Casimir Badeni sponsored legislation favoring the Czechs in linguistic and cultural matters; and violent opposition to these measures was aroused among the nationalistic Germans. The Deuischer Schulverein (German School Society), an organization founded in 1880 to promote German schools in foreign countries, was a center of resistance particularly in Carinthia, where the Slavs were looked upon as especially menacing. The corn-flower was a patriotic symbol in Wilhelmian days. Deutschland, DeiUsth- land uber alles, a lyric written by Fallersleben in 1841, was sung by the nationalistic groups in Austria to the tune written by Hayden for the Imperial hymn. Singing it was, therefore, an insult to the Habsburgs. The 'HeiF an old German form of greeting was used by Austrian nationalists instead of tfie native forms (e.g., Griiss Gotf), and had an anti-Semitic under- tone. It required little manipulation to transform all these things into the Nazi practices now current. 18 MEIN KAMPF The fate of this State is so closely bound up with the life and growth of the entire German nationality that it is unthinkable to separate its history into German and Austrian. As a matter of fact when Germany began to split into two supreme powers, this very separation became German history. The imperial crown jewels kept in Vienna, reminders of the old realm splendor, still seem to exercise a magic spell, a pledge of eternal communion. The German-Austrian's elementary outcry for a reunion with the German motherland during the days of the break- down of the Habsburg State was merely the result of a feeling of nostalgia slumbering deep in the hearts of the entire nation for a return to the paternal home which had never been forgotten. This would be inexplicable had not the political education of each individual German-Austrian been the origin of that common longing. In it there lies a longing which contains a well that never dries, especially in time of forgetfulness and of temporary well-being it will again and again forecast the future in recalling the past. Even today, courses in world history in the so-called secondary schools are still badly neglected. Few teachers realize that the aim of history lessons should not consist in the memorizing and rattling forth of historical facts and data; that it does not matter whether a boy knows when this or that battle was fought, when a certain military leader was born, or when some monarch (in most cases a very mediocre one) was crowned with the crown of his an- cestors. Good God, these things do not matter. To 'learn' history means to search for and to find the forces which cause those effects which we later face as historical events. Here, too, the art of reading, like that of learning, is to remember the important, to forget the unimportant. AT HOME 19 It was perhaps decisive for my entire future life that I was fortunate enough to have a history teacher who was one of the few who understood how essential it was to make this the dominating factor in his lessons and examinations. At the Realschule in Linz my teacher was Professor Doctor Ludwig Poetsch, who personified this requisite in an ideal way. The old gentleman, whose manner was as kind as it was firm, not only knew how to keep us spellbound, but actually carried us away with the splendor of his eloquence. I am still slightly moved when I remember the gray-haired man whose fiery descriptions made us forget the present and who evoked plain historical facts out of the fog of the centuries and turned them into living reality. Often we would sit there enraptured in enthusiasm and there were even times when we were on the verge of tears. Our happiness was the greater inasmuch as this teacher not only knew how to throw light on the past by utilizing the present, but also how to draw conclusions from the past and applying them to the present. More than anyone else he showed understanding for all the daily problems which held us breathless at the time. He used our youthful na- The educational ideas here expressed are in part the common property of all who have gone to school and in part the legacy of Turnvater Jahn, the founder of the Turnvereine, or gymnas- tic societies, whose Deutsches Volkstum (German Folkishness) appeared in 1810, and whose part in rallying Prussian youth against Napoleon was a most estimable one. When Hitler speaks of the girl who ought to remember that her duty is to become a German mother, or of history as the science which demonstrates that one's own people is always right, he is echoing Jahn in the first instance. The best discussion in Eng- lish of this interesting pedagogue is still an essay which appeared in the London Magazine during 1820, when these new Prussian ideas of education seemed important but strange to English- men. 20 MEIN KAMPF tional fanaticism as a means of education by repeatedly appealing to our sense of national honor, and through this alone he was able to manage us rascals more easily than would have been possible by any other means. He was the teacher who made history my