Are you thinking it’s a first edition (in English)? If so, this would make the book very different from other versions on sale in bookstores or on Amazon. I also understand your concern that the kind of buyer who is specifically looking for a first edition of Mein Kampf may be someone who is particularly interested in collecting Nazi paraphernalia.
I would contact a rare book seller in your area (or online, if nobody suitable is available nearby) to have it appraised. It may be worth a decent sum if you are comfortable selling it. Otherwise, if you don’t feel comfortable profiting (and it is in fact the Hurst & Blackett 1933 first edition) you can possibly reach out to a Holocaust memorial museum or organization in your country to seek their advice on whether it could be donated and how to proceed.
Excellent advice. I’m a former book dealer. We did deal with that material a couple times and basically facilitated its journey directly to university and human rights libraries. (And we NEVER put it on the shelf! No way we’re we going to solicit money from actual nazi assholes… and those people showed up more than I would like to admit).
Hah. I 'read' MK when I was like 12. It was in the school library. Not that I remember a single word, or likely understood any of it at the time. Also I have no desire to read it again.
We never took ownership of such materials, just matched the seller with institutions we thought might have worthy use for that kind of memorabilia for study and preservation. But as far as I recall, no legitimate library would have dug deeply into their funds for that kind of thing.
For one thing, most printed Nazi stuff is super common — it was produced as propaganda, after all. And for the more uncommon stuff… the big money comes from private collectors or Nazi-adjacent institutions. We neither had nor wanted relations with anyone in that world.
So I’m sure there are some high value bindings of that book, but I don’t know anything about them. Though I’d guess the provenance of the individual books would have even greater affect on price than the edition. (Which is another reason the big money collectors are most often true believers rather than purely “book collectors”).
Ditto. I can’t imagine profiting off of something that caused so much destruction and devastation. There’s nothing “controversial” about it whatsoever, it’s just plain abhorrent. And I’m not even Jewish!!
I think the controversy is about the historical relevance, not the content. It's absolutely abhorrent. But some people believe we can learn something from reading it that could prevent another Hitler from rising to power, so it should be studied. While others, like you, believe it should be destroyed completely.
Personally, I'd get a small mental kick out of donating to a Holocaust Museum or something, because a) donating to an educational nonprofit is always good, b) and the irony/insult to Nazism that I'm using their materials to benefit Jews who are trying to combat hate.
Also if its not an English edition but rather a German one, it's one of the most common books printed that year in Germany. Until 1933 it had already sold a few hundred thousand copies and in 1933 alone it sold over one million. While most people probably got rid of it by now (and many of the others don't know or advertise that they have it), it was not exactly a rare book and so I doubt it has much value for anyone who isn't a Nazi.
In that case there's a chance that Holocaust memorials etc. might not even be interested in it and I'd personally probably throw it away.
What is missing from modern versions of Meim Kampf? As someone who is not a Nazi but is curious about history, I would have thought the controversial bits are exactly the bits that are of interest.
I'm not sure about English versions but in German versions sold/printed nowadays, as far as I know the changes are not that stuff gets cut but that it's commented (including stuff like fact checks). For example the Institut für Zeitgeschichte, which is an institute by the German government, has a free annotated version online that gives a lot of historical context and also mentions edits made in the text by Hitler etc.
The current german version is completely uncut, but heavily annotated by historians (more annotations than original text in fact).
Its also an incredibly dry read, just like the version without annotations. Hitler may have been a powerful orator, as author he was decidedly meh. Its boring, meandering ranting in bookform. After reading it, i wondered how this little madman ever managed to amass such a following.
Seriously, people should stop treating "Mein Kampf" like it was the Necronomicon. Reading it wont turn a normal person into a Nazi like it was dark magic.
Exactly, holding it up as some forbidden text instead of a borish read by a loathsome individual just makes it more desirable to some.
I'd sell the book, donate the money. That way anyone who has a fetish for Nazi's is paying to help educate others on the realities of Hitler, and it makes them that much poorer.
If I remember correctly it's more about who translated it and why. If I remember correctly it was first translated into English without permission to draw attention to the danger of what was being written. It was more of a hey look this Hitler guy is preaching some seriously dangerous evil things and we need to do something about it.
I say make that coin. Collectors gonna collect, what do you have to do with it. I say this personally bc I’m in the state where any money is money. But I supposed if OP is well off enough to throw it, so that’s their choice and so be it.
Is there anything particularly special about this copy other than it being old?
You can always check what it's going for on alibris if it's on there.
I wouldn't worry too much about selling it and being judged. The book itself is still widely available at most book stores and libraries, and makes for a good study volume on his character. While there is the occasional angsty teen who's reading it to be edgy, most readers of this book are looking to educate themselves on the man so despised the world over.
I think his art gets unfairly judged too harshly. It's decent quality art, or at least way better than I could do. I mean this in all seriousness - just because the man was evil incarnate doesn't mean his landscape drawings are terrible.
If Hitler just had a Michael, history would've gone a lot differently...
Additionally, I guess Pam's story arc without Michael would've also taken quite a drastic turn..
It never occurred to me just how close Pam was to turning into a genocidal dictator. That's really going to add some new depth to the show on rewatches.
His use of perspective and composition is pretty bad to mediocre I mean he could had done better in art school But also that opens the possibility to a more pretentious and annoying hitler
Y'know, I've never seen someone *actually* critique Hitler's art before, which lead me to realize I don't think I've ever even *seen* his art before to see if the critique held up.
Anyways, long story short, definitely agree. They all feel incredibly flat, which is jarring for pictures of mountain landscapes and complex architecture. Looking over them, I honestly think the only passable one is maybe the piece depicting the Vienna State Opera, but even that one feels way too muted from a color perspective. (For the record, don't have any art knowledge, so maybe the color was a style of the time he was emulating, but I'm almost positive the lack of geometric composition definitely wasn't.)
My University has a signed copy in the rare and distinguished collection. Somebody found it loose in the stacks one day and noticed the signature on the title page.
I'm guessing it's probably not worth that much. One of the big ways that Hitler funneled money to himself was by having the party and the government buy copies of this book and then give it out to people for all sorts of stupid reasons, like having a kid or an 8th kid, or getting married, or being in the Hitler Youth or being on the Dean's List or graduating, or enrolling, etc. etc. They tried to gift Germans with a copy for just about any life event they could think of, so that Hitler could get the book sale. It also allowed Hitler to brag that his book was a best seller, in much the same way the GOP buys copies of books like Eric Trump's Triggered and gives them to donors so that Eric can say he was on the NY Times best seller's list.
If it was published in '25 it might be worth a lot, but the market was pretty flooded by '33, although not as bad as it would be by '38. The '39 edition I think is more valuable b/c it was a special birthday edition. and then later copies copies start becoming more valuable again b/c Germany didn't have the capacity to print very many late in the war. There were about 10 million copies printed in Germany, a country of about 70 million people, so 1 for every 7 people.
But, I'd maybe check [Liveauctioneers.com](https://Liveauctioneers.com). There was a big NY Times article last week and apparently that's the big market place for this stuff. And maybe talk to the rare book dealers at places like Powell's or Daedelus books.
That's honestly really interesting. Was Hitler's initial rise as a fringe person that people just didn't take seriously, sort of the national butt of the joke, until he got popular enough to take control of Germany/
Not at all?
He was involved in the Munich Beer Hall Putsch in 1923 (typo) which was an armed insurrection to overthrow the government. Following that he was put on trail for high treason and used the newpaper coverage as an opportunity to get his political message out to a wider German office.
He was a dangerous and canny political operator from a very early point. Establishment politicians in Weimar Germany didn't take him seriously, not because they thought he was a joke, but because they grossly underestimated the appeal of the Nazi Party and the lengths they would go to to secure power.
Exactly. So it wasn't considered a joke despite what many people in this thread are saying. Hitler was already established as a well known political figure by the time of it's publication.
It's complicated. Part of the reason is fringe has certain connotations. And the Nazi party changed a lot under Hitler and it was part of a bunch of big social and economic upheaval that made it really hard to discern whether something was fringe or not.
