I read something this week that really unsettled me: “we will meet again at Philippi,” was a favorite phrase of Adolf Hitler.
He is said to have paraphrased Julius Caesar, apparently one of his favorite plays, when threatening his opponents. Reportedly, he would also quote the soothsayer’s warning to Caesar, “beware the ides of March,” and an uncovered sketchbook from 1926 reveals set designs for the play.
According to Hitler’s Private Library: The Books That Shaped His Life, a new book by Timothy W Ryback, Hitler owned a German translation of Shakespeare’s Collected Works and was well-versed in the Bard.
I can already imagine Hitler appreciating Shakespeare’s presentation of Shylock:
“Why was it, he wondered, the German Enlightenment produced Nathan the Wise, the story of the rabbi who reconciles Christians, Muslims and Jews, while it had been left to Shakespeare to give the world The Merchant of Venice and Shylock?”
I don’t know why this news unsettles me … but it does. Perhaps I find it eerie that, although my world view is polarized to Hitler’s, we’ve both been influenced by the same books. Does this news surprise you? Or have you long accepted the far-reaching influence of Shakespeare?
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Comments
Concerning Shakespeare’s works being read and enjoyed by Hitler. If you look at the way the Jewish people were treated in England in the medieval period you will find that they were treated very badly and killed, they were also the king’s bankers, and on their death what ever wealth they had gathered during their life time automatically became the kings. Sadly every epoch seems to have its under dogs. People who are treated extremely badly, as if they were sub-human. For instance African slavery ect, ect.Knowledge is used for both good and evil, the chice is the ours.
It is hardly surprising, that being familiar with the works of Shakespeare, that Hitler would have enjoyed such plays as ‘The Merchant of venice’ and ‘Julius Caeser’. However, it is a well known fact that the German leader deliberately misinterpreted the works of Nietsche and Heidigger to suit his own somewhat dubious political ends, and may well have done the same with the immortal bard.
Also, although Shakespeare’s treatment of Shylock may seem anti-semitic, we know that a lot of the time the poet was merely presenting us with contemporary attitudes and prejudices which he did not necessarily share, and the “if you cut us, do we not bleed” speech by Shylock gives strong evidence that he was not a total anti-semite.
‘Julius Caeser’ would have an obvious appeal to Hitler as Rome was a fascist regime which Hitler and many of the leading nazis were very inpressed by and sought to emulate, although, Julius Caeser was murdered by those who wanted Rome to remain a republic.
It is also known that Hitler was not quite so impressed by all of Shakespeare’s characters, and felt a particular revulsion for Hamlet, who he saw as weak, effeminate and completely un-aryan. In fact, Joseph Goebbels propoganda ministry actually produced a re-written version of ‘Hamlet’ with the protaganist being presented as a blonde haired, blue eyed man of action, with all the hesitations and doubt pared away. One wonders what would have been left of the original play with the main point of it being cut out; it must have been quite hilarious from a literary point of view.
Anyway, the point that I am making is that anyone can like and be influenced by Shakespeare or any other author, but do not necessarily percieve his works in the same way as anybody else, all of us having slightly differing views and interpretations of exactly what Shakespeare was trying to say: if this were not the case, so many books of Shakesperian criticism would not have been, and would not still be being produced today.
Thus, even if Hitler was a fan of, and was influenced by Shakespeare, it was not necessarily for the same reasons that you and I find inspiration from some of the greatest dramatic poems ever written.
“However, it is a well known fact that the German leader deliberately misinterpreted the works of Nietsche and Heidigger to suit his own somewhat dubious political ends…”
It is but a commonly held myth. There’s little evidence at all of Hitler even expressing an interest In Nietzsche, much less a great misinterpretation, and Heidegger was a devout National Socialist and supporter of Hitler.
Hitler expressed a great interest in Schopenhauer, and could even quote excerpts of The World as Will and Representation from heart.
It is often expressed that we must learn from history, but what can be apprehended with only trite vitriol and slander?
My grandfather toured germany several times in the 1920s and 1930s with students from london to perform shakespeare. He was employed to designed the costumes and organised things. At one point he was forced to go to hitlers birthday party.