favorite sub- ject. Nevertheless, although it was entirely unintentional on his part, I already then became a young revolutionary. Who could possibly study German history with such a teacher and not become an enemy of the State which, through its ruling dynasty, so disastrously influenced the state of the nation? And who could keep faith with an imperial dynasty which betrayed the cause of the German people for its own ig- nominious ends, a betrayal that occurred again and again in the past and in the present? Boys though we were, did we not already realize that this Austrian State did not and could not harbor love for us Germans? Our historical knowledge of the influence of the House of Habsburg was supported by daily experiences. In the North and the South the poison of foreign nationalities This is probably one of the most revealing passages in the book. Hitler has consistently considered himself a 'Revolu- tionary,' but has added little to the interpretation of the term given here. The longing to change the structure of society de- veloped, in his case, not out of the consciousness of real or fan- cied social and economic injustices, but out of the feeling that the Ruling House did not adequately support the demands of the German groups. After the War he took an identical point of view in Germany itself, laying siege to the Weimar Republic because its policy of international conciliation seemed to him a duplicate of the policy of making concessions to Slavic groups which Habsburg governments had sponsored. Cf . Adolf Hitter, by Theodor Heuss (1932). AT HOME 21 eroded the body of our own nationality, and it was apparent how even Vienna became less and less a German city. The Royal House became Czech wherever possible, and it must have been the hand of the goddess of eternal justice and inexorable retribution which caused Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the most deadly enemy of Austrian-Germanism, to fall by the very bullets he himself had helped to mold. For was he not the patron of Austria's Slavization from above ! The burdens which the German people had to bear were enormous, its sacrifices in taxes and blood unheard of, and yet, everyone who had eyes to see realized that all this would IDC in vain. What grieved us most was the fact that the whole system was morally protected by the alliance with Germany, and thus Germany herself, in a fashion, sanc- tioned the slow extermination of the German nationality in the old monarchy. The hypocrisy of the Habsburgs, who knew well how to create the impression abroad that Austria was still a German State, fanned the hatred against this house into flaming indignation and contempt. It was only in the Reich itself that the 'chosen ones' saw nothing of all this. As if stricken with blindness, they walked by the side of the corpse, and in the indications of decomposition they thought they detected signs of 'new' life. The tragic alliance between the young Reich and the old Austrian sham State was the source of the ensuing World War and of the general collapse as well. In the course of this book I shall find it necessary to deal further with this problem. It suffices to state here that from my earliest youth I came to a conviction which never de- serted me, but on the contrary, grew stronger and stronger: That the protection of the German race presumed the destruc- tion of Austria, and further, that national feeling is in no way identical with dynastic patriotism; that above all else, the 22 MEIN KAMPF Royal House of Habsburg was destined to bring misfortune upon the German nation. Even then I had drawn the necessary deductions from this realization: an intense love for my native German- The picture Hitler draws of his early youth is, therefore, one of idle years spent fighting off formal education under the pre- text that he wanted to become an artist. That he has ever since considered himself brilliantly gifted as a painter and archi- tect is indubitable. The flags, uniforms and insignia of the Party were designed by him. The 'senate chamber* and study in the Brown House, Munich, are proudly displayed as exam- ples of the Fuhrcr's (Leader's) work. In the first, which is primarily a study in red leather, the swastika serves as an al- lusion to the SPQR of ancient Rome. Later on his views were influenced by his Bavarian environment, more particularly it would seem by the art theories of Schulze-Naumburg, who in the Thuringia of 1930 led the attack on modernistic art and architecture. During 1937 Munich was stirred by an exposition of 'De- generate Art,' which gathered from the museums pictures ad- judged not to be in the strict Aryan tradition. Meanwhile there had been erected in the same city a Kunsthalle adorned with a row of simple classical pillars; and this structure is generally accepted as embodying Hitler's ideal of what a build- ing ought to be. The example of Mussolini also had its effect. In order to provide a suitable approach to the Kunsthalle, one of King Ludwig's ancient streets was torn down and widened. Down this