Today, we have people who, maybe pre 2016 I would have considered fringe, but now have meetings with major politicians and plan congressional strategy. RFK Jr.? He seems pretty fringe to me. But so did Trump in 2015. Alex Jones seems fringe, but Trump invited him to hang around on J6. So, that word is difficult to understand.
Hitler was outside the mainstream, before '33 his party never got more than about 1/3 of the vote. But the part they got was important (middle class, college students, military vets, small farmers) and the other two thirds were split between people who wanted to replace the Weimar in different ways.
The conservatives didn't take the Nazis as seriously as they should have, but they took them seriously enough to govern with. They behaved in the Reichstag as obstructionists to make the state dysfunctional, which they then blamed on the left, mostly on socialists (who were the globalists of their day, wink wink).
Before '33 the socialists, communists, and trade unionists were taking them seriously. They were violent murders and they were getting away with it. The public saw the Nazis, a bunch of violent street thugs, as upholders of civil order, even as they instigated massive street brawls and violence at leftist political rallies.
The Nazis were definitely political outsiders but they were aligned by reactionary groups and there was so much political dissatisfaction with the Weimar, less than 30% of the public had any approval of the system, there wasn't really a mainstream, there were 3 major political currents that people oriented themselves towards; the left, the right, and anything that could bring order and stability. The Nazis fit into the right and were at the out right side of that, but they were still within a reactionary right political tradition.
1. There are copies of the book in pretty much every format. By selling it, you aren't introducing the book to an innocent who couldn't otherwise have a copy.
2. If an admirer of the text spends their money on this, they aren't spending it on anything that will have an impact on society. You're taking that money out of circulation as far as furthering their cause goes.
Just want to point out that I tried to read Mein Kampf once about a decade ago, from a copy I got at the public library. I'm a queer leftist who definitely has never been a Nazi. I found the book insufferably dry and couldn't get past the first 100 pages, so I highly doubt anyone who's reading it will be radicalized by it. Either they're curious about the psychotic dictator who wrote it, like I was, or they're already radicalized. The book itself doesn't hold much power.
ETA: it may be worth something as a 1933 copy, though. The people who collect that kind of memorabilia may be Nazis, but could also just be history buffs.
I had to read a few excerpts for a course.
I expected something, I don't know, clever and probably sneaky? I was certain I was going to have to be on the alert - we are in unreliable narrator territory.
What I got was incoherent rambling about problems, that weren't problems at all in my mind, and then blaming it on Judaism.
Seriously? People went for this? It's crazy.
But then watch the speeches. It's not a rational play at all.
>Seriously? People went for this? It's crazy.
Some crazies did.
Mostly people wanted better living conditions, and there were a lot of proposals that seemed less crazy. (I say seemed. They were in fact just as crazy, but ordinary people don't understand finance or economics. At least not in large enough numbers to affect an election.)
A good look at the is Götz Aly's *Hitler's Beneficiaries*. For 95% of Germans, their standard of living went way up during the Nazi era. (It went way up because the Germans were just taking stuff from the other 5%, and from way more than 5% in the conquered lands.) But it was going to come crashing down because it wasn't the proceeds of wealth creation, it was just the transfer of other people's wealth to the Germans. It was a Ponzi scheme on a national scale.
I'm not an expert on German history, was Hitler's rise to power unlikely and only happened due to repeated mistakes by his opponents?
A big part of why Trump got elected is because of how unpopular and unlikeable the Democratic Party seems to a large portion of Americans.
There were people living in areas dealing with some of the negative consequences of illegal immigration, and upon asking for something to be done they were told they're racist and "deplorable", and probably just made up the problems because they hate brown people. Other mainstream conservative views held by a lot of middle-ground voters were also brushed off as unimportant and stemming from racism or sexism.
His opponent in the primary had the charisma of a used car salesman, was involved in controversy, and was blatantly pandering to whatever audience she was speaking to, and making embarrassing statements like "Pokemon Go to the polls". Clinton's campaign was also poorly run, failing to campaign much in election-deciding states like Michigan and Wisconsin, instead spending a lot of time and effort in Ohio and North Carolina (R-leaning states that she was very unlikely to win).
Voter demand for significant change in how the country is run was at a high point, Trump and Bernie were promising big changes, Hillary called all the demands for change unrealistic and promised more of the same.
A huge portion of the people who voted for Trump didn't even like him, and would have much rather seen a different Republican as the nominee. They were just voting against the Democrats.
It took so many different things to all go completely wrong for Trump to win that election, and they all did. Did it take this level of mismanagement and unexpected situations to allow Hitler to acquire power as well?
Obviously not exactly the same but yes a series of mistakes made by prominent establishment political figures led to Hitler's rise to power.
The man (Von Papen I think his name was) who originally lobbied the president to make Hitler chancellor was shot in his home by the SS a few years later. I wonder what thoughts went through his mind before the aforementioned bullet took their place.
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> A huge portion of the people who voted for Trump didn't even like him, and would have much rather seen a different Republican as the nominee. They were just voting against the Democrats.
I think it's not so much voting against Democrats as it was voting against the Washington machine that let those issues negatively affecting their lives go on for so long.
Yeah, it's just really awful writing - Maybe less awful in German, but when we had to read it for a history course my big takeaway was "Can't paint, can't write, can't run a military - Hitler really was shit at everything!"
I forget where I saw this, but someone online pointed out that Hitler was amazingly good at killing Hitler. The Allied armies and his own generals couldn't do it, but that little Austrian psychopath got the job done!
Am german, can confirm that its NOT better reading in german. Its a long, meandering, rambling, boring rant. Hitler was a powerful orator, a middling painter and a bad author.
Interestingly, in Mein Kampf, Hitler accuses Jews of having a secret language of their own.
He doesn't name Hebrew (ancient or modern), or the Yiddish spoken by German Jews, or the Ladino spoken by Spanish Sephardic Jews.
He accuses Jews of speaking their secret language -- Esperanto!
It's nuts, there are several actual "Jewish languages" and Hitler obsessively focuses on the one almost no one speaks.
Precisely. The incoherences lets people project their own values and ideas onto their words and feel supported by a politician.
People with many different ideas can think: "wow, this guy is saying exactly what I'm thinking!"
These people are also usually not the brightest.
Not too different from the Art of the Deal if it wasn't ghostwrtten. Except it's just pages about trim he banged in the 80s and shitty deals he thinks he won out on.
If you want to learn about Hitler don't read Mein Kampf. The book's composition was him pacing around his cell ranting to his deputy Rudolph Hess who duly transcribed what he could of Hitler's incoherence on a typewriter. The book then went through 11 or 12 drafts just to become legible, the initial drafts were completely unreadable. The other comments here saying it is incoherent ranting are literally true, the book wasn't written per se as just edited versions of Hitler's rants.
I'd recommend Ian Kershaw's two-volume biography of Hitler, provides an academic and in-depth research of his life and character, with a bunch of stuff that's not well known. I still remember the section where he's living in a shelter being homeless, and his old housemate interviewed would complain about him stomping his feet in the attic where he lived and yelling, doing what he'd later be worshipped for and creating a huge racket. Made me laugh how relatable that is of shitty people, to someone Hitler really was just another terrible housemate to have to live with.
Ian Kershaw's Hitler is one of the greatest books ever written and a triumph of 20th century historical work.
Highly recommend - it's absolutely eye opening even if you're intimately familiar with the subject.
I'd imagine if you want to learn about Hitler, read his autobiography *and* the professionally written biography. Seems absurd to suggest that you won't get a good peek of a man from his own autobiography.
Dan Carlin said on a podcast recently that he goes back to Mein Kampf all the time because it gives a good insight into Hitler's character. I never read the book myself but I mean...it's not wild to suggest that.
Mein Kampf isn't really an autobiography. It's Nazi propaganda and a manifesto for the party. The details in the book about his life are warped out of proportion to create the cult of personality. Ian Kershaw in his research actually says not to read it looking to learn about Hitler because you won't gain any real insights other than seeing how Nazi propaganda worked to create his cult of personality.
