Hitler's Table Talk

316 GOETHE'S HOUSE AND THE BERGHOF
the ideal thing is that they should remain not only in private
hands, but also in the family that has traditionally lived in
them—else they lose their character. Thus these great monuments
of the past, which have retained their character as living
organisms, are also centres of culture. But when the countryhouse
is occupied by a caretaker acting as a guide, a little State
official with a Bavarian or Saxon accent, who ingenuously
recites his unvarying piece of claptrap, things no longer have a
soul—the soul is gone.
Wahnfried, as in Wagner's lifetime, is a lived-in house. It
still has all its brilliance, and continues to give the effect of a
lover. Goethe's house gives the impression of a dead thing.
And how one understands that in the room where he died he
should have asked for light—always more light! Schiller's
house can still move one by the picture it gives of the penury
in which the poet lived.
All these thoughts occurred to me whilst I was reflecting what
might become of my house at Obersalzberg. I can already see
the guide from Berchtesgaden showing visitors over the rooms
of my house: "This is where he had breakfast. . .". I can also
imagine a Saxon giving his avaricious instructions: "Don't
touch the articles, don't wear out the parquet, stay between the
ropes . . .". In short, if one hadn't a family to bequeath one's
house to, the best thing would be to be burnt in it with all its
contents—a magnificent funeral pyre !
I've just been reading a very fine article on Karl May. I
found it delightful. It would be nice if his work were republished.
I owe him my first notions of geography, and the
fact that he opened my eyes on the world. I useid to read him by
candle-light, or by moonlight with the help of a huge magnifying-glass.
The first thing I read ofthat kind was The Last of the
Mohicans. But Fritz Seidl told me at once: "Fenimore Cooper is
nothing; you must read Karl May." The first book of his I read
was The Ride through the Desert. I was carried away by it. And I
went on to devour at once the other books by the same author.
The immediate result was a falling-off in my school reports.
Apart from the Bible, Don Quixote and Robinson Crusoe are the
two most often read books in the world. Cervantes' book is the