On Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice. | Neil Cross On Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice. In 1925 – the very year the High Bouncing Love appeared as the Great Gatsby – another best-selling, era-defining book was published, having been renamed by an editor with an eye for such things. The book was called Mein Kampf. Max Amann, the editor in question, had been Hitler’s company sergeant in World War I. Later, he had the publishing gumption to discern that the author’s working title wasn’t really a goer – Hitler having called his opus Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice. Now, Mein Kampf is a canny title, evoking a certain grandeur; implying the story of terrible odds being overcome, the exertions of a self-created Superman.

By way of contrast, Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice sounds like a book scribbled on toilet paper by the madman who sits next to you on the bus….accurately signalling not only the narrative’s lunatic malignancy but its fervid anti-style — its incessant, mind-boggling, monomaniacal ranting. Mein Kampf is so manifestly a product of its author’s pathology, the experience of reading is weirdly tedious. It’s a difficult book even to hate. To read it, or to try (I never got past more than twenty pages) is simply to come away baffled and depressed; not by the views expressed, which any halfwit could see were demented, but that people appear to have read this stuff in their droves….even before circumstance meant they kind of had to. Mein Kampf sold well enough for Hitler to buy himself a decent Merc while he was still in prison. It made him rich before it helped make him Chancellor in 1933.

The nature of historical causality is a monstrously complex and disputatious subject on which I have many opinions but no expertise — but still, I can’t help but wonder to what degree things might have been different, had Hitler had a less astute and (one presumes) forthright literary editor. Guess Who's on the Backlist BOOKEND / By RICHARD COHEN Guess Who's on the Backlist The received wisdom in the publishing community is that backlist -- books published some time ago but that keep on selling -- is the bread and butter on which a publishing house thrives. Ask Farrar, Straus & Giroux, with Isaac Singer, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and John McPhee, or Penguin, whose backlist regularly contributes more than 60 percent of its North American sales. However, there can be surprises. In 1985, when I took over as trade publishing director of Hutchinson, an English publishing house, I started to research the 98 years of Hutchinson's history and discovered that (excepting best sellers by Kingsley Amis, Anthony Burgess, Ruth Rendell and Frederick Forsyth) Hutchinson had only five books over four years old that still had reasonable sales.

One was a business book, ''Getting to Yes,'' first published in 1981. Three of the others were collections of religious light verse by an American, Helen Steiner Rice. The remaining title was ''Mein Kampf,'' Hitler's apologia, composed in prison in 1924. Its original title was ''A Four-and-a-Half-Year Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice,'' but Hitler's publisher, Max Amann of Franz Eher Verlag, who had been Hitler's company commander during World War I, persuaded him to use the shorter version. By the time of Hitler's death, after which publication of the book was banned, more than eight million copies had been sold in Germany. Hitler had granted his German publishers world rights, and as Eher Verlag regularly used the literary agency of Curtis Brown to handle its sales in Britain, Curtis Brown took over the German Chancellor's book. As the agency says now, ''He was a respectable head of state, democratically elected.'' In America, Eher Verlag decided to handle the rights themselves, and sold the book to Houghton Mifflin.

The small firm of Hurst & Blackett, later to be subsumed into Hutchinson, bought the British rights, paying just �350. In October 1933, the book was published in an abridged version in both the United States and Britain, with a translation heavily censored by the German Embassy in London. The German version had 781 pages, the English-language edition 297. Even so, the book's main message was clear. The reviewer in The New York Times noted, ''It is with sadness, tinged with fear for the world's future, that we read Hitler's hymn of hate.'' In January 1939 Hutchinson published a translation of the full text. Three years later the Americans commissioned their own version, from the highly respected translator Ralph Manheim. None of this was sanctioned by Berlin. The American and British editions went ahead throughout the 1930's without any contract with the author -- almost as if war had already been declared. After the war there was a lull. The book was seen as largely unreadable, and there was little interest in it even as a historical document.