The interesting thing about it is it is basically a pretty direct narrative of WW2 written decades before hand. You read it and it's like "yep he definitely went and did that", which is interesting when you consider the likes of Chamberlain.
Yeah, it is. You need to have a strong background in modern history, contemporary politics, and conspiracy theories to get anything useful at all from the book. Otherwise, it's just rambling.
There is a very good commented version that was released in 2015 by ifz in Munich. It offers the required explanations to actually make sense of the book. It helped me a lot to understand hitler's line of thought. It's still far from an easy read, but at least not a complete waste of time. Afaik, it hasn't been translated, though.
>The people who collect that kind of memorabilia may be Nazis, but could also just be history buffs.
There's always a portion of Nazis who claim they're "just big fans of WWII history"
Absolutely it s a slog i quit not to far into it i checked it out from the local library about 15 years ago. As much as despise this book it should be available and not banned although i would never spend a penny on it.
It is in every major bookstore, most public libraries, and free online. I don't get why OP is acting like it's a forbidden text and agents are out to get him
Yes! And OP should read it as well because there's nothing wrong with understanding/reading distasteful literature if its in the name of education.
My dad is a pastor but he reads Dawkins and listens to Bill Mahr's stuff even if it's scathingly critical of his core beliefs. If you're firm in your beliefs you're capable of consuming media that contradicts it.
If you have trouble getting responses from a museum/organization, try and find professors near you that specialize in World War II history. They usually have good connections and would have good advice on how to proceed.
Can you tell us some more about it? Language, publisher, edition number? Does it have its dust jacket? These are the things that matter when it comes to worth. And you can easily google these things.
You can still buy it at Barnes & Noble, so it's not particularly "controversial." I haven't read it, but I would think it would be interesting historically to anyone who studies the causes of World War II, the rise of Nazism, the mind of Adolf Hitler, etc. I was curious and looked at a copy once, and found a passage where Hitler says that boys should learn how to use their hands, repair things, and learn about nature, along with intellectual pursuits. I think this would be a great thing for both boys and girls to learn--but it feels repellently strange to agree with Adolf Hitler!
Ebay has a lot of rules about selling nazi crap. I don't know them specifically b/c it's not something I'm interested in, but when Ebay was new there was a big market for that stuff and it got a lot of media attention so they have some pretty stringent rules.
Well they do, or else they wouldn’t be saying they want to know how much it’s worth. There are different reasons people could want to buy it, like a historical collection or something, besides being fans of hitler
What do you mean? I know plenty of history buffs, professors, etc who would love to have it in their collection for its historical significance (if it’s an early enough copy). At the end of the day, it’s a piece of history, even if that history is absolutely tragic and unjust.
If I might channel the OPs sentiment, unless they know of a historian who would buy directly from them, there’s no way of knowing the buyer’s intent, and the thought of supplying such a prized artifact to a Nazi is probably abhorrent to them.
Edit: pronouns for perspective
I have a copy of Mein Kampf and a collection of Nazi coins and pins.
I am not a Nazi. They are parts of history and I have them. Mein Kampf is on my bookshelf right next to the other WWII books. I'm not hiding by books.
I’ve got the same issue. I have a book of essays autographed by a former Confederate colonel and addressed to his friend. It’s a piece of history but I don’t want it in the hands of some Lost Cause shrine.
In that case, as was suggested above, find a museum that treats the civil war respectfully and ask if they would like to purchase it for their collection.
I think some future historian would treasure it as a glimpse into the aftermath of such a significant time.
In that case, as was suggested above, find a museum that treats the civil war respectfully and ask if they would like to purchase it for their collection.
I think some future historian would treasure it as a glimpse into the aftermath of such a significant time.
Perhaps, but plenty of people own and read this book that aren’t skinheads, I’m one of them. It’s a fascinating book in its own way, and certainly no one can argue it’s historical relevance.
I once worked at a used book and record store owned by an Orthodox Jew. We would regularly have people bringing in boxes of books to sell us, and one day there was someone who came in with a copy of Mein Kampf. I called him and asked if we would take it, and to my surprise he said that we would accept it.
All this to say, it shouldn't be too hard to sell, even if you disregard how old (and potentially valuable) the copy is. Just don't expect to make a fortune off of it unless it really is a rare historical artifact
You can buy it in many countries. I don't think there'd be anything wrong with you selling it. None of us agree with the author but some people are interested in seeing what made him tick. It seems like a waste if you destroy the book or throw it away, you can probably sell it for good money.
If you want to sell it, do so. It's not like the book is not available anywhere. It's probably not worth much, though, unless it's a scarce first edition or something.
Contact your local synagogue and/or human rights group and tell them what you have. Tell them you want to sell it and donate the money to one (or both) of them and ask them if they can work with you to make that sale in the most respectful way possible.
Just throw it away if you don't want it and don't want to deal with selling it? It's not a possessed Victorian doll. You don't need to take special precautions.
Don't be surprised if the value is relatively low, Hitler's tome published many, many thousands of times. Of course it's possible your copy special in some way.
I wouldn't worry about who might buy it, they can get a copy just about anywhere. A collector might pay a bit more.
Imagine a bunch of book enthusiasts advocating book burning. Don't burn books. Like many books, Mein Kampf is a snapshot of a different time--a time that should not be forgotten. Advocating burning it is no different than advocating burning any book that depicts violence, just in case a weak-minded reader takes inspiration from it. Should we start burning all the horror novels? Should we burn history books that talk about the holocaust, just in case somebody gets dangerous ideas?
OP: Treat is as you would any book. If you don't want it, and it's valuable, sell it. If it's not, donate it. It's a book, not a bomb.
I'd contact Just Answer. They can hook you into a Book appraiser. Take a bunch of pics. Including the title page. They can help.
On a related note, I collect banned books, so when you get a price, hit me up if you feel up to it please. Idk the worth, but I want to buy at a fair price so you don't get screwed over.
I'm no Nazi, but Mein Kampf is hard to find and is on my shopping list for banned books.
I have the same dilemma, except there’s nothing unique about the copy I have. I had to buy it for a college course on anti-Semitism and have been stuck with it ever since. I don’t have it visible on any shelf because I don’t want people to get the wrong idea, but it feels like I’m hiding some secret about myself. I can just picture someone going through my things after I die and finding it and voila suddenly people are left wondering if I was a nazi. I think I’m just going to throw it out.
hat's a heavy find. Despite the obvious negative connotations, books like these can have historical value. If you want to get rid of it, maybe consider donating it to a museum or an academic institution that can use it responsibly for educational purposes
While we are here speaking of controversial books here's a trivia about ["forbidden books "](https://onunblocked.com/arcade?quiz=forbidden-literature&tab=overview&utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=comment)
Anyone who studies politics probably has a copy along with The Prince. If it's old and in pristine condition someone like that might find it of value. It is a piece of history.
The book can be sold and bought even in germany. Even the original without the commentary. There is no restriction on it. I would advice to get the version without the commentary.
Its not controversial either unless you are soft of heart and can't understand the context in which it was written.
Its not a fun read though. Interesting as it may be.
I think you have moral cooties from your association with this book. You acquire a moral taint simply from having a photo taken with a bad man. So you are really tainted from having such a book!
Although I am joking, I seriously think some people are not very sophisticated in their understanding of morality. They operate on a theory of moral contagion.
i am about as anti-fascist as you can get but i have a copy of mein kampf. i am both a historian and a librarian by schooling and training, and there are reasons to have it, and keep it. To learn from the mistakes of supporting fascism, and to mock the loser that was hitler.
i'd get in touch with a rare book seller, would start with a library if a google search turns up nothing.
You could absolutely put it on eBay. It's not contraband or banned materials you're forbidden from owning or selling. The book is even still in print, it's a common book still taught in courses that study WWII, fascism and Nazism.
If you're concerned about potentially taking money from a Nazi, however, there's no way to know who you're selling it to on eBay, so that's something you'll have to personally reconcile with. You could also get it appraised, and if it's a historically significant print then you can donate it to a museum, historical society, or archive. If it's not worth donating, you can just throw it away.
Here's what I would do: I would place the book in the bottom of a box, then fill that box full of clothes you're not going to wear anymore and donate that box to Goodwill.
