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Tag: Adolf Hitler

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Autobiography Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 64

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 8th-9th January 1942

Childhood memories—Religious instruction—The Abbé Schwarz — “Sit down, Hitler!” — The story of Petronella.
 

In Austria, religious instruction was given by priests. I was the eternal asker of questions. Since I was completely master of the material, I was unassailable. I always had the best marks.

On the other hand, I was less impeccable under the heading of Behaviour. I had a particular liking for the delicate subjects in the Bible, and I took a naughty pleasure in asking embarrassing questions.

Father Schwarz, our teacher, was clever at giving me evasive answers. So I kept on insisting until he lost his patience. One day—I’ve forgotten with reference to what—he asked me if I said my prayers in the morning, at midday and at night. “No, sir, I don’t say prayers. Besides, I don’t see how God could be interested in the prayers of a secondary schoolboy.” “Sit down, then!”

young adolph

Every pupil took to some new occupation. For my part, I used to excite him by waving pencils in the colours of Greater Germany. “Put away those abominable colours at once!” he’d say. The whole class would answer with a long howl of disapproval. Then I would get up and explain to him that it was the symbol of our national ideal. “You should have no other ideal in your heart but that of our beloved country and our beloved house of Hapsburg. Whoever does not love the Imperial family, does not love the Church, and whoever does not love the Church, does not love God. Sit down, Hitler!” If there hadn’t been a few teachers who would intercede for me on occasion, the affair would have ended badly for me.

Before Easter we had lessons to prepare us for confession. It was a tremendous rag. Often I promised myself to moderate my ways, but I couldn’t help it, I couldn’t endure all those hypocrisies. I can still see that Schwarz, with his long nose. I saw red when I looked at him. And I retorted as best I could! One day my mother came to the school, and he took the opportunity to pounce on her and explain that I was a lost soul. “You, unhappy boy…” he apostrophised me.

“But I’m not unhappy, sir.”

“You’ll realise you are, in the Next World.”

“I’ve heard about a scientist who doubts whether there is a Next World.”

“What do you (in German, ‘Du’) mean?”

“I must inform you, sir, that you are addressing me as ‘thou’.”

“You won’t go to Heaven.”

“Not even if I buy an indulgence?”

I was very fond of visiting the cathedral. Without my realising it, this was because I liked architecture. Somebody must have informed Father Schwarz of these visits, and he supposed I went there for some secret reason. The fact was, I was full of respect for the majesty of the place. One day, on leaving, I found myself face to face with the priest. “And there was I thinking you were a lost soul, my son! Now I see you’re nothing of the sort.”

At Steyr we had a Jew as teacher. One day we shut him up in his laboratory. In his class things were like in a Jewish school— everything was anarchy. This teacher had no authority at all. The boys were afraid of him at first, so it seems—because he used to howl like a madman. Unfortunately for him, one day he was caught laughing immediately after being angry. The boys realised that his bouts of anger were mere play-acting, and that was the end of his authority.

I always had the habit of reading during lessons—reading books, of course, that had nothing to do with the aforesaid lessons. One day I was reading a book on diseases caused by microbes, when the teacher pounced on me, tore the book from my hands, and threw it into a corner. “You should take an example from me, and read serious works, if read you must.”

Steyr was an unpleasant town—the opposite of Linz. Linz, full of national spirit. Steyr, black and red—the clergy and Marxism. I lodged with a school-companion in Grünmarkt, No. 9, in a little room overlooking the courtyard.

After the examinations, we organised a great party. It’s the only time in my life I’ve been drunk. I had obtained my certificate, next day I was to leave Steyr and return to my mother. My comrades and I secretly gathered over a quart of local wine. I’ve completely forgotten what happened during that night. I simply remember that I was awoken at dawn, by a milk woman, on the road from Steyr to Karsten. I was in a lamentable state when I got back to the house of my crux. I had a bath and drank a cup of coffee. Then Petronella asked me whether I had obtained my certificate. I wanted to show it to her, I rummaged in my pockets, I turned them inside out.

Not a trace of my certificate! What could I have done with it, and what was I to show my mother? I was already thinking up an explanation: I had unfolded it in the train, in front of an open window, and a gust of wind had carried it off! Petronella did not agree with me, and suggested that it would be better to ask at the school for a duplicate of the document. And, since I had drunk away all my money, she carried her kindness so far as to lend me five gulden.

The director began by keeping me waiting for quite a long time. My certificate had been brought back to the school, but torn into four pieces, and in a somewhat inglorious condition. It appeared that, in the absent-mindedness of intoxication, I had confused the precious parchment with toilet paper. I was overwhelmed.

I cannot tell you what the director said to me, I am still humiliated, even from here. I made a promise to myself that I would never get drunk again, and I’ve kept my promise.