Then, toward the end of the 1950's, another literary effort by Hitler, written in the late 20's, was discovered and published as ''Hitler's Secret Book.'' It created considerable controversy, and what Hitler had written before coming to power suddenly became a subject of interest. By this time Hutchinson was run by the eccentric Robert Lusty, who set about resurrecting ''Mein Kampf'' from the backlist. The whole project took time, with various plans for either a new abridged version or a heavily annotated complete text. By the mid-60's questions about the book were being raised in the House of Commons, and sections of the British Jewish community were claiming that ''Mein Kampf'' would be a focus for anti-Semitism. Donald Cameron Watt, the political historian who had been commissioned by Lusty to write a new introduction, wrote an article in The Spectator accusing Hutchinson of loss of nerve. Eventually the complete text was republished, in 1969, and it has been in print in Britain ever since. Each new edition has prompted a letter of complaint from the German Government.

The questions we faced at Hutchinson were, what were a publisher's responsibilities when confronted with such a book, and should we do anything to try to increase sales? Our sales manager acknowledged it was not like selling any other work on the list but asked if we could use a slightly more attractive cover than the solemn two-color jacket the book then had, and it was arranged that at the same time we should update the blurb. The editor responsible checked the revised material with the company's new managing director, who complained that it had to be changed. The wording contained the phrase ''this evil book.'' That wouldn't do. ''We can't say a book is evil if we ourselves are publishing it,'' the managing director argued. The editor demurred, not least because the reprint was overdue and changes had to be kept to a minimum. By the time the final version was published, the phrase had been changed anagrammatically to ''this vile book'' -- a triumph of publishing economics. ''Mein Kampf'' still sells its regular 3,000 copies a year in Britain. All royalties are channeled through the Curtis Brown agency, which does not take a commission but passes the money on to a suitable charity.

When the agency first tried to find a recipient for the money, the West German Government refused it, and so did all Jewish charities based in Germany, regarding the royalties as tainted. Who now receives the money? Curtis Brown declines to say. As the agency explains, ''If the name of the charity who receives the money were made public, they'd immediately have to announce they could no longer take it.'' In America, the book has been continuously in print with Houghton Mifflin since its original publication. Until the United States entered the war, royalties were sent directly to Eher Verlag; then, under the Trading With the Enemy Act, they were paid to the State Department. In 1979 Houghton Mifflin was allowed to stop paying any royalties. By then the United States Government had received over $90,000. In January Houghton Mifflin will publish a new edition -- the Manheim translation, but with a fresh introduction by the historian John Lukacs.

Houghton Mifflin's present publisher is Wendy Strothman, who says: ''It's difficult to imagine being in the position of the editors who originally decided to release a book that they profoundly disagreed with. But I admire their prescience. At that time, without the diversity of media we possess today, the book served a function that could be carried in part by other means of communication now. I'd also argue that nowadays it is one of the most powerful rebuttals we can deliver to Holocaust revisionists.'' Houghton Mifflin is not publishing the book purely for academic study, but for the general reader. Shouldn't the book be published in a special way -- with the literary equivalent of a public health warning? Here Strothman is adamant: ''I defer to our own First Amendment. Ideas are sometimes messy, but it's far more dangerous to suppress them in fear of their falling into the wrong hands than to reveal them for what they are.'' Meanwhile, the publishing world itself is changing. In Britain, Hutchinson has long since been purchased by Random House. But dog eats dog, not always aware of what has gone to make up its meal.

Random House is in the process of being purchased by the vast German conglomerate of Bertelsmann. Thus Hitler's racist tract, unavailable in German bookstores, will shortly be published throughout Britain and the Commonwealth by a German company. THE head of Bertelsmann's North American trade book operations, Peter Olson, was surprised to learn that Bertelsmann was now the publisher of ''Mein Kampf.'' ''It certainly wasn't the motivation for buying the company,'' he said with a laugh. ''I don't imagine anyone's going to be delighted to hear about it,'' he added. ''I admit I have to suppress a twinge of uncomfortableness, but there's not going to be a call by me, or any of my German colleagues, telling Hutchinson they shouldn't publish it. There's not going to be any central interference on a book because of political concerns. If Hutchinson decides they don't want to publish it, that's O.K. by me. If the opposite, that's O.K. too.