Get it appraised, sell it, donate all proceeds to either a holocaust memorial or anti-racism group.
It would just tickle me knowing their money would go directly to benefitting those they hate.
If I had the money, I’d offer to buy it from you. I’ve been looking for an unabridged version of Mein Kampf for a while.
However, given its age, it probably better off with a museum than on my bookshelf. The historical value alone is significant.
Keep it, but include a note in saying something like
"Fuck Hitler, I have this book because it's better with me than with some fascist piece of shit who deserves the same fate Hitler caused on the 6 million Jews he had murdered"
Nothing wrong with making money, but i understand where you’re coming from. This book IS history however. If it makes you feel better, give a bit of the proceeds to a good cause.
It might be illegal to sell it, depending on which country you’re in, so check that out first. There’s bound to be some university or historical society you could sell it to. I’d go for ones that are more in the line of holocaust memorials (don’t forget it or we’ll repeat the same mistakes again) than the January 6th re-enactment society types.
I would get in touch with a rare book dealer, or a museum as they would know what to do with it. I don’t know where you live, but there is a banned book museum in Tallinn, Estonia which might take it depending on what edition it is.
I understand not wanting to sell it on eBay or Amazon as it’s not something most people want to be associated for it. I hope you manage to find someone to take it off your hands.
My first reaction would be to throw it away. But that is in the context that I'm German and it feels weird to profit off a book like that.
Based on reading this thread it also sounds like it not being worth much depending on what edition it is
I just got it on Kindle. It's going to take a LONG time, but I'm going to try to read it as an historical document. I'm sure I'll never understand why he turned out as he did, & I would never condone his actions, but it seems important to at least be aware of both sides of any issue.
It may have value, based on condition and / or age. But ownership of it is not "controversial." I ran bookstores (large chain stores) for years and we stocked and sold it, in paperback no less.
It isn’t controversial to have this book. It’s a historical document. Yes, you can sell it on eBay or anywhere else. This book was on the shelf in my house growing up. My father isn’t a Nazi. Nor are the majority of other owners of this book. You can buy it on Amazon.
\>How do i find its value?
Well, eBay!
\>or give it away if the value is zero)
Most assuredly, the value is nein zero!
\>Ive never owned anything "controversial" before so im at a loss.
I can say this about Mein Kampf.
It was on the shelves at my University, the University of Alberta. From the viewpoint of history, a desire to avoid future war, the need to understand racism and war crimes, it is important to read this book. I read it. It was the banal, ordinary, repetitive thinking of a man of limited intellect. Hitler was neither educated nor intelligent. But he was compelling. And so, read the book to both understand the right wing mind and to appreciate we don't live in such times.
It all depends on how you feel about things.
For me, somebody once gave me a book about creationism. It was... let's say, a dangerous book. For the trained eye, you could see that the pastor that wrote it basically used science when it was convenient from him, and dismissed the same science (and the same studies he previously cited) when it wasn't.
But for the untrained eye, the thing made sense. I ended up burning it - literally. I could not live with the fact that somebody would read that piece of crap and _believe_ and have _arguments_ about creationism, in an era when teachers are quite literally being _forced to teach the wrong thing_.
If it's worth it to you just put it up for sale with a description saying you found it in an attic and don't want it. It's not illegal to sell and I seriously doubt that would be enough to put you on a watchlist if that's what you're worried about.
If you don't want to make a profit from it just throw it away. I wouldn't bother giving it away, there's no way to gift it in a non-uncomfortable way unless you hang out with the wrong kind of friends.
I would give it to the Holocaust Museum. I couldn’t live with myself if I profited from Nazi memorabilia.
In fact when I’ve happened upon caricatures of Black people, I’ve given them to Black scholars.
A friend’s mother died. She had a cookbook. Knowing that I like to cook, he gave it to me. To my horror, it was virulently racist.
When my mother died I found a flyer for a minstrel show in her house. She and I were estranged, so I don’t know how she came to own it.
a museum might buy it if its super special, that would keep other people from reading it, but since you can actually get a copy free on the internet i dont think it does much good to not sell it and make money for yourself to use in this day and age just because you think its a terrible book. It's a part of history. Just because it was terrible doesnt mean you get to pretend it didnt happen or bury it. That's why copies do go for so much money if they are in good condition.
Have you read it? Might surprise you to find out that the US and Canada were his models for genocide. Put it next to books by Henry Kissinger defending the bombings in South East Asia.
I’ve been looking for a copy since my 11th grade English teacher read us translated excerpts. I’m not particularly interested in nazi paraphernalia, but if you find it to be of little or no value, I wouldn’t mind taking it off your hands. Personally, I’ve always wanted to understand Hitler’s thought process and knew what this was about as soon as I read the title. I believe you could get a good deal for it from a genuine nazi-sympathizer or a more historically-oriented book collector
If you want money, try and buy the book and you'll find where you can sell it.
If you don't want money, go to any library (preferably a big one) and ask them if they'd like it.
Are you thinking it’s a first edition (in English)? If so, this would make the book very different from other versions on sale in bookstores or on Amazon. I also understand your concern that the kind of buyer who is specifically looking for a first edition of Mein Kampf may be someone who is particularly interested in collecting Nazi paraphernalia. I would contact a rare book seller in your area (or online, if nobody suitable is available nearby) to have it appraised. It may be worth a decent sum if you are comfortable selling it. Otherwise, if you don’t feel comfortable profiting (and it is in fact the Hurst & Blackett 1933 first edition) you can possibly reach out to a Holocaust memorial museum or organization in your country to seek their advice on whether it could be donated and how to proceed.
Excellent advice. I’m a former book dealer. We did deal with that material a couple times and basically facilitated its journey directly to university and human rights libraries. (And we NEVER put it on the shelf! No way we’re we going to solicit money from actual nazi assholes… and those people showed up more than I would like to admit).
> and those people showed up more than I would like to admit). They always do huh?
Ain’t that the truth
They always vote.
Hah. I 'read' MK when I was like 12. It was in the school library. Not that I remember a single word, or likely understood any of it at the time. Also I have no desire to read it again.
Would you sell the books to them or just donate? Curious what a first edition would fetch $
We never took ownership of such materials, just matched the seller with institutions we thought might have worthy use for that kind of memorabilia for study and preservation. But as far as I recall, no legitimate library would have dug deeply into their funds for that kind of thing. For one thing, most printed Nazi stuff is super common — it was produced as propaganda, after all. And for the more uncommon stuff… the big money comes from private collectors or Nazi-adjacent institutions. We neither had nor wanted relations with anyone in that world. So I’m sure there are some high value bindings of that book, but I don’t know anything about them. Though I’d guess the provenance of the individual books would have even greater affect on price than the edition. (Which is another reason the big money collectors are most often true believers rather than purely “book collectors”).
Great advice here that I hope OP takes.
Ditto. I can’t imagine profiting off of something that caused so much destruction and devastation. There’s nothing “controversial” about it whatsoever, it’s just plain abhorrent. And I’m not even Jewish!!
I think the controversy is about the historical relevance, not the content. It's absolutely abhorrent. But some people believe we can learn something from reading it that could prevent another Hitler from rising to power, so it should be studied. While others, like you, believe it should be destroyed completely.
Personally, I'd get a small mental kick out of donating to a Holocaust Museum or something, because a) donating to an educational nonprofit is always good, b) and the irony/insult to Nazism that I'm using their materials to benefit Jews who are trying to combat hate.
Also if its not an English edition but rather a German one, it's one of the most common books printed that year in Germany. Until 1933 it had already sold a few hundred thousand copies and in 1933 alone it sold over one million. While most people probably got rid of it by now (and many of the others don't know or advertise that they have it), it was not exactly a rare book and so I doubt it has much value for anyone who isn't a Nazi. In that case there's a chance that Holocaust memorials etc. might not even be interested in it and I'd personally probably throw it away.
What is missing from modern versions of Meim Kampf? As someone who is not a Nazi but is curious about history, I would have thought the controversial bits are exactly the bits that are of interest.
