Mein Kampf literally means ‘My Struggle’ and was a book written by Adolf Hitler near the beginning of his political career. Although widely considered a difficult book to read written by a man with more bile than ideology, it became the bible of Nazism. Thanks to its author taking power in Germany the book sold over five million copies before World War 2; far fewer than five million were actually read.


 

Mein Kampf is in two parts, published in 1925 and 1927 respectively. Part 1 was dictated by Hitler during his brief imprisonment after the Beer Hall Putsch, and is called ‘Die Abrechnung’,  ‘A Settlement of Accounts’. In it Hitler talks of his younger days, of the First World War, and how he viewed the climax of this conflict as a betrayal by German socialists and Jews. Thanks to the help of Hess, who was writing the dictation, there are thoughts on the needs for Germans to seek Lebensraum in the east by removing the Slavs and the Communists, and there is ample evidence of Hitler’s anti-Semitism in his ramblings about race, picturing perfect Aryans and subnormal Jews, who Hitler is prepared to remove in a bloody manner.

The second volume of Mein Kampf is titled ‘The National Socialist Movement’ and was written when Hitler was free. It’s what his Nazi Party must do to acquire power, and then how they’d used it. Like the first volume it’s a bizarre read that’s all over the place.

After the Second World War Germany banned Mein Kampf, but it’s available in other countries.

Although a controversial text, the fact elements of German / Hitler’s policy can be traced through from the book to the war make it a vital source in the study of the era.