It's an interesting question whether Bertelsmann would choose to publish 'Mein Kampf.' Probably not.'' While Bertelsmann remains secure in its policy of editorial noninterference, the fate of ''Mein Kampf'' is far from an academic matter in the world at large. Earlier this year, the book was banned in Portugal, the publishing house Hugin Editora having reached an agreement with the German Embassy for all copies of ''Mein Kampf'' to be recalled and pulped. The Federal State of Bavaria, which controls all rights to the book except the English-language editions, has also caused it to be banned in Sweden, Norway, Latvia, Switzerland and Hungary. In Israel there had never been an edition available until 1995, when Academon, an imprint of the Hebrew University, issued a limited edition. The publisher was sharply criticized, and the book is now out of print. For the time being, in Britain at least, Bertelsmann remains Hitler's publisher. Which leads to a further irony. Last year Random House purchased from Reed Elsevier the Heinemann general list.

Among the backlist authors is Winston Churchill; so Churchill and Hitler may shortly nestle next to each other on Bertelsmann's backlist -- as they do on Houghton Mifflin's. ''Mein Kampf'' is now published by Hutchinson's sister imprint, Pimlico. There is a new blurb on the back cover -- with ''this evil book'' reinstated. Richard Cohen is the managing director of Richard Cohen Books. Adolf Hitler: Mein Kampf Adolf Hitler Nazism > Adolf Hitler > Mein Kampf Adolf Hitler: Mein Kampf Mein Kampf (German "My Struggle") is a book written by Adolf Hitler, exposing Hitler's political ideology, National Socialism. Contents: 4 Sequel The writing of Mein Kampf The first volume, titled Eine Abrechnung ("A reckoning") was published on July 18, 1925; the second volume Die nationalsozialistische Bewegung ("The national-socialistic movement") was published in 1926.

The original title Hitler chose was “Four and a Half Years of Struggle against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice.” His Nazi publisher, Max Amann, decided this title was too complicated and had it shortened to Mein Kampf (simply "My Struggle", or "My Battle"). Hitler dictated the book during his imprisonment in Landsberg to Emil Maurice, then after July 1924 to Rudolf Heß, who later, along with several others, edited it. The book has been said to be convoluted, repetitious and hard to read, but even cursory browsing clearly outlines major ideas that culminated in the horrors of WWII. Particularly prominent is Hitler's violent anti-Semitism. For example, he claims that the international language Esperanto was part of a Jewish plot, and makes arguments towards the old German nationalist idea of Drang nach Osten: the necessity to gain Lebensraum ("living space") eastwards, especially in Russia. Much of the material was distorted or fabricated by the author. Hitler used the main thesis of "The Jewish peril", which speaks of an alleged Jewish conspiracy to gain world leadership.

Overall, however, it does explain many details of Hitler's childhood and the process in which he became increasingly anti-Semitic and militaristic, especially during his years in Vienna. In one early chapter, he wrote about how he noticed Jews in the city streets for the first time and then asked himself 'Was that a German?' In terms of political theories, Hitler announced his hatred in Mein Kampf toward what he believed to be the twin evils of the world: Communism and Judaism, and he stated that his aim was to eradicate both from the face of the earth. He also announced that Germany needed to obtain new soil called lebensraum which would properly nurture the "historic destiny" of the German people; this goal explains why Hitler invaded Europe, both East and West, before he launched his attack against Russia. Hitler presented himself as the "Übermensch", frequently rendered as the crude "Superman" (overman is the more appropriate term in its original context), that the basically a-political Friedrich Nietzsche had referred to in his writings, especially in his book, 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra'.