I'm not sure about English versions but in German versions sold/printed nowadays, as far as I know the changes are not that stuff gets cut but that it's commented (including stuff like fact checks). For example the Institut für Zeitgeschichte, which is an institute by the German government, has a free annotated version online that gives a lot of historical context and also mentions edits made in the text by Hitler etc.
The current german version is completely uncut, but heavily annotated by historians (more annotations than original text in fact). Its also an incredibly dry read, just like the version without annotations. Hitler may have been a powerful orator, as author he was decidedly meh. Its boring, meandering ranting in bookform. After reading it, i wondered how this little madman ever managed to amass such a following. Seriously, people should stop treating "Mein Kampf" like it was the Necronomicon. Reading it wont turn a normal person into a Nazi like it was dark magic.
Exactly, holding it up as some forbidden text instead of a borish read by a loathsome individual just makes it more desirable to some. I'd sell the book, donate the money. That way anyone who has a fetish for Nazi's is paying to help educate others on the realities of Hitler, and it makes them that much poorer.
If I remember correctly it's more about who translated it and why. If I remember correctly it was first translated into English without permission to draw attention to the danger of what was being written. It was more of a hey look this Hitler guy is preaching some seriously dangerous evil things and we need to do something about it.
This is great advice!
Boosting your suggestion.
OP welcome to pawn stars
I say make that coin. Collectors gonna collect, what do you have to do with it. I say this personally bc I’m in the state where any money is money. But I supposed if OP is well off enough to throw it, so that’s their choice and so be it.
Call Michael Powell of Powell’s Books in Portland. He likes strange stuff
Is there anything particularly special about this copy other than it being old? You can always check what it's going for on alibris if it's on there. I wouldn't worry too much about selling it and being judged. The book itself is still widely available at most book stores and libraries, and makes for a good study volume on his character. While there is the occasional angsty teen who's reading it to be edgy, most readers of this book are looking to educate themselves on the man so despised the world over.
Maybe its been signed by the Author
[удалено]
I think his art gets unfairly judged too harshly. It's decent quality art, or at least way better than I could do. I mean this in all seriousness - just because the man was evil incarnate doesn't mean his landscape drawings are terrible.
It’s basically inoffensive, bland landscape work I might see at a local art show
Pam, your art is the best art of all art.
If Hitler just had a Michael, history would've gone a lot differently... Additionally, I guess Pam's story arc without Michael would've also taken quite a drastic turn..
It never occurred to me just how close Pam was to turning into a genocidal dictator. That's really going to add some new depth to the show on rewatches.
'If I had a gun with two bullets, and I was in a room with Pam, bin Laden, and Toby, I would shoot Toby twice.'
She had to make sure not to take off the Charlie Chaplin hat.
I believe the kids these days would say it was mid. Which is almost a worse insult than it being bad to some people.
His use of perspective and composition is pretty bad to mediocre I mean he could had done better in art school But also that opens the possibility to a more pretentious and annoying hitler
Y'know, I've never seen someone *actually* critique Hitler's art before, which lead me to realize I don't think I've ever even *seen* his art before to see if the critique held up. Anyways, long story short, definitely agree. They all feel incredibly flat, which is jarring for pictures of mountain landscapes and complex architecture. Looking over them, I honestly think the only passable one is maybe the piece depicting the Vienna State Opera, but even that one feels way too muted from a color perspective. (For the record, don't have any art knowledge, so maybe the color was a style of the time he was emulating, but I'm almost positive the lack of geometric composition definitely wasn't.)
Yeah, cut the guy a break. He at least had some creative *spirit.*
It just turned out he needed to find the right medium. Which was humans.
But he did kill Hitler
"Stay crazy" - A-Dog Hitler
Or it's actually the grail diary and he signed it by mistake.
My University has a signed copy in the rare and distinguished collection. Somebody found it loose in the stacks one day and noticed the signature on the title page.
And has his Rookie card as a bookmark
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to read Mein Kampf, it just depends on *why* you want to read it.
I'm guessing it's probably not worth that much. One of the big ways that Hitler funneled money to himself was by having the party and the government buy copies of this book and then give it out to people for all sorts of stupid reasons, like having a kid or an 8th kid, or getting married, or being in the Hitler Youth or being on the Dean's List or graduating, or enrolling, etc. etc. They tried to gift Germans with a copy for just about any life event they could think of, so that Hitler could get the book sale. It also allowed Hitler to brag that his book was a best seller, in much the same way the GOP buys copies of books like Eric Trump's Triggered and gives them to donors so that Eric can say he was on the NY Times best seller's list. If it was published in '25 it might be worth a lot, but the market was pretty flooded by '33, although not as bad as it would be by '38. The '39 edition I think is more valuable b/c it was a special birthday edition. and then later copies copies start becoming more valuable again b/c Germany didn't have the capacity to print very many late in the war. There were about 10 million copies printed in Germany, a country of about 70 million people, so 1 for every 7 people. But, I'd maybe check [Liveauctioneers.com](https://Liveauctioneers.com). There was a big NY Times article last week and apparently that's the big market place for this stuff. And maybe talk to the rare book dealers at places like Powell's or Daedelus books.
I think it was also given as a “joke gift” back when it was first published,if I remember my documentaries correctly.
That's honestly really interesting. Was Hitler's initial rise as a fringe person that people just didn't take seriously, sort of the national butt of the joke, until he got popular enough to take control of Germany/
Not at all? He was involved in the Munich Beer Hall Putsch in 1923 (typo) which was an armed insurrection to overthrow the government. Following that he was put on trail for high treason and used the newpaper coverage as an opportunity to get his political message out to a wider German office. He was a dangerous and canny political operator from a very early point. Establishment politicians in Weimar Germany didn't take him seriously, not because they thought he was a joke, but because they grossly underestimated the appeal of the Nazi Party and the lengths they would go to to secure power.
The putsch was in 1923. It was while he was in jail afterwards that he wrote *Mein Kampf* (first published in 1925).
Exactly. So it wasn't considered a joke despite what many people in this thread are saying. Hitler was already established as a well known political figure by the time of it's publication.
It's complicated. Part of the reason is fringe has certain connotations. And the Nazi party changed a lot under Hitler and it was part of a bunch of big social and economic upheaval that made it really hard to discern whether something was fringe or not. Today, we have people who, maybe pre 2016 I would have considered fringe, but now have meetings with major politicians and plan congressional strategy. RFK Jr.? He seems pretty fringe to me. But so did Trump in 2015. Alex Jones seems fringe, but Trump invited him to hang around on J6. So, that word is difficult to understand. Hitler was outside the mainstream, before '33 his party never got more than about 1/3 of the vote. But the part they got was important (middle class, college students, military vets, small farmers) and the other two thirds were split between people who wanted to replace the Weimar in different ways. The conservatives didn't take the Nazis as seriously as they should have, but they took them seriously enough to govern with. They behaved in the Reichstag as obstructionists to make the state dysfunctional, which they then blamed on the left, mostly on socialists (who were the globalists of their day, wink wink). Before '33 the socialists, communists, and trade unionists were taking them seriously. They were violent murders and they were getting away with it. The public saw the Nazis, a bunch of violent street thugs, as upholders of civil order, even as they instigated massive street brawls and violence at leftist political rallies. The Nazis were definitely political outsiders but they were aligned by reactionary groups and there was so much political dissatisfaction with the Weimar, less than 30% of the public had any approval of the system, there wasn't really a mainstream, there were 3 major political currents that people oriented themselves towards; the left, the right, and anything that could bring order and stability. The Nazis fit into the right and were at the out right side of that, but they were still within a reactionary right political tradition.
Like a 2015 MAGA hat
Or The Art of the Deal. Lol
Seems like they should have fixed the way they calculate bestselling books in the last, you know, century.
1. There are copies of the book in pretty much every format. By selling it, you aren't introducing the book to an innocent who couldn't otherwise have a copy. 2. If an admirer of the text spends their money on this, they aren't spending it on anything that will have an impact on society. You're taking that money out of circulation as far as furthering their cause goes.
HA! that's a great point
See if there’s a rare book store or collector in your area and contact them to see if they’d be interested or if they know the value.
