I want to tell you about the worst book I ever read. Actually, I haven’t read it. I’ve read excerpts from it. Because I’ve heard that reading this book could get you unwelcome attention from the security services. In fact I’ve been told that in public libraries this book is flagged. So, if you take it out, your name goes on the Government’s shit list, (of course they don’t call it a “shit list.” They use a more polite title). I can’t understand why anyone would want to take this book out because not only is it a terrible book it’s virtually impossible to read. Which is exactly the opposite effect most authors are striving for.
So what is this book? It’s Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.” Most people, apart from neo-Nazis of course, will agree that this book of the Fuhrer’s is morally repugnant. So instead, I want to concentrate on the structure of the book and the fact that there’s just too much padding in it! In fact, there’s enough padding in this book to insulate every house on earth. If Hitler had confined his literary aspirations to producing a simple pamphlet that read: “I, ADOLF HITLER, WANT TO CONQUER THE WORLD AND KILL ALL THE JEWS!” that would have had some literary merit. No padding there. Straight and to the point. But no, instead he forced his lackey Rudolph Hess to type out a whole book filled with padding. This shows just how cruel he was. And that was probably the real reason Hess flew to Scotland. He was scared Hitler might decide he had another book in him.
Hitler’s problem was his material was thin. It consisted of a desire for world domination and genocide. Not enough there for a book. In fact, not even enough to fill a sheet of A4 paper. What was needed was padding! Lots of it. And, as we all know, padding is the refuge of the third-rate writer. Of course, once the war was over German intellectuals either claimed they’d never read the book or that they tried to but it was so bloody turgid that they failed to get the message. That Hitler, on the advice of Goebbles, had put the message right at the end knowing that no one had a stomach strong enough to read that far. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised of some German intellectual didn’t use that excuse. It’s amazing what you can come up when the threat of the noose hangs over your head. In the same way that the citizens of this highly developed country failed to notice that six million people were being murdered.
Although it was probably the worst written book in history Hitler made a sizable fortune out of it. This, of course, casts doubt on my previous assertion that my former countrymen weren’t stupid. On the other hand, perhaps people bought it for reasons other than reading. To prove to the Gestapo that you were a loyal German. Of course the Gestapo couldn’t ask you questions about the book to find out if you’d read it because they’d also have found it impossible to read. Perhaps they used it as a torture. If so I imagine it had to be used sparingly. They would have forced prisoners to read no more than five pages. Any more than that would have driven the prisoners mad. Let’s hope aspiring writers on here don’t end up having their manuscripts assessed by a neo-Nazi who happens to be working for the publisher. Those people couldn’t tell a good book even if it was shoved sideways up their fundamental orifices without the aid of a lubricant. Unless, of course, the aspiring writer in question has a penchant for padding. Like me, for example.
PS: Another book with too much padding is the telephone directory. It has our number in it, yet they’ve seen fit to pad it out with all those others. However, the difference between Mein Kampf and the telephone directory is that the latter is intellectually superior.
So what is this book? It’s Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf.” Most people, apart from neo-Nazis of course, will agree that this book of the Fuhrer’s is morally repugnant. So instead, I want to concentrate on the structure of the book and the fact that there’s just too much padding in it! In fact, there’s enough padding in this book to insulate every house on earth. If Hitler had confined his literary aspirations to producing a simple pamphlet that read: “I, ADOLF HITLER, WANT TO CONQUER THE WORLD AND KILL ALL THE JEWS!” that would have had some literary merit. No padding there. Straight and to the point. But no, instead he forced his lackey Rudolph Hess to type out a whole book filled with padding. This shows just how cruel he was. And that was probably the real reason Hess flew to Scotland. He was scared Hitler might decide he had another book in him.
Hitler’s problem was his material was thin. It consisted of a desire for world domination and genocide. Not enough there for a book. In fact, not even enough to fill a sheet of A4 paper. What was needed was padding! Lots of it. And, as we all know, padding is the refuge of the third-rate writer. Of course, once the war was over German intellectuals either claimed they’d never read the book or that they tried to but it was so bloody turgid that they failed to get the message. That Hitler, on the advice of Goebbles, had put the message right at the end knowing that no one had a stomach strong enough to read that far. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised of some German intellectual didn’t use that excuse. It’s amazing what you can come up when the threat of the noose hangs over your head. In the same way that the citizens of this highly developed country failed to notice that six million people were being murdered.
Although it was probably the worst written book in history Hitler made a sizable fortune out of it. This, of course, casts doubt on my previous assertion that my former countrymen weren’t stupid. On the other hand, perhaps people bought it for reasons other than reading. To prove to the Gestapo that you were a loyal German. Of course the Gestapo couldn’t ask you questions about the book to find out if you’d read it because they’d also have found it impossible to read. Perhaps they used it as a torture. If so I imagine it had to be used sparingly. They would have forced prisoners to read no more than five pages. Any more than that would have driven the prisoners mad. Let’s hope aspiring writers on here don’t end up having their manuscripts assessed by a neo-Nazi who happens to be working for the publisher. Those people couldn’t tell a good book even if it was shoved sideways up their fundamental orifices without the aid of a lubricant. Unless, of course, the aspiring writer in question has a penchant for padding. Like me, for example.
PS: Another book with too much padding is the telephone directory. It has our number in it, yet they’ve seen fit to pad it out with all those others. However, the difference between Mein Kampf and the telephone directory is that the latter is intellectually superior.
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