It is doubtful that Hitler read any Nietzsche beyond a superficial level, as Nietzsche did not refer to his overman in the way in which Hitler would refer to him. For Nietzsche it was a man who could overcome himself (hence overman and not superman) by controlling his impulses and would be able to channel this energy into something creative. The nationalism and anti-semitism that was indeed growing in Nietzsche's time was something which Nietzsche despised and wrote about continuously: there is probably no other writer from Germany that insulted the Germans more than Nietzsche. Since Hitler blamed the current parliamentary government for much of the ills against which he raged, he announced that he wanted to completely destroy that type of government. It is in Mein Kampf that the true nature of Hitler's character can be discovered. He divided humans up based on physical attributes. Hitler stated that German "Aryans" with blond hair and blue eyes were at the top of the hierarchy (Hitler himself had brown hair and blue eyes), and assigned the bottom of the order to Jews, Poles, Russians, Czechs and Gypsies. Hitler went on to say that dominated peoples benefit by learning from the superior Aryans.

Hitler further claimed that the Jews are conspiring to keep this master race from rightfully ruling the world, by diluting its racial and cultural purity and by convincing the Aryan to believe in equality rather than superiority and inferiority. He described the struggle for world domination as an ongoing racial, cultural, and political battle between Aryans and Jews. The supposed struggle for world domination between Aryans and Jews was accepted by the population when Hitler eventually came to power. Popularity prior to the Second World War Before Hitler's rise to power, the book sold very slowly. Although the NSDAP (the National Socialist German Workers' Party) claimed that it was already a huge seller, documents revealed following World War II proved this to be false. Some historians have speculated that a wider reading might have alerted the world to the dangers Hitler would pose to peace in Europe and to the Holocaust that he would pursue. An abridged English translation was produced before World War II. However, the publisher removed some of the more anti-semitic and militaristic statements.

The publication of this version caused Alan Cranston, who was an American reporter for UPI in Germany and later senator from California, to publish his own abridged and annotated translation, which he believed to more truly reflect the contents of the book. In 1939 he was sued by Hitler for copyright infringement and a Connecticut judge ruled in Hitler's favor; the publication of Cranston's version had to be stopped after about 500,000 copies had been sold. After Hitler's rise to power, the book gained enormous popularity and virtually became the Bible of every Nazi. Every couple intending to get married was required to own a copy. Sales of Mein Kampf earned Hitler millions; however, many of those who purchased it never read it from first page to last page, and many bought it simply to show their allegiance to Hitler, gain position in the NSDAP and avoid the attentions of the Gestapo. By the end of the war, about 10 million copies of the book had been distributed in Germany. Current availability Today, the copyright of all editions of Mein Kampf except the English and the Dutch (Dutch government seized that in the same way) is owned by the state of Bavaria.

The copyright will end on December 31, 2015. Historian Werner Maser, in an interview with Bild am Sonntag has stated that Peter Raubal, son of Hitler's nephew Leo Raubal, would have a strong legal case for winning the copyright from Bavaria if he pursued it. Raubal, an Austrian engineer, has stated he wants no part of the rights to the book, which could be worth millions of Euros. The government of Bavaria, in agreement with the Federal Government of Germany, does not allow any copying or printing of the book in Germany, and opposes it also in other countries but with less success. Owning and buying the book is legal. Trading in old copies is legal as well, unless it is done in such a fashion as to promote hatred or war, which is generally illegal. Most German libraries carry heavily commented and excerpted versions of Mein Kampf. In the Netherlands selling the book, even in the case of an old copy, is illegal as promoting hatred, but possession and lending is not. In 1997 the government explained to the parliament that selling a scientifically annotated version might escape prosecution.

In 1999, the Simon Wiesenthal Center documented that major internet booksellers like amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com sell Mein Kampf to Germany. After a public outcry, both companies agreed to stop those sales. Mein Kampf was an influential text among the Arab Ba’ath Party activists. An Arabic edition of Mein Kampf has been published by Bisan publishers in Lebanon. It ranks on the best-seller list among Palestinian Arabs. Public-domain copies of Mein Kampf are available at various Internet sites with links to banned books; also, several web sites provide copies of the book. However, some of those copies are edited in a dubious way, for example to replace the many references to Christianity in the book with neo-Pagan ones. Sequel After the party's poor showing in the 1928 elections, Hitler believed the reasons for loss was that public didn't fully understand his ideas. He retired to Munich to dictate a sequel to Mein Kampf which focused on foreign policy. The book was never published, due either to his first book's poor sales or that it revealed too much of his plans. The book was locked in his publisher's safe and was not discovered until 1958.

