Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship [Paperback]

Brigitte Hamann (Author), Thomas Thornton (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 9, 2000

Hitler's Vienna explores the critical, formative years that the young Adolf Hitler spent in Vienna. It is both a cultural and political portrait of the Austrian capital and a biography of Hitler during his years there, from 1906 to 1913. Hitler's was not the modern, artistic "fin-de-si�cle Vienna" we associate with Freud, Mahler, and Wittgenstein. Instead, it was a cauldron of fear and ethnic rivalry and a breeding ground for racist political theories. Brigitte Hamann vividly depicts the undercurrent of disturbing ideologies that flowed beneath the glitter of the Hapsburg capital. Drawing on previously untapped sources that range from personal reminiscences to the records of homeless shelters where the unemployed Hitler spent his nights, Hamann gives us the fullest account ever rendered of this period of Hitler's life and shows us how profoundly his years in Vienna influenced his later career.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Usually, accounts of Hitler start with WWI and his subsequent rise to power in Munich. And usually, histories of Vienna in the early part of this century focus on the Secession, on Freud, on Viktor Adler. But in her carefully argued and smartly written book, Hamann (The Reluctant Empress) creates a portrait that shows the evolution of a far different city, one that for five years, between 1908 and 1913, shaped one young provincial. This is a Vienna of poor laborers who live in men's hostels and are the willing fodder of Social Democrats and Pan-Germans alike. Waves of immigrants (among them Jews fleeing Russian pogroms) and the introduction of equal suffrage in 1906 gave rise to a virulent crop of chauvinistic German politicians and theoreticians who shaped Hitler's worldview, from his racism to his use of "Fuhrer" and "Heil," both adopted from Pan-German activist Georg Schonerer. Unlike many biographers, Hamann finds the roots of Hitler's anti-Semitism here, rather than in run-ins with Jewish professors at the Academy of Visual Arts (there were none), a Jewish grandfather (the evidence, she convincingly argues, is lacking) or a syphilitic Jewish prostitute (Hitler was inordinately afraid of both infection and women). Hamann also traces other crucial aspects of Hitler's development to his time in Vienna: his fascination with the mechanics of theater and the political symbolism of architecture, and his hatred of parliamentarianism. Hamann's deep knowledge of Vienna and her skeptical approach to previous sources results in a double-sided portrait that will help readers understand both the Dual Monarchy and WWI and the Third Reich and WWII. Photos.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Hamann's deep knowledge of Vienna and her skeptical approach to previous sources results in a double-sided portrait that will help readers to understand both the Dual Monarchy and WWI and the Third Reich and WWII."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A virtuoso piece both of research and exposition...Brigitte Hamann is an author of great flair, as well as being thorough, scholarly, and thoughtful."--Robert Evans, Oxford University

"The world needs another Hitler biography like it needs another squirrel, but his one is different and worth the effort.... Hamann paints a fascinating picture of the events and readings that shaped the young Hitler. Much of this information will be unfamiliar to American readers, and translator Thornton has done a masterful job of inserting notes to help those unfamiliar with the details of Austrian history. Highly recommended for any library with serious interest in 20th-century European history."--Library Journal

"A fascinating and impressive book...whether one accepts its underlying thesis, Hitler's Vienna serves as a prologue to the inhuman." --George Steiner, [London] Times Literary Supplement

"A valuable social history of Vienna's netherworld and an attempt at explaining Hitler's anti-Semitism."--Kirkus Reviews

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (November 9, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195140532
• ISBN-13: 978-0195140538
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,737,235 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Valuable Study, December 25, 2001

By 

Kurt Harding "bon vivant" (Boerne TX) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship (Paperback)

