Ben Wilson

Hello, and welcome to How to Take Over the World.

This is Ben Wilson.

Today's episode requires a little bit of explanation, I think.

I'm working on a series about Adolf Hitler.

Perhaps you've heard of him, Austrian fellow.

I'm sorry it's been taking a long time.

I just want to do a lot of research, cover all the angles.

And one of the interesting things about Hitler is that he was so limited in so many ways.

He wasn't necessarily a great strategist.

He was quite lazy.

He was smart, but he wasn't brilliant.

And one biography points out that he was so limited in so many ways and that the one thing that he was truly exceptional at, indisputably, was his ability to speak to a crowd.

He was an unbelievable public speaker.

That's how he came to power.

The biography says that he, quote, literally spoke his way into power.

So, of course, I wanted to see how he learned to do that.

And one source that I saw mentioned multiple times is this guy, Gustav Le Bon, who did pioneering research on the behavior of crowds.

And apparently Hitler studied his work.

So I went through and read Le Bon's work on crowds, and I found it really, really interesting as a manual on how to really engage, persuade and motivate people in a crowd.

For example, like a big speech to an auditorium or at a protest or political rally or anything like that.