The first authoritative English edition was not published until 2003 (Hitler's Second Book: The Unpublished Sequel to Mein Kampf). 20 classic books that almost had completely different titles | Metro News 20 classic books that almost had completely different titles Ellen Scott for Metro.co.uk Saturday 18 Jun 2016 4:13 pm All your favourite books were thiiis close to being named something entirely different. (Picture: Getty) Sure, we know you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. But we so do. And the title is a pretty big part of that. Because let’s be real. Would we have picked up the joy that is Interpreter of Maladies if it had been called LOVE AND STUFF? Probably not. So thank the publishers and editors of the world for giving classic books their final titles. They did what was needed to convince us to pick up a book and give it a chance. Thank them for saving us from the original names of these classic books. 1. The Great Gatsby (Picture: metro.co.uk) Originally called: Trimalchio in West Egg.

Fitzgerald eventually realised that a reference to a character in Petronius’ Satyricon was a bit too obscure. 2. War and Peace Originally called: All’s Well That Ends Well Really? 3. The Very Hungry Caterpillar Originally called: A Week With Willie Worm Not quite as appealing. After significant revisions, Austen’s working titled was changed to more closely represent the storyline. 5. Mein Kampf Originally called: Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice Best to keep it simple, right? 6. Dracula Originally called: The Dead Un-Dead The good news is that we can now use this title for our zombie-themed screenplay. Hooray! 7. The Secret Garden The Secret Garden sounds quite a bit more enticing. 8. Atlas Shrugged Originally called: The Strike Ayn Rand decided that The Strike gave away a key point of the novel. Her husband suggested Atlas Shrugged 9. Brideshead Revisited Originally called: A House of the Faith Waugh wanted to rein in the heavy spiritual focus. 10. Lolita Originally called: The Kingdom by the Sea 11.

Catch-22 Heller debated Catch-11, Catch-14, Catch-17, and Catch-18 before finally landing on Catch-22. 12. To Kill a Mockingbird Originally called: Atticus The final title feels more meaningful, no? 13. Lord of the Flies Click to reveal (Picture: metro.co.uk) Originally called: Strangers from Within One of the publishers thought that Strangers from Within was ‘too explicit’. An editor pitched Lord of the Flies – a translation of the Hebrew for Beelzebub. Dark. 14. Gone With the Wind Originally called: Tomorrow is Another Day The initial title still appears as the last line of the book. 15. The Good Soldier Originally called: The Saddest Story As the novel was set to be published just after the outbreak of World War One, the publishers asked Ford to change the title. He suggested The Good Soldier as a joke, but it stuck. 16.

1984 The History Place - Rise of Hitler: Hitler's Book "Mein Kampf" Hitler's Book "Mein Kampf" Although it is thought of as having been 'written' by Hitler, Mein Kampf is not a book in the usual sense. Hitler never actually sat down and pecked at a typewriter or wrote longhand, but instead dictated it to Rudolf Hess while pacing around his prison cell in 1923-24 and later at an inn at Berchtesgaden. Reading Mein Kampf is like listening to Hitler speak at length about his youth, early days in the Nazi Party, future plans for Germany, and ideas on politics and race. The original title Hitler chose was "Four and a Half Years of Struggle against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice." His Nazi publisher knew better and shortened it to "Mein Kampf," simply My Struggle, or My Battle. In his book, Hitler divides humans into categories based on physical appearance, establishing higher and lower orders, or types of humans. At the top, according to Hitler, is the Germanic man with his fair skin, blond hair and blue eyes.