(G. D. asked whether any of Hitler’s teachers had witnessed his rise to power.) Yes, some of them. I was not a model pupil, but none of them has forgotten me. What a proof of my character!

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Architecture Mozart Music Richard Wagner Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 65

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 13th-14th January 1942

The composer Bruckner—Brahms at his height—Wagner and Goring—Great architects—Talent must be encouraged.
 
After a hearing of Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony: This work is based on popular airs of upper Austria. They’re not textually reproduced, but repeatedly I recognise in passing Tyrolean dances of my youth. It’s wonderful what he managed to get out of that folklore. As it happened, it’s a priest to whom we must give the credit for having protected this great master. The Bishop of Linz used to sit in his cathedral for hours at a time, listening to Bruckner play the organ. He was the greatest organist of his day.

One can imagine this obscure peasant’s arrival in Vienna, amidst an effete society. One of Bruckner’s opinions of Brahms was published in a newspaper recently, and further increased the sympathy I felt for him: “Brahms’s music is very beautiful, but I prefer my own.” There you have the self-awareness, full both of humility and of pride, such as a peasant can feel, in all simplicity, when he is inspired by a true conviction. The critic Hanslick depicted Bruckner’s life in Vienna as a real hell for him. When the moment came when it was no longer possible to ignore his work, he was covered with decorations and overwhelmed with honours. What did all that mean to him? Wouldn’t it have been better not to have misunderstood him so long?

Jewry had raised Brahms to the pinnacle. He was lionised in the salons and was a pianist of theatrical gestures. He exploited effects of the hands, effects of the beard and hair. Compared with him, Bruckner was a man put out of countenance, an abashed man.

Wagner also had the feeling for gesture, but with him it was innate. Wagner was a man of the Renaissance—like Goring in a certain aspect (and it would be silly to blame him).

There is nothing crueller than to live in a milieu that has no understanding for a work already achieved or in process of gestation. When I think of a man like Schiller or Mozart! Mozart who was flung, nobody knows where, into a communal grave… What ignominy!

If I hadn’t been there to prevent it, I believe the same thing would have happened to Troost. That man revolutionised the art of building. Perhaps it would have taken a few years—and he’d have died without anyone having the slightest idea of his genius. When I got to know him, he was depressed, embittered, disgusted with life. It often happens that architects are hyper-sensitive people. Think merely of Hansen, who was the most richly gifted of the architects of Vienna. And Hasenauer? The critics had attacked him so savagely that he committed suicide before his great work was finished—and yet the Vienna opera-house, so marvellously beautiful, puts the Paris Opera into the shade. To know that one is capable of doing things that nobody else can do—and to have no possibility of giving proof of it!

It seems that people should make sacrifices for their great men as a matter of course. A nation’s only true fortune is its great men. A great man is worth a lot more than a thousand million in the State’s coffers. A man who’s privileged to be the Head of a country couldn’t make a better use of his power than to put it at the service of talent. If only the Party will regard it as its main duty to discover and encourage the talents! It’s the great men who express a nation’s soul.

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Axiology Deranged altruism Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 66

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 13th-
14th January 1942

Deranged altruism.
 

 
I read to-day that India at present numbers three hundred and eighty-eight million inhabitants, which means an increase of fifty-five millions during the last ten years. It’s alarming. We are witnessing the same phenomenon in Russia. The women there have a child every year.

The chief reason for this increase is the reduction in mortality due to the progress made by the health services. What are our doctors thinking of? Isn’t it enough to vaccinate the whites?

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Painting Table talks Women

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 67

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 15th-16th January 1942

A woman of genius
—The Arts must be protected.
 
 

It’s claimed that women have no creative genius. But there’s one extraordinary woman, and it irritates me that men don’t do her justice. Angelica Kauffmann was a very great painter. The most illustrious of her own contemporaries admired her.

For Linz Museum I can think of only one motto: “To the German people, that which belongs to it.”

The Munich Pinakothek is one of the most magnificent achievements in the world. It’s the work of one man. What Munich owes to Ludwig I is beyond computing. And what the whole German people owes to him ! The palace of the Uffizi at Florence does honour not to Florence alone, but to all Italy.

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Real men Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 68

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 16th-17th January 1942

The first of the Faithful.
 
 
One of my first escapades after my emergence from prison, in 1925, consisted in a visit to Berchtesgaden. I told the Büchners that I had work to do and needed absolute quiet. I accordingly installed myself in the small annexe.

Our newspaper-sellers were often boycotted and beaten up. One of our most faithful supporters, since 1920, was old Jegg. My happiest memories are of this time. The attachment I then felt to the people has never left me. There are such bonds joining me to them that I can share in their troubles and joys. I put myself spontaneously in their place. For years I lived on Tyrolean apples, and so did Hess. It’s crazy what economies we had to make.