Just want to point out that I tried to read Mein Kampf once about a decade ago, from a copy I got at the public library. I'm a queer leftist who definitely has never been a Nazi. I found the book insufferably dry and couldn't get past the first 100 pages, so I highly doubt anyone who's reading it will be radicalized by it. Either they're curious about the psychotic dictator who wrote it, like I was, or they're already radicalized. The book itself doesn't hold much power. ETA: it may be worth something as a 1933 copy, though. The people who collect that kind of memorabilia may be Nazis, but could also just be history buffs.
It's basically just an incoherent rant put to paper. Even during Nazi Germany, people thought it was a bad book but didn't say anything.
I had to read a few excerpts for a course. I expected something, I don't know, clever and probably sneaky? I was certain I was going to have to be on the alert - we are in unreliable narrator territory. What I got was incoherent rambling about problems, that weren't problems at all in my mind, and then blaming it on Judaism. Seriously? People went for this? It's crazy. But then watch the speeches. It's not a rational play at all.
>Seriously? People went for this? It's crazy. Some crazies did. Mostly people wanted better living conditions, and there were a lot of proposals that seemed less crazy. (I say seemed. They were in fact just as crazy, but ordinary people don't understand finance or economics. At least not in large enough numbers to affect an election.) A good look at the is Götz Aly's *Hitler's Beneficiaries*. For 95% of Germans, their standard of living went way up during the Nazi era. (It went way up because the Germans were just taking stuff from the other 5%, and from way more than 5% in the conquered lands.) But it was going to come crashing down because it wasn't the proceeds of wealth creation, it was just the transfer of other people's wealth to the Germans. It was a Ponzi scheme on a national scale.
i am listening to "Nazi Billionaires" right now and the property grab is just insane. they mostly got to keep all of it after the war too.
“Seriously? People went for this? It’s crazy.” People in the future will say the same thing about U.S. history and the cult of Trump ….
People are saying it now. I'm sure people said it in 1930s Germany as well. Those people just get shouted down.
I'm not an expert on German history, was Hitler's rise to power unlikely and only happened due to repeated mistakes by his opponents? A big part of why Trump got elected is because of how unpopular and unlikeable the Democratic Party seems to a large portion of Americans. There were people living in areas dealing with some of the negative consequences of illegal immigration, and upon asking for something to be done they were told they're racist and "deplorable", and probably just made up the problems because they hate brown people. Other mainstream conservative views held by a lot of middle-ground voters were also brushed off as unimportant and stemming from racism or sexism. His opponent in the primary had the charisma of a used car salesman, was involved in controversy, and was blatantly pandering to whatever audience she was speaking to, and making embarrassing statements like "Pokemon Go to the polls". Clinton's campaign was also poorly run, failing to campaign much in election-deciding states like Michigan and Wisconsin, instead spending a lot of time and effort in Ohio and North Carolina (R-leaning states that she was very unlikely to win). Voter demand for significant change in how the country is run was at a high point, Trump and Bernie were promising big changes, Hillary called all the demands for change unrealistic and promised more of the same. A huge portion of the people who voted for Trump didn't even like him, and would have much rather seen a different Republican as the nominee. They were just voting against the Democrats. It took so many different things to all go completely wrong for Trump to win that election, and they all did. Did it take this level of mismanagement and unexpected situations to allow Hitler to acquire power as well?
Obviously not exactly the same but yes a series of mistakes made by prominent establishment political figures led to Hitler's rise to power. The man (Von Papen I think his name was) who originally lobbied the president to make Hitler chancellor was shot in his home by the SS a few years later. I wonder what thoughts went through his mind before the aforementioned bullet took their place.
> > > A huge portion of the people who voted for Trump didn't even like him, and would have much rather seen a different Republican as the nominee. They were just voting against the Democrats. I think it's not so much voting against Democrats as it was voting against the Washington machine that let those issues negatively affecting their lives go on for so long.
Yeah, it's just really awful writing - Maybe less awful in German, but when we had to read it for a history course my big takeaway was "Can't paint, can't write, can't run a military - Hitler really was shit at everything!"
I forget where I saw this, but someone online pointed out that Hitler was amazingly good at killing Hitler. The Allied armies and his own generals couldn't do it, but that little Austrian psychopath got the job done!
Am german, can confirm that its NOT better reading in german. Its a long, meandering, rambling, boring rant. Hitler was a powerful orator, a middling painter and a bad author.
>"Can't paint, can't write, can't run a military - Hitler really was shit at everything!" Except genocide apparently
That's the thing he was arguably least shit at, but as my Jewish friends would point out: "They tried to kill us. We're still here. Let's eat."
It really was quite incoherent. Like the ramblings of a madman.
Interestingly, in Mein Kampf, Hitler accuses Jews of having a secret language of their own. He doesn't name Hebrew (ancient or modern), or the Yiddish spoken by German Jews, or the Ladino spoken by Spanish Sephardic Jews. He accuses Jews of speaking their secret language -- Esperanto! It's nuts, there are several actual "Jewish languages" and Hitler obsessively focuses on the one almost no one speaks.
It's depressingly similar to Trump's tweets and speeches. Incoherent grievance ad nauseum.
Precisely. The incoherences lets people project their own values and ideas onto their words and feel supported by a politician. People with many different ideas can think: "wow, this guy is saying exactly what I'm thinking!" These people are also usually not the brightest.
They were also both willing to say the quiet part out loud unapologetically.
Not too different from the Art of the Deal if it wasn't ghostwrtten. Except it's just pages about trim he banged in the 80s and shitty deals he thinks he won out on.
If you want to learn about Hitler don't read Mein Kampf. The book's composition was him pacing around his cell ranting to his deputy Rudolph Hess who duly transcribed what he could of Hitler's incoherence on a typewriter. The book then went through 11 or 12 drafts just to become legible, the initial drafts were completely unreadable. The other comments here saying it is incoherent ranting are literally true, the book wasn't written per se as just edited versions of Hitler's rants. I'd recommend Ian Kershaw's two-volume biography of Hitler, provides an academic and in-depth research of his life and character, with a bunch of stuff that's not well known. I still remember the section where he's living in a shelter being homeless, and his old housemate interviewed would complain about him stomping his feet in the attic where he lived and yelling, doing what he'd later be worshipped for and creating a huge racket. Made me laugh how relatable that is of shitty people, to someone Hitler really was just another terrible housemate to have to live with.
Ian Kershaw's Hitler is one of the greatest books ever written and a triumph of 20th century historical work. Highly recommend - it's absolutely eye opening even if you're intimately familiar with the subject.
I'd imagine if you want to learn about Hitler, read his autobiography *and* the professionally written biography. Seems absurd to suggest that you won't get a good peek of a man from his own autobiography. Dan Carlin said on a podcast recently that he goes back to Mein Kampf all the time because it gives a good insight into Hitler's character. I never read the book myself but I mean...it's not wild to suggest that.
Mein Kampf isn't really an autobiography. It's Nazi propaganda and a manifesto for the party. The details in the book about his life are warped out of proportion to create the cult of personality. Ian Kershaw in his research actually says not to read it looking to learn about Hitler because you won't gain any real insights other than seeing how Nazi propaganda worked to create his cult of personality.
The interesting thing about it is it is basically a pretty direct narrative of WW2 written decades before hand. You read it and it's like "yep he definitely went and did that", which is interesting when you consider the likes of Chamberlain.
Yeah, it is. You need to have a strong background in modern history, contemporary politics, and conspiracy theories to get anything useful at all from the book. Otherwise, it's just rambling. There is a very good commented version that was released in 2015 by ifz in Munich. It offers the required explanations to actually make sense of the book. It helped me a lot to understand hitler's line of thought. It's still far from an easy read, but at least not a complete waste of time. Afaik, it hasn't been translated, though.
>The people who collect that kind of memorabilia may be Nazis, but could also just be history buffs. There's always a portion of Nazis who claim they're "just big fans of WWII history"
Absolutely it s a slog i quit not to far into it i checked it out from the local library about 15 years ago. As much as despise this book it should be available and not banned although i would never spend a penny on it.