Hitler refers to this type of person as an Aryan. He asserts that the Aryan is the supreme form of human, or master race. And so it follows in Hitler's thinking, if there is a supreme form of human, then there must be others less than supreme, the Untermenschen, or racially inferior. Hitler assigns this position to Jews and the Slavic peoples, notably the Czechs, Poles, and Russians. In Mein Kampf, Hitler states: "...it [Nazi philosophy] by no means believes in an equality of races, but along with their difference it recognizes their higher or lesser value and feels itself obligated to promote the victory of the better and stronger, and demand the subordination of the inferior and weaker in accordance with the eternal will that dominates this universe." Hitler then states the Aryan is also culturally superior. "All the human culture, all the results of art, science, and technology that we see before us today, are almost exclusively the creative product of the Aryan..." "Hence it is no accident that the first cultures arose in places where the Aryan, in his encounters with lower peoples, subjugated them and bent them to his will.

They then became the first technical instrument in the service of a developing culture." Hitler goes on to say that subjugated peoples actually benefit by being conquered because they come in contact with and learn from the superior Aryans. However, he adds they benefit only as long as the Aryan remains the absolute master and doesn't mingle or inter-marry with inferior conquered peoples. But it is the Jews, Hitler says, who are engaged in a conspiracy to keep this master race from assuming its rightful position as rulers of the world, by tainting its racial and cultural purity and even inventing forms of government in which the Aryan comes to believe in equality and fails to recognize his racial superiority. "The mightiest counterpart to the Aryan is represented by the Jew." Hitler describes the struggle for world domination as an ongoing racial, cultural, and political battle between Aryans and Jews. He outlines his thoughts in detail, accusing the Jews of conducting an international conspiracy to control world finances, controlling the press, inventing liberal democracy as well as Marxism, promoting prostitution and vice, and using culture to spread disharmony.

Throughout Mein Kampf, Hitler refers to Jews as parasites, liars, dirty, crafty, sly, wily, clever, without any true culture, a sponger, a middleman, a maggot, eternal blood suckers, repulsive, unscrupulous, monsters, foreign, menace, bloodthirsty, avaricious, the destroyer of Aryan humanity, and the mortal enemy of Aryan humanity... "...for the higher he climbs, the more alluring his old goal that was once promised him rises from the veil of the past, and with feverish avidity his keenest minds see the dream of world domination tangibly approaching." This conspiracy idea and the notion of 'competition' for world domination between Jews and Aryans would become widespread beliefs in Nazi Germany and would even be taught to school children. This, combined with Hitler's racial attitude toward the Jews, would be shared to varying degrees by millions of Germans and people from occupied countries, so that they either remained silent or actively participated in the Nazi effort to exterminate the entire Jewish population of Europe. Mein Kampf also provides an explanation for the military conquests later attempted by Hitler and the Germans.

Hitler states that since the Aryans are the master race, they are entitled simply by that fact to acquire more land for themselves. This Lebensraum, or living space, will be acquired by force, Hitler says, and includes the lands to the east of Germany, namely Russia. That land would be used to cultivate food and to provide room for the expanding Aryan population at the expense of the Slavic peoples, who were to be removed, eliminated, or enslaved. But in order to achieve this, Hitler states, Germany must first defeat its old enemy France, to avenge the German defeat of World War I and to secure the western border. Hitler bitterly recalls the end of the First World War, saying the German Army was denied its chance for victory on the battlefield by political treachery at home. In the second volume of Mein Kampf he attaches most of the blame to Jewish conspirators in a highly menacing and ever more threatening tone. When Mein Kampf was first released in 1925 it sold poorly. People had been hoping for a juicy autobiography or a behind-the-scenes story of the Beer Hall Putsch. What they got were hundreds of pages of long, hard to follow sentences and wandering paragraphs composed by a self-educated man.