avenue, festooned with countless flags and abundant drapery, II Duce proceeded upon the occasion of his historic trip to Munich in 1937. More recently the new Chancellery in Berlin has been com- pleted. A skyscraper, taller than any in New York, was pro- jected for Hamburg. Hitler is also known to have devised models of a Vienna and Berlin reconstructed according to his ideas of what a city ought to be. Enormous sums have already been diverted into building operations. AT HOME S3 Austrian country and a bitter hatred against the 'Austrian* State. The art of historical thinking, which had been taught me in school, has never left me since. More and more, world history became a never-failing source of my understanding of the historical events of the present, that is, politics. What is more, I do not want to ' learn ' it, but I want it to teach me. Since I had become a political 'revolutionary' at so early a stage, it was not much later that I became an 'artistic' one. At that time the capital of Upper Austria had a theater of fairly high standing. Almost everything was performed there. At the age of twelve I saw 'Wilhelm Tell' for the first time, and a few months later, I saw the first opera of my life, 4 Lohengrin.' I was captivated at once. My youth- ful enthusiasm for the master of Bayreuth knew no bounds. Again and again I was drawn to his works and today I con- sider it particularly fortunate that the modesty of that provincial performance reserved for me the opportunity of seeing increasingly better productions. All this served to confirm my deep-rooted aversion for the career my father had chosen for me, especially after I had left childhood behind and approached manhood a painful experience. I was more definitely convinced that I could never be happy as an official. And now that my talent for drawing had also been recognized in school, my resolve was even more firmly established. Neither pleas nor threats could influence me. I wanted to become a painter, and no power on earth could ever make an official of me. But it was strange that as the years passed, I demon- strated more and more interest in architecture. At that 24 MEIN KAMPF time I took it for granted that this was merely an augmen- tation of my talent for painting and secretly I was delighted at this widening of my artistic horizon. I had no idea that things were to turn out so differently. The question of my career was to be settled more quickly than I had anticipated. When I was thirteen my father died quite suddenly. The old gentleman, who had always been so robust and healthy, had a stroke which painlessly ended his wanderings in this world, plunging us all in the depths of despair. His dearest wish, to help his son to build up his existence, thus safe- guarding him against the pitfalls of his own bitter experi- ence, had apparently not been fulfilled. But unconsciously he had sown the seed for a future which neither he nor I would have grasped at that time. At first nothing changed in my daily life. My mother probably felt the obligation to continue my education in accordance with my father's wishes, in other words, to have me continue my studies for the career of an official. But I was determined more than ever not to be- come an official. My attitude became more and more in- different in the same measure that the subjects and the education which school afforded me deviated from my own ideal. Suddenly an illness came to my aid, and in the course of a few weeks, settled the perpetual arguments at home and, with them, my future. Because of a severe pulmonary illness, the doctor strongly advised my mother not to place me in an office later on under any circumstances. I was also to give up school for at least one year. With this event, all that I had fought for, all that I had longed for in secret, suddenly became reality. Impressed by my illness, my mother agreed at long last to take me out of school and to send me to the Akademie. AT HOME 25 These were my happiest days; they seemed like a dream to me, and so they were. Two years later my mother's death put a sudden end to all these delightful plans. It was the end of a long and painful illness that had seemed fatal from the very beginning. Nevertheless it was a terrible shock to me. I had respected my father, but I loved my mother. Necessity and stern reality now forced me to make a quick decision. My mother's severe illness had almost ex- hausted the meager funds left by my father; the orphan's pension which I received was not nearly enough for me to live on, and so I was faced with the problem of earning my own daily bread. I went to Vienna with a suitcase, containing some clothes and my linen, in my hand and an unshakable determination in my heart. I, too, hoped to wrest from Fate the success my father had met fifty years earlier; I, too, wanted to become 'something' but in no event an official. CHAPTER II YEARS OF STUDY AND SUFFERING IN VIENNA t% ^W^ JTHEN my mother died, Fate had cast the die in \J\X one direction at least. T T During the last months of her suffering, I