Normal Mailer brings back old ghosts

Mailer is such a gifted writer that he would make even washing machine operation instructions interesting. In "Castle in the Forest", Mailer reconstructs Adolf Hitler's childhood from a perspective of a demon whose influence on Hitler.. you'll guess the rest.


Indeed, the book is captivating, despite its length and leeways. But maybe it does not give stunning new insight in its subject. Surprisingly, Veikko Huovinen, a Finnish satirist, used the same idea in his "Veitikka" (1971) where he potrayed Hitler as a devilish prankster.