Hitler: The Memoir of the Nazi Insider Who Turned Against the
Führer Of American and German parentage, Ernst Hanfstaengl
graduated from Harvard and ran the family business in New York
for a dozen years before returning to Germany in 1921. By chance
he heard a then little-known Adolf Hitler speaking in a Munich
beer hall and, mesmerized by his extraordinary oratorical power,
was convinced the man would some day come to power. As Hitler's
fanatical theories and ideas hardened, however, he surrounded
himself with rabid extremists such as Goering, Hess, and
Goebbels, and Hanfstaengl became estranged from him. But with
the Nazi's major unexpected political triumph in 1930, Hitler
became a national figure, and he invited Hanfstaengl to be his
foreign press secretary. It is from this unique insider's
position that the author provides a vivid, intimate view of
Hitler-with his neuroses, repressions, and growing megalomania-
over the next several years. In 1937, four years after Hitler
came to power, relations between H