had gone to Vienna to take my entrance examination to the Akademic. I had set out with a lot of drawings, convinced that I would pass the examination with ease. At the Real- schulc I had been by far the best artist in my class; and since then my ability had improved greatly, so that my self- satisfaction made me hope both proudly and happily for the best. There was but one cloud which occasionally made its ap- pearance; my talent for painting sometimes seemed to over- shadow my ability for drawing, especially in nearly all of the branches of architecture. Also my interest in the art of building as a whole grew steadily. This was stimulated, when I was not quite sixteen, by the fact that I was allowed for the first time to spend a two weeks' vacation in Vienna. I went there especially to study the picture gallery of the Hofmuseum, but I had eyes for nothing but the buildings of the museum itself. All day long, from early morn until late at night, I ran from one sight to the next, for what at- tracted me most of all were the buildings. For hours on end YEARS OF STUDY AND SUFFERING 27 I would stand in front of the opera or admire the Parliament Building; the entire Ringstrasse affected me like a fairy tale out of the Arabian Nights. And now I was in this beautiful city for the second time, burning with impatience; I waited with pride and confi- dence to learn the result of my entrance examination. I was so convinced of my success that the announcement of my failure came like a bolt from the blue. And yet it was true. When I had obtained an interview with the director and asked him to explain why I had not been admitted to the general painting school at the Akademie, he assured me that the drawings I had submitted clearly showed my lack of painting ability, but that my talents obviously lay in the field of architecture; it was the school of architecture and not the school of painting where I belonged. They could not understand why I had not attended a school for archi- tecture or why I had not been given any instruction in this art. Downcast, I left von Hansen's magnificent building on the Schillerplatz, dissatisfied with myself for the first time in my life. What I had been told about my ability was like a bright flash of lightning which seemed to illuminate a dis- sonance from which I had long suffered, but as yet I had not been able to give myself a clear account of its wherefore and whyfore. A few days later I, too, knew that I would become an architect. However, the way was to be an extremely difficult one, for all that which I had stubbornly neglected at the Real- schule was to take its vengeance now. The admission to the school of architecture of the Akademie was dependent on attendance at the Polytechnic's building school, and admis- sion to this was only possible after having received a certifi- cate of maturity at a secondary school. I was without all this. In all human probability it seemed as though the realization of my artist dreams was no longer possible. 28 MEIN KAMPF When, after my mother's death, I went to Vienna for the third time and this time to remain there for many years, I had in the meantime regained my peace and my confi- dence. My former obstinacy had returned and my goal was finally fixed before my eyes. I wanted to become an archi- tect, and one should not submit to obstacles but overcome them. And I would overcome these obstacles, always bear- ing in mind my father's example, who, from being a poor village boy and a cobbler's apprentice, had made his way up to the position of civil servant. Now I was on surer ground and the chances for the struggle were better; what I then looked upon as the cruelty of Fate, I praise today as the wisdom of Providence. When the Goddess of Misery took me into her arms more than once and threatened to Hitler's mother died on December 21, 1908, leaving him vir- tually penniless. He left Vienna again in the spring of 1912. During the period intervening, he lived generally in the Refuge for Men, in Vienna-Brigittenau, Information concerning his activities has been supplied by various people who then knew him, primarily Rudolf Hanisch, a designer, whose memoirs have been evaluated by Heiden. It is often difficult to determine whether these traditions are historically accurate, since the Hitler of Vienna days was a bit of human flotsam who in addi- tion kept pretty much to himself. But we know that he slept in a ward with other derelicts, that he was fed at the gate of the monastery in the Gumpendorferstrasse; that in winter he earned an occasional schilling with a snow shovel; and that he drew little water-colors and sketches whicii Hanisch peddled around at the humbler art shops. It has been proved that at the time he had Jewish acquaintances and a number of Jewish friends. More important, however, is the fact that he spent much time in the cafes, reading the newspapers constantly available there. He was never, then, a 'house painter, 1 but remained a young man with a poor scholastic record who had time to read political journalism.