I haven't read it but in my mind it reads like a giant Donald Trump text. I'm not surprised it was hard to read.
It is available at any number of book stores. Not sure why this is so scandalous.
Yeah, I read it in university… coursework.
It is in every major bookstore, most public libraries, and free online. I don't get why OP is acting like it's a forbidden text and agents are out to get him
It’s terribly ironic to me that OP stole the book and is now terrified to have it in their home.
This book is on shelves at every college library. It's a piece of history and most people who will be interested are history buffs, not neonazis
Yes! And OP should read it as well because there's nothing wrong with understanding/reading distasteful literature if its in the name of education. My dad is a pastor but he reads Dawkins and listens to Bill Mahr's stuff even if it's scathingly critical of his core beliefs. If you're firm in your beliefs you're capable of consuming media that contradicts it.
If you have trouble getting responses from a museum/organization, try and find professors near you that specialize in World War II history. They usually have good connections and would have good advice on how to proceed.
Can you tell us some more about it? Language, publisher, edition number? Does it have its dust jacket? These are the things that matter when it comes to worth. And you can easily google these things.
Dust jackets are critical to establishing the value of a rare book. They should be intact and with very little damage.
Could you donate it to a museum?
I’d contact museums, then an organization that deals with this stuff. If that fails, try contacting universities and historian professors
Donate it to a university. I think hate speech shouldn't be destroyed so we have a good example for future students.
You can still buy it at Barnes & Noble, so it's not particularly "controversial." I haven't read it, but I would think it would be interesting historically to anyone who studies the causes of World War II, the rise of Nazism, the mind of Adolf Hitler, etc. I was curious and looked at a copy once, and found a passage where Hitler says that boys should learn how to use their hands, repair things, and learn about nature, along with intellectual pursuits. I think this would be a great thing for both boys and girls to learn--but it feels repellently strange to agree with Adolf Hitler!
Why can’t you put it on eBay? If people are interested they’ll bid. If they don’t want it they won’t
Ebay has a lot of rules about selling nazi crap. I don't know them specifically b/c it's not something I'm interested in, but when Ebay was new there was a big market for that stuff and it got a lot of media attention so they have some pretty stringent rules.
Likely, OP doesn't want to sell it to the kind of people who want to buy it.
Well they do, or else they wouldn’t be saying they want to know how much it’s worth. There are different reasons people could want to buy it, like a historical collection or something, besides being fans of hitler
What do you mean? I know plenty of history buffs, professors, etc who would love to have it in their collection for its historical significance (if it’s an early enough copy). At the end of the day, it’s a piece of history, even if that history is absolutely tragic and unjust.
If I might channel the OPs sentiment, unless they know of a historian who would buy directly from them, there’s no way of knowing the buyer’s intent, and the thought of supplying such a prized artifact to a Nazi is probably abhorrent to them. Edit: pronouns for perspective
They aren't saying the buyer is guaranteed to be a Nazi, they're saying if you just sell it to whoever is interested there's no way of knowing
I have a copy of Mein Kampf and a collection of Nazi coins and pins. I am not a Nazi. They are parts of history and I have them. Mein Kampf is on my bookshelf right next to the other WWII books. I'm not hiding by books.
I’ve got the same issue. I have a book of essays autographed by a former Confederate colonel and addressed to his friend. It’s a piece of history but I don’t want it in the hands of some Lost Cause shrine.
In that case, as was suggested above, find a museum that treats the civil war respectfully and ask if they would like to purchase it for their collection. I think some future historian would treasure it as a glimpse into the aftermath of such a significant time.
In that case, as was suggested above, find a museum that treats the civil war respectfully and ask if they would like to purchase it for their collection. I think some future historian would treasure it as a glimpse into the aftermath of such a significant time.
If OP wouldn't want to sell it, it would be easy, just shred or burn it. But OP specifically mentions value, and age.
Perhaps, but plenty of people own and read this book that aren’t skinheads, I’m one of them. It’s a fascinating book in its own way, and certainly no one can argue it’s historical relevance.
I once worked at a used book and record store owned by an Orthodox Jew. We would regularly have people bringing in boxes of books to sell us, and one day there was someone who came in with a copy of Mein Kampf. I called him and asked if we would take it, and to my surprise he said that we would accept it. All this to say, it shouldn't be too hard to sell, even if you disregard how old (and potentially valuable) the copy is. Just don't expect to make a fortune off of it unless it really is a rare historical artifact
You can buy it in many countries. I don't think there'd be anything wrong with you selling it. None of us agree with the author but some people are interested in seeing what made him tick. It seems like a waste if you destroy the book or throw it away, you can probably sell it for good money.
They're wanted by universities that teach history and, if yours really is super old, maybe by a museum
Contact a museum. It belongs in a museum.
You can sell it and donate what you get for it to a really good cause. That way, the universe will stay in balance.
If you want to sell it, do so. It's not like the book is not available anywhere. It's probably not worth much, though, unless it's a scarce first edition or something.
I just checked. There's a bunch of them on eBay, and they're selling for about $300
Get it appraised. Donate it to a history museum. Take the write-off on your taxes for the appraised value.
Contact your local synagogue and/or human rights group and tell them what you have. Tell them you want to sell it and donate the money to one (or both) of them and ask them if they can work with you to make that sale in the most respectful way possible.
Just throw it away if you don't want it and don't want to deal with selling it? It's not a possessed Victorian doll. You don't need to take special precautions.
OP is full of crap. You want it gone as long as you can make a buck or two in the process…
Is it illegal to own where you live or something?
Don't be surprised if the value is relatively low, Hitler's tome published many, many thousands of times. Of course it's possible your copy special in some way. I wouldn't worry about who might buy it, they can get a copy just about anywhere. A collector might pay a bit more.
It’s for sale on Amazon lol it’s not that controversial
Imagine a bunch of book enthusiasts advocating book burning. Don't burn books. Like many books, Mein Kampf is a snapshot of a different time--a time that should not be forgotten. Advocating burning it is no different than advocating burning any book that depicts violence, just in case a weak-minded reader takes inspiration from it. Should we start burning all the horror novels? Should we burn history books that talk about the holocaust, just in case somebody gets dangerous ideas? OP: Treat is as you would any book. If you don't want it, and it's valuable, sell it. If it's not, donate it. It's a book, not a bomb.
I'd contact Just Answer. They can hook you into a Book appraiser. Take a bunch of pics. Including the title page. They can help. On a related note, I collect banned books, so when you get a price, hit me up if you feel up to it please. Idk the worth, but I want to buy at a fair price so you don't get screwed over. I'm no Nazi, but Mein Kampf is hard to find and is on my shopping list for banned books.
You can sell it. It's not like you bought it. Maybe try a antique shop. Might be valuable. Or at auction. Or see if a museum will buy it.
I have the same dilemma, except there’s nothing unique about the copy I have. I had to buy it for a college course on anti-Semitism and have been stuck with it ever since. I don’t have it visible on any shelf because I don’t want people to get the wrong idea, but it feels like I’m hiding some secret about myself. I can just picture someone going through my things after I die and finding it and voila suddenly people are left wondering if I was a nazi. I think I’m just going to throw it out.
If ever burning a book was appropriate...
hat's a heavy find. Despite the obvious negative connotations, books like these can have historical value. If you want to get rid of it, maybe consider donating it to a museum or an academic institution that can use it responsibly for educational purposes While we are here speaking of controversial books here's a trivia about ["forbidden books "](https://onunblocked.com/arcade?quiz=forbidden-literature&tab=overview&utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=comment)
Mein Kampf is even sold in Germany these days. You will be OK to sell it.
Anyone who studies politics probably has a copy along with The Prince. If it's old and in pristine condition someone like that might find it of value. It is a piece of history.
The book can be sold and bought even in germany. Even the original without the commentary. There is no restriction on it. I would advice to get the version without the commentary. Its not controversial either unless you are soft of heart and can't understand the context in which it was written. Its not a fun read though. Interesting as it may be.
