Nowadays, many credible and educative sources could be used to learn the human history and the development of the events which promoted the creation of the present world. Mein Kampf is one of the most provocative and interesting historical works that help to understand the backgrounds of World War II. The main peculiarity of this book is its author, Adolf Hitler. Therefore, it is not a surprise that many readers find themselves as if they were listening to Hitler’s speeches directly and absorbing each of his ideas. Though Hitler combined the worst human characteristics, it is wrong to neglect the fact that his skills and intentions made him a world leader, and Mein Kampf is the source that describes the creation of the person that made nations unite and be afraid of him for several years.
Beginning from the time when he lived with his parents in Braunau-on-the-Inn and admired every single day of his life and ending by the description of “an epoch of racial adulteration” when it was necessary to follow the duty of “preserving the best elements of its racial stock” (Hitler 557), Hitler introduced his life as it was from his point of view without any guesses or doubts. He knew that his book could be available to many people in different epochs, and he was not afraid to share his fears, anger, weaknesses, and confidence. On the one hand, Hitler mentioned: “I thank heaven that I can look back to those happy days and find the memory of the helpful” (14).
This ability to focus on the past and have feelings for something important in his life makes him an ordinary person with certain dreams and plans, a person, who is ready to use his past to improve his future. On the other hand, it seems that the author tries to escape all possible human feelings to become a strong leader. “When the individual is no longer burdened with his own consciousness of blame… then and only then will he have that inner tranquillity and outer force to cut off drastically and ruthlessly all the parasite growth” (Hitler 32). It is one of the particularly significant quotes in the book because it introduces Hitler as a self-assured person with an ability to divide people into categories and hate not one person or several people only, but a whole nation, whose representatives aimed at “disarming the intellectual leaders of the opposite race” and mask tactics and fool victims talking about “the equality of all men, no matter what their race or color may be” (Hitler 262).
In general, Mein Kampf may be considered as one of the best sources that could describe the development of one of the most successful leaders in the whole world. Hitler was cruel and confident in his correctness. However, the book shows that even under the mask of one of the cruelest people in the world, there is a boy with his own dreams and intentions to have a happy life.
Work Cited
Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf. Translated by James Murphy, Hurst & Blackett, 2014.