The book is not allowed to be printed in Germany but that is as far as the copyright goes, any attempts by the State of Bavaria and the Foreign Office to prevent its being published abroad – among others in Israel – have been thwarted. You can also buy it in used book shops, there should be abundant supplies as every couple received a copy on getting married in the Third Reich. But historians are worried that Neo-Nazis will flood the market with cheap editions once the copyright expires, they insist that the only way to deal with the general availability of Hitler’s ideas is to publish a critical edition with annotations, sources and other explanations. Since Hitler himself didn’t bother much with quoting sources or researching them (c’mon, the poor guy was in jail and didn’t have the internet!) the research would be exhaustive and exhausting, lasting an estimated three years. The final product would have to be expensive to cover the costs, not very conducive to making it available to schools or universities.
But Bavaria is not amenable to any scientific arguments. “Mein Kampf� is bad, dangerous and propaganda material and must therefore be kept under lock and key on the poison shelf. Sort of reminds me of the last scene of “Raiders of the Lost Ark� where “specialists� are taking care of the immensely potent relic …
Related topic: Buying Mein Kampf in Germany