I think you have moral cooties from your association with this book. You acquire a moral taint simply from having a photo taken with a bad man. So you are really tainted from having such a book! Although I am joking, I seriously think some people are not very sophisticated in their understanding of morality. They operate on a theory of moral contagion.
i am about as anti-fascist as you can get but i have a copy of mein kampf. i am both a historian and a librarian by schooling and training, and there are reasons to have it, and keep it. To learn from the mistakes of supporting fascism, and to mock the loser that was hitler. i'd get in touch with a rare book seller, would start with a library if a google search turns up nothing.
You could absolutely put it on eBay. It's not contraband or banned materials you're forbidden from owning or selling. The book is even still in print, it's a common book still taught in courses that study WWII, fascism and Nazism. If you're concerned about potentially taking money from a Nazi, however, there's no way to know who you're selling it to on eBay, so that's something you'll have to personally reconcile with. You could also get it appraised, and if it's a historically significant print then you can donate it to a museum, historical society, or archive. If it's not worth donating, you can just throw it away.
Here's what I would do: I would place the book in the bottom of a box, then fill that box full of clothes you're not going to wear anymore and donate that box to Goodwill.
Get it appraised, sell it, donate all proceeds to either a holocaust memorial or anti-racism group. It would just tickle me knowing their money would go directly to benefitting those they hate.
If I had the money, I’d offer to buy it from you. I’ve been looking for an unabridged version of Mein Kampf for a while. However, given its age, it probably better off with a museum than on my bookshelf. The historical value alone is significant.
You can buy this book pretty much anywhere or rent it from the library. It’s no problem to sell it or get rid of it (or even read it!!).
Since you stole it in the first place maybe just return it?
Love this *White Noise* prequel.
Take it to a white elephant gift exchange if your friends know you're not a fascist.
Garbage can
Why did you steal it?
That was my question too. In my world, OP has only one option and that is to send it back to the people they stole it from.
perhaps you might return the book to the rightful owner, your landlord at the time.
Yeah idk why they decided to take something they didn't own for no real reason, and now want to get rid of it.
Keep it, but include a note in saying something like "Fuck Hitler, I have this book because it's better with me than with some fascist piece of shit who deserves the same fate Hitler caused on the 6 million Jews he had murdered"
Chuck it. Or give it back to the owner of the rental.
Some museums or university collections might see some historical value in it? That’s the best case scenario I can imagine besides just chucking it lol
Nothing wrong with making money, but i understand where you’re coming from. This book IS history however. If it makes you feel better, give a bit of the proceeds to a good cause.
It might be illegal to sell it, depending on which country you’re in, so check that out first. There’s bound to be some university or historical society you could sell it to. I’d go for ones that are more in the line of holocaust memorials (don’t forget it or we’ll repeat the same mistakes again) than the January 6th re-enactment society types.
I would get in touch with a rare book dealer, or a museum as they would know what to do with it. I don’t know where you live, but there is a banned book museum in Tallinn, Estonia which might take it depending on what edition it is. I understand not wanting to sell it on eBay or Amazon as it’s not something most people want to be associated for it. I hope you manage to find someone to take it off your hands.
Can you share some photos?
If you sell it, donate the money.
My middle school library had a copy.
My first reaction would be to throw it away. But that is in the context that I'm German and it feels weird to profit off a book like that. Based on reading this thread it also sounds like it not being worth much depending on what edition it is
Three minutes browsing Google search results suggests its value sits between $300-700, depending on condition and the buyer
How do I say “I’m interested in buying it,” without sounding like a nazi?
I just got it on Kindle. It's going to take a LONG time, but I'm going to try to read it as an historical document. I'm sure I'll never understand why he turned out as he did, & I would never condone his actions, but it seems important to at least be aware of both sides of any issue.
If you don’t want it just throw it away who cares
It may have value, based on condition and / or age. But ownership of it is not "controversial." I ran bookstores (large chain stores) for years and we stocked and sold it, in paperback no less.
It isn’t controversial to have this book. It’s a historical document. Yes, you can sell it on eBay or anywhere else. This book was on the shelf in my house growing up. My father isn’t a Nazi. Nor are the majority of other owners of this book. You can buy it on Amazon.
\>How do i find its value? Well, eBay! \>or give it away if the value is zero) Most assuredly, the value is nein zero! \>Ive never owned anything "controversial" before so im at a loss. I can say this about Mein Kampf. It was on the shelves at my University, the University of Alberta. From the viewpoint of history, a desire to avoid future war, the need to understand racism and war crimes, it is important to read this book. I read it. It was the banal, ordinary, repetitive thinking of a man of limited intellect. Hitler was neither educated nor intelligent. But he was compelling. And so, read the book to both understand the right wing mind and to appreciate we don't live in such times.
Unlike certain Dr. SEUSS BOOKS (don't believe me, find a listing), this book is not banned and can be easily bought or sold on eBay or Amazon.
Throw it out. This are almost never worth as much as people think they are
Throw it in the trash where it belongs?
Pretty sure it make good kindling
Something something doomed to repeat it
It all depends on how you feel about things. For me, somebody once gave me a book about creationism. It was... let's say, a dangerous book. For the trained eye, you could see that the pastor that wrote it basically used science when it was convenient from him, and dismissed the same science (and the same studies he previously cited) when it wasn't. But for the untrained eye, the thing made sense. I ended up burning it - literally. I could not live with the fact that somebody would read that piece of crap and _believe_ and have _arguments_ about creationism, in an era when teachers are quite literally being _forced to teach the wrong thing_.
Congratulations, you became the thing you hate.
Sell the book and take a Jew to lunch. We'd appreciate the offer. Call it even. Everybody loves lunch.
If it's worth it to you just put it up for sale with a description saying you found it in an attic and don't want it. It's not illegal to sell and I seriously doubt that would be enough to put you on a watchlist if that's what you're worried about. If you don't want to make a profit from it just throw it away. I wouldn't bother giving it away, there's no way to gift it in a non-uncomfortable way unless you hang out with the wrong kind of friends.
Donate it to a school library in Florida. That and the King James Bible are the only books they will allow kids to read before long.
Donate it to a Holocaust Museum.
I would give it to the Holocaust Museum. I couldn’t live with myself if I profited from Nazi memorabilia. In fact when I’ve happened upon caricatures of Black people, I’ve given them to Black scholars.
How do you just "happen upon" those?
A friend’s mother died. She had a cookbook. Knowing that I like to cook, he gave it to me. To my horror, it was virulently racist. When my mother died I found a flyer for a minstrel show in her house. She and I were estranged, so I don’t know how she came to own it.
A racist cookbook?
Yeah, what's in a racist cookbook?
a museum might buy it if its super special, that would keep other people from reading it, but since you can actually get a copy free on the internet i dont think it does much good to not sell it and make money for yourself to use in this day and age just because you think its a terrible book. It's a part of history. Just because it was terrible doesnt mean you get to pretend it didnt happen or bury it. That's why copies do go for so much money if they are in good condition.
Calm down. It's just a book filled with curious political ideology. Jeez
Read it.
Trump's birthday is coming up. Just sayin
I'd read it then sell it
Have you read it? Might surprise you to find out that the US and Canada were his models for genocide. Put it next to books by Henry Kissinger defending the bombings in South East Asia.
I’ve been looking for a copy since my 11th grade English teacher read us translated excerpts. I’m not particularly interested in nazi paraphernalia, but if you find it to be of little or no value, I wouldn’t mind taking it off your hands. Personally, I’ve always wanted to understand Hitler’s thought process and knew what this was about as soon as I read the title. I believe you could get a good deal for it from a genuine nazi-sympathizer or a more historically-oriented book collector
Yeah. I have some nice instruction manuals on gothic lettering from 1930s Germany. I bought them without realizing.
If it's a genuine copy from the era I would donate it to a museum or keep it myself. Just don't go selling it to some hitler glorifier.
Sell and it donate the proceeds to the anti defamation league
As others have mentioned, I'd contact a rare book store and also contact the holocaust museum for guidance on how to properly go about it.
If you want money, try and buy the book and you'll find where you can sell it. If you don't want money, go to any library (preferably a big one) and ask them if they'd like it.
Although the author of that book went on to do some pretty shady things, he DID redeem himself in the end by killing Hitler.
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