However, after Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, millions of copies were sold. It was considered proper to own a copy and to give one to newlyweds, high school graduates, or to celebrate any similar occasion. But few Germans ever read it cover to cover. Although it made him rich, Hitler would later express regret that he produced Mein Kampf, considering the extent of its revelations. Those revelations concerning the nature of his character and his blueprint for Germany's future served as a warning to the world. A warning that was mostly ignored. Copyright © 1996 The History Place All Rights Reserved Books | By Emily Temple | November 11, 2011 It’s a well-known fact that authors, for all their brilliance, can be less than visionary when it comes to coming up with titles. We understand — so much goes into the perfect title, both from an artistic and a commercial point of view, and when you’re so close to the work at hand, we can imagine how it could be a little challenging to see the issue from all angles. But even if a writer is particularly talented at title-penning, the names of books can go through as many permutations as the text itself before they see the light of day.

Plus, for good or ill, writers have husbands, wives, publishers and others to weigh in, causing even more changes. Lovers of book trivia, read on: after the jump you’ll find our list of what some classic works were almost called. Check it out and let us know whether you think the changes were for the better or the worse in the comments. When Jane Austen’s father submitted an early version of her second novel, First Impressions, to a publisher on her behalf, it was rejected. As Pride and Prejudice, it did much better. [ via ] Don DeLillo wanted to name his 1985 breakout novel Panasonic, but the corporation’s lawyers protested, and he settled for White Noise. [ via ] Once Max Brod got his hands on it, Kafka’s The Man Who Disappeared was retitled as Amerika. [ via ] Philip Roth’s most famous novel went through incarnations as The Jewboy, Wacking Off, and A Jewish Patient Begins his Analysis before it became Portnoy’s Complaint.

[ via ] Bafflingly, All’s Well that Ends Well was the original title for Tolstoy’s epic War and Peace — in fact, it was first released under that title until its publishers came to their senses. [ via ] Toni Morrison wanted to name her first post-Nobel prize novel War, but instead wound up calling it the wildly dissimilar Paradise. [ via ] They Don’t Build Statues to Businessmen was the original title of Jaqueline Susann’s Valley of the Dolls. [ via ] Rick Moody, who has described himself as a ‘bad titler,’ eventually changed the title of his novel F.F. to The Ice Storm. Apparently, “F.F.” would have been meant as “short for ‘Fantastic Four’ or a variant of the notation for ‘fortissimo.'” [ via ] Trimalchio in West Egg; Among Ash-Heaps and Millionaires; On the Road to West Egg; Under the Red, White, and Blue; Gold-Hatted Gatsby; and The High-Bouncing Lover were all titles considered for F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.

[ via ] Adolf Hitler originally wanted to title his book Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice, but ultimately changed it to the much more succinct Mein Kampf. [ via ] Ford Maddox Ford wanted to call his novel The Saddest Story — he only suggested calling it The Good Soldier as a joke, but his publisher wasn’t laughing, and took him up on it. [ via ] The Last Man in Europe wasn’t commercial enough for George Orwell’s publisher, who suggested they go with 1984. [ via ] When William Golding’s first novel was discovered in Faber and Faber’s slush pile, it was called Strangers from Within. With a little editorial guidance, every American schoolchild now reads it as Lord of the Flies. [ via ] In the end, Ayn Rand thought her first title, The Strike, gave too much plot away, and renamed her novel Atlas Shrugged, at the suggestion of her husband. [ via ] Tomorrow Is Another Day was the working title of Gone With the Wind, and that’s not the only change we’re grateful for: up until the very last second, Scarlett was named ‘Pansy.’ Bullet dodged.

[ via ] Bram Stoker considered many titles, one of them being The Dead Un-Dead, before landing on the much less B-filmish Dracula. [ via ] When Carson McCullers was twenty-one, she submitted six chapters of her first novel, The Mute, to Houghton-Mifflin. They offered her an advance, renamed the book The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, and launched her career. [ via ] Fiesta, the original title of Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, is still used on many foreign editions. [ via ] Evelyn Waugh’s The House of the Faith was changed to the much more distinctive title Brideshead Revisited. [ via ] Joseph Heller originally imagined his novel as a Catch-11, but doubled the number to Catch-22 so as not to compete with the recently released Ocean’s Eleven. [ via ] Alex Haley’s influential 1976 novel was changed from Before This Anger to the much more diplomatic Roots: The Saga of an American Family. [ via ] When Harper Lee decided her magnum opus was about more than one character, Atticus became To Kill a Mockingbird.

