The Alternative Hypothesis

La Part de l'autre ("The Part of The Other", also called "The Alternative Hypothesis") is a 2001 alternate history novel by Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt, the plot serving to illustrate the writer's ideas of Moral Philosophy. It consists of a fictionalized biography of Adolf Hitler, sticking to the known facts of Hitler's life, in parallel with the fictional alternative biography the world-famous painter known as "Adolf H." - the person which Hitler could have become. According to Schmitt, "The minute which changed the course of world history" is the moment when a member of the jury of the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts uttered the words "Adolf Hitler: Failed". The historical character, angry and bitter at being rejected by the academy, feeling that he deserved to be accepted and that he must have been the victim of some kind of conspiracy, begins to descend the path that would eventually lead him to be the rabble-rousing leader of the Nazi Party and the dictator of Nazi Germany. Conversely, in the alternative reality where the jury member said "Adolf Hitler: Accepted", the young Hitler is deliriously happy to enter the academy, where he discovers a world of feelings that his less fortunate double would never know - eventually leading to his becoming the highly successful painter Adolf H.