Every mark saved was for the Party. Another loyal supporter was little Neuner, Ludendorff’s valet. There were also noblemen: Stransky, Scheubner-Richter, von der Pfordten. I realised the similarity of opposites. My comrades at the beginning already came from all parts of Germany. Nothing in the groundwork of the Party has changed. I still rely on the same forces.

It’s a great time, when an entirely unknown man can set out to conquer a nation, and when after fifteen years of struggle he can become, in effect, the head of his people. I had the luck to number some strong personalities among my supporters.

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Schutzstaffel (SS) Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 69

the-real-hitler

 

22nd January 1942, midday
 

The gift of command comes naturally to everyone in Lower Saxony. Wasn’t it from there that Great Britain got its ruling class?

Thanks to its method of recruiting, the SS will be a nursery of rulers. In a hundred years’ time from now, we’ll control this whole empire without having to rack our brains to know where to find the proper men. The essential thing is to leave behind the pettinesses of the parochial spirit. That’s why I’m so glad we’re installed in Norway and all over the place.

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Table talks Vegetarianism

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 70

the-real-hitler

 

22nd January 1942, evening

Meat-eaters and vegetarians—Alcohol and smoking.
 
 

At the time when I ate meat, I used to sweat a lot. I used to drink four pots of beer and six bottles of water during a meeting, and I’d succeed in losing nine pounds! When I became a vegetarian, a mouthful of water from time to time was enough.

When you offer a child the choice of a piece of meat, an apple or a cake, it’s never the meat that he chooses. There’s an ancestral instinct there. In the same way, the child would never begin to drink or smoke if it weren’t to imitate others.

The consumption of meat is reduced the moment the market presents a greater choice of vegetables, and in proportion as each man can afford the luxury of the first fruits. I suppose man became carnivorous because, during the Ice Age, circumstances compelled him. They also prompted him to have his food cooked, a habit which, as one knows to-day, has harmful consequences. Our peasants never eat any food that hasn’t been cooked and re-cooked, and thus deprived of all its virtues. The southern peoples are not acquainted either with a meat diet or with cooking. I lived marvellously in Italy. I don’t know any country that enlivens one more. Roman food, how delicious it is!

When I go into an inn where people are smoking, within an hour I feel I’ve caught a cold. The microbes hurl themselves upon me! They find a favourable climate in the smoke and heat.

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Final solution Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 71

the-real-hitler

 

23rd January 1942, midday

Appreciation of the Czechs—The internal policy of the Habsburgs—When the Popes harried the Jews—The “decent” Jews.
 
 
Of all the Slavs, the Czech is the most dangerous, because he’s a worker. He has a sense of discipline, he’s orderly, he’s more a Mongol than a Slav. Beneath the top layer of a certain loyalty, he knows how to hide his plans. Now they’ll work, for they know we’re pitiless and brutal. I don’t despise them, I have no resentment against them. It’s destiny that wishes us to be adversaries. To put it briefly, the Czechs are a foreign body in the midst of the German community. There’s no room both for them and for us. One of us must give way.

As regards the Pole, it’s lucky for us that he’s idle, stupid and vain. It’s the duty of the Party to settle these questions once and for all in the course of the next five hundred years. The Habsburgs broke their teeth on them. They believed they could smooth everything down by kindness. The Czechs didn’t have the feeling that they were being treacherous in acting as they did. In any case, it’s one of the incomprehensible circumstances of history that the ancient Bavarians left those territories and the Czechs settled there. Such a situation is unbearable from the geopolitical point of view. The result has been, we have the Poles close at hand, and, between them and the Czechs, nothing but the narrow Silesian strip.

The Jew must clear out of Europe. Otherwise no understanding will be possible between Europeans. It’s the Jew who prevents everything. When I think about it, I realise that I’m extraordinarily humane. At the time of the rule of the Popes, the Jews were mistreated in Rome.

Until 1830, eight Jews mounted on donkeys were led once a year through the streets of Rome. For my part, I restrict myself to telling them they must go away. If they break their pipes on the journey, I can’t do anything about it. But if they refuse to go voluntarily, I see no other solution but extermination. Why should I look at a Jew through other eyes than if he were a Russian prisoner-of-war?

In the p.o.w. camps, many are dying. It’s not my fault. I didn’t want either the war or the p.o.w. camps. Why did the Jew provoke this war? A good three hundred or four hundred years will go by before the Jews set foot again in Europe. They’ll return first of all as commercial travellers, then gradually they’ll become emboldened to settle here—the better to exploit us. In the next stage, they become philanthropists, they endow foundations.