[ via ] Vladimir Nabokov originally planned on calling his most famous work The Kingdom by the Sea before it became the Lolita we know and love today. Waste not, want not — Nabokov used a very similar phrase (A Kingdom by the Sea) in his 1974 pseudo-autobiographical novel Look at the Harlequins! as the title of a Lolita-like book written by the narrator. [ via ] Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward’s book about the Watergate scandal was originally called At this Point in Time, before it was changed to the more dramatic All the President’s Men. [ via ] Stephen Crane’s original manuscript was entitled Private Fleming, His Various Battles, but in an attempt to keep it from sounding like what he considered to be a more traditional Civil War narrative, he renamed it The Red Badge of Courage. [ via ] Mein Kampf : Adolf Hitler : 9781512221602 Try AbeBooks Description Mein Kampf This edition is the only German government funded and recognized version of Adolf Hitler's popular Mein Kampf (popularly known as My Struggle in English).

James Murphy was invited by the NAZI Propaganda Ministry to translate the book in English so that the NAZI propaganda and vision can be disseminated in the English speaking countries too. This edition has both the volumes and is the James Murphy's original translation that you are viewing right now! Mein Kampf was originally published in two volumes. Adolf Hitler started dictating Mein Kampf to Rudolf Hess when he was imprisoned in Festungshaft against the Beer Hall Putsch, a failed attempt of coup. One of the earliest translation was by James Murphy that received official recognition by the Third Reich. Actually James Murphy's translation was officially funded by the NAZI party ruling in Germany in a time/era which they called The Third Reich. However later when James Murphy isolated himself from NAZI ideology and chanted negative remarks and comments that were against the NAZI party and rule he was told by the NAZI Propaganda ministry to leave German soil immediately. He sent his wife later to Germany so that his original notes can be retaken. He completed his translation with the help of these notes.

Initially Hitler was naming his book "Viereinhalb Jahre (des Kampfes) gegen Luge, Dummheit und Feigheit" or in English "Four and a Half Years (of Struggle) Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice." However he accepted the suggestion of Mein Kampf by Max Amann who was the publisher of Hitler's book(s). He was so passionate about his thoughts and ideas that he predicted that book will be an instant bestseller and will do for all the expenses of NAZI party in the future. The book was not an instant success as per the records of sales until the year 1931 up to 1933 when Hitler won Chancellorship in Germany. A surge in the sales could be seen thereafter when Hitler already had started distancing himself from his first literary creation, his autobiography, Mein Kampf.

He was so submerged and preoccupied with his new status that he started to call it a mistake to write such book that he called "fantasy behind the bars." The tax accrued for Mein Kampf was about 405,500 Reichsmark (About $1.5 Million in 2015) at the time he took up Chancellorship of Germany when his tax debts were written off. By the time he had completed his first year as the chancellor of the Germany Mein Kampf had became an essential component of German social life. People are using the then Legendary book "Mein Kampf" for gifts, homage, education and for whatever, whenever possible. And by the time the WORLD WAR II ended the sales of Mein Kampf in Germany alone was toughing 10 Million mark. The book was running in top selling list for over a decade competing neck to neck and sometimes lagging behind the Bible. Writing a book to disseminate his ideas concerning Nazism or Fascism had been important for Adolf Hitler until he finally reached his goal of Chancellorship. However, when the first book of two volumes, could not help him much in gaining ground in German politics he wrote his next book that was never published.

Later in his last years, when the war was about to end, Adolf Hitler ordered his comrades to put the original manuscript in a locker under a shelter for Air Strikes. This book was an extension of NAZI viewpoints, ideas and propaganda. Hitler used his energy to further improve the NAZI ideology and engineer new components and enhance the former ones." show more Product details 148.6 x 214.1 x 18.5mm | 621.42g Publication date 9781512221602

Question: What book was to have been called, in translation, "Four and a Half Years (of Struggle) Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice"?
Answer: Mein Kampf