I thought I knew a lot about Adolf Hitler's life, even his youth, until I stumbled upon this book. Hitler's Vienna provides a fascinating glimpse into the social, economic, and political milieu in which young Hitler found himself immersed when he came from the provinces to the capital of the crumbling Austro-Hungarian empire in order to pursue his dream of a career in art or architecture.
The book is really less about Hitler himself than about the forces which helped to shape his weltanschauung. Though he reportedly not an anti-Semite as a youth, it was in Vienna that Hitler learned the language of anti-semitism and nationalism.
As I engrossed myself in the book, my thoughts often wandered to comparing the identity politics and quota demands of Austro-Hungarian politicians with the increasing ethnic balkanization here in the United States and wondered whether such a man as Hitler could not one day spring from our political landscape.
One of the chief things I learned is that political and ethnic anti-Semitism was already a very potent force among both the more radical German-nationalist followers of Georg Schoenerer as well as among the more mainstream supporters of the enormously popular mayor of Vienna, Karl Lueger. There was also a large groundswell of anti-Czech sentiment due to a heavy flow of Czechs into Vienna and to the mistreatment by Czechs of Germans in Sudetenland, a situation that Hitler was later to temporarily rectify.
The most surprising fact about Hitler brought to light is that he had many Jewish friends during his Vienna days. And I had to laugh at the part where he was described by a former fellow boarder at the men's hostel as having arrived wearing shoulder-length hair and wearing nothing but a coat because he didn't have a shirt.
Though the book adds much to what we knew of Hitler, it comes no closer than any other of really getting inside his head to explain his true motivations. After all, hundreds of thousands of Europeans hated Jews and lived through the same hardships that young Hitler did, but only Hitler took that extra step and made the end of Jewry his life's work. Nevertheless, this book is a very valuable study and is an easy and fascinating read that comes highly recommended to all those who yearn to know more about the life and times of Adolf Hitler.

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The key to Mein Kampf, March 31, 2003

By 

Bill Stevenson (West Palm Beach, FL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship (Hardcover)

Brigitte Hamann has done a remarkable thing with this book. By examining Vienna during Hitler's formative years, she has unlocked a lot of mystery surrounding the great man himself. While it is true that she uncovered discrepancies in Hitler's description of those years in Mein Kampf, her real contribution is in helping the reader to understand what Hitler was talking about, and why he said the things he said.

Particularly useful is Hamann's analysis of the prominent politicians of the day. She first described these leaders and their political ups and downs. Then, with the testimony of the witnesses who knew Hitler during those years, she deftly draws a picture of the formative influences that helped shape the mature dictator. Hitler was obsessed with politics and he learned what worked and what did not work during those early years in Vienna. Many of his later policies first saw the light of day in the Vienna of his youth. There is a chilling passage about the problem of gypsy pickpockets expected for the 60 Anniversary Parade in honor of Emperor Franz Joseph, in 1908. One solution, seriously presented in Parliament at the time, was to tattoo a number on the forearm of every gypsy.

Hamann also provides an in-depth analysis of the Austro-Hungarian attempt at a multi-ethnic parliamentarism, the chaos and the inefficiency that it brought, and the consequent neglect for the common people. The Pan-German movement, which clearly influenced the young Hitler is clearly explained in considerable detail. At times while reading this book, I had to pause and remind myself that the period under review presaged the rise of Adolf Hitler to power by some 20 years!

Out of the murk emerges Hitler as a young man obsessed by politics, hot tempered, forceful in argument, with poor work habits, odd hours, and a penchant for talk. Hamann's decision to look at the politics that helped him to formulate his world view is brilliant history. This fascinating book is very worthy of your attention.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hitler was more than the product of Vienna., May 4, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship (Hardcover)

This excellent volume, which suffers from a poor translator, demonstrates that the overwhelmingly anti-semitic atmosphere of Vienna when Hitler lived there did not turn him into an anti-semite. It is surprising how little it seemed to influence him at that time; he seems to have successfully resisted becoming an anti-semite. Thus his war experience and the influence of post-WWI Munich must be seen as more decisive. One needs more concentration on the growth of anti-semitism in Germany and in Bavaria in particular during and shortly after the World War. However unfairly Hitler concluded that the Jews were responsible for all Germany's ills, his reaction must have been somewhat less irrational than has previously been thought. His equation of Jews and Bolshevism was widespread in Europe in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution and must not be underestimated in assessing the growth of Fascism and anti-Semitism. Hamann's book makes Hitler both more and less an enigma.