Hitler

October 1, 2011
In the guise of a scholarly screed, former Marine Corps Reserve Stolfi (German Panzers on the Offensive Russian Front, 2003, etc.) makes an incredible--and entirely failed--attempt to rehabilitate the most reviled figure of modern history. The author strongly objects to the universal "denigration" of Adolf Hitler. Across nearly 500 pages, he decries the "antipathy" against his hero, mistaking amoral charisma for integrity. Hitler, writes the author, was a man of towering achievement, a messiah for the German people, an intense, idealistic mastermind. To Stolfi, the young Wagnerian hero of World War I who boasted a firm handshake and direct eye contact was a sensitive Bohemian artist and opera lover. Against all evidence, the author also proclaims him a wonderful painter and superb architect. Hitler pronounced himself the savior of Europe from the threat of Marxism, and the murder of millions of Jews was simply political necessity. Readers should understand that Stolfi's book is not a biography but a preposterous hagiography employing selective fact supported by quotes from a few Nazis and a lot from the Führer's own Mein Kampf. It is also a jealous, sarcastic discourse against the "conventional wisdom" of the "great-biographers" (unlike Stolfi, these include reliable authors such as Toland, Fest, Kershaw, etc.). The book ends before the end of the Third Reich. Ultimately, despite the author's effort to spin the malign corruption--especially offensive while it is still in living memory--there remains nothing beyond the evil and tyranny that his subtitle promises. A repellent text, as deranged as its subject.

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September 15, 2011
What can we call a man who willfully and repeatedly engages in mass murder, torture, and betrayal? A monster? Evil? Such words won't do for examining Hitler, according to U.S. Naval Postgraduate School professor emeritus Stolfi, who, although he pays tribute to the scholarship and research of more comprehensive biographies, asserts that they concentrate attention on Hitler's actions rather than his personal characteristics, accepting his evil as an incomprehensible given. Such bias inevitably leads biographers to ignore some of Hitler's talents and, in Stolfi's view, remarkable accomplishments. This is no neo-Nazi apologia for the horrors of the Third Reich. It is an earnest effort to interpret Hitler's personal evolution and place his actions within his personal and political context. The youth Hitler was an intelligent but rather unfocused dreamer with an artistic temperament. Like millions of other men, his admirable WWI service transformed him and further solidified messianic tendencies. In trying to fathom the real Hitler, Stolfi may be on a fool's errand, but this provocative work is at least worthy of discussion.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)