When a Jew does that, the thing is particularly noticed—for it’s known that they’re dirty dogs. As a rule, it’s the most rascally of them who do that sort of thing. And then you’ll hear these poor Aryan boobies telling you: “You see, there are good Jews!”

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Richard Wagner Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 72

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 24th-25th January 1942

Origin of Tristan and Isolda—Cosima Wagner—Wahnfried—The Makart style—Bayreuth—On the Nuremberg Congress.
 
 
Whatever one says, Tristan is Wagner’s masterpiece, and we owe Tristan to the love Mathilde Wesendonck inspired in him. She was a gentle, loving woman, but far from having the qualities of Cosima. Nobody like Wagner has had the luck to be entirely understood by a woman. Those are things that life does not owe a man, but it’s magnificent when it happens.

Neither Mozart nor Beethoven, neither Schiller nor Goethe, have had a share of such happiness. In addition to all Wagner’s gifts, Cosima was femininity personified, and her charm had its effect on all who visited Wahnfried. After Wagner’s death, the atmosphere at Wahnfried remained what it had been during his lifetime. Cosima was inconsolable, and never ceased to wear mourning. She had wanted her own ashes to be scattered over her husband’s tomb, but she was refused this satisfaction.

Nevertheless, her ashes were collected in an urn, and this urn was placed on the tomb. Thus death has not separated these two beings, whom destiny had wished to live side by side! Wagner’s lifetime was also that of a man like Meyerbeer! Wagner is responsible for the fact that the art of opera is what it is to-day. The great singers who’ve left names behind became celebrated as interpreters of Wagner. Moreover, it’s since him that there have been great orchestra-leaders. Wagner was typically a prince. His house, Wahnfried, for example! It’s been said that the interior, in Makart style, was over-loaded.

But should a house be mistaken for a gallery of works of art? Isn’t it, above all, a dwelling, the framework for a private life, with its extensions and its radiance? If I possess a gallery of ancestors, should I discard it on the pretext that not all the pictures in it are masterpieces?

At the beginning of this century there were people called Wagnerians. Other people had no special name. What joy each of Wagner’s works has given me! And I remember my emotion the first time I entered Wahnfried. To say I was moved is an understatement! At my worst moments, they’ve never ceased to sustain me, even Siegfried Wagner. (Houston Stewart Chamberlain wrote to me so nicely when I was in prison.) I was on Christian-name terms with them. I love them all, and I also love Wahnfried.

So I felt it to be a special happiness to have been able to keep Bayreuth going at the moment of its discomfiture. The war gave me the opportunity to fulfil a desire dear to Wagner’s heart: that men chosen amongst the people—workers and soldiers—should be able to attend his Festival free of charge. The ten days of the Bayreuth season were always one of the blessed seasons of my existence.

Festspielhaus_Bayreuth_Innen

And I already rejoice at the idea that one day I shall be able to resume the pilgrimage! The tradition of the Olympic Games endured for nearly a thousand years. That results, it seems to me, from a mystery similar to that which lies at the origin of Bayreuth. The human being feels the need to relax, to get out of himself, to take communion in an idea that transcends him. The Party Congress answers the same need, and that’s why for hundreds of years men will come from the whole world over to steep themselves anew, once a year, in the marvellous atmosphere of Nuremberg. They’ll come, and they’ll see side by side the proofs we shall have left of our greatness, and at the same time the memories of old Nuremberg.

On the day following the end of the Bayreuth Festival, and on the Tuesday that marks the end of the Nuremberg Congress, I’m gripped by a great sadness—as when one strips the Christmas tree of its ornaments.

Categories
Aryan beauty Marriage Table talks

Uncle Adolf’s table talk, 73

the-real-hitler

 

Night of 25th-26th January 1942

On marriage—Some beautiful women.
 

 

It’s lucky I’m not married. For me, marriage would have been a disaster.

It’s only after maternity that the woman discovers that other realities exist in life for her. The man, on the other hand, is a slave to his thoughts. The idea of his duties rules him. He necessarily has moments when he wants to throw the whole thing overboard, wife and children too. When I think of it, I realise that during the year 1932, if I’d been married, I’d scarcely have spent a few days in my own home.

The bad side of marriage is that it creates rights. In that case, it’s far better to have a mistress. The burden is lightened, and everything is placed on the level of a gift.

The Fuehrer noticed two guests who looked somewhat crestfallen, J.W. and Chr. Sehr. He turned towards Sehr, and explained: What I’ve said applies only to men of a higher type, of course!

Relieved, Sehr, exclaimed: “That’s just what I was thinking, my Fuehrer.”

At Brunswick, a young girl rushed towards my car to offer me a bouquet. She was blonde, dashing, wonderful. Everyone around me was amazed, but not one of these idiots had the idea of asking the girl for her address, so that I could send her a word of thanks. I’ve always reproached myself most bitterly.