The problem with this book is that it’s value even as an historical document is limited as the biography even as written by the subject is still entirely fiction when compared to what we know both about the man’s personality and his actions. We inhabit the fantastical world of a dilettante-come-genius, brought low by foreign conspirators and domestic incompetence. He delves into matters of social legislation, religion and whether deer should have wood in their stomaches. He ruled as the paternal monarch: shaping science education and “larger railway stations” according to his expertise. So why read this book? Because it’s an insight into the mind of a man who willingly became a walking stereotype. Oh, and the Germans found a whole lot of British greatcoats stocked up in Belgium. The Tsar of Russia said “I shall stay home this year, for we are going to have war”, a quote that defeats my Google searches. Wilhelm’s got some “evidence” that the Americans were in on it from 1897. Who started the war? Definitely the Entente. The Foreign Office keeps losing critical documents, such as his indisputably insightful reports on England or his corrections to otherwise inflammatory interviews. The problem is always other people made him do it, no matter what anyone else says.
He always knew beforehand when the wrong action was being taken, be it the Kruger Telegram or his descent on Morocco. His powers wax and wan as suits, constitutionally unable to control his Chancellor’s foreign policy on one page, giving him “strict orders to maintain peace” on another. Wilhelm is a terrible liar, flatly denying events that most definitely occurred, such as the infamous “blank cheque” meeting with the Austrians on 5 July 1914. “I gave the dying Emperor his last joy on earth when I had the Second Infantry Brigade march past him, led by me in person.”īut what about the leadup to World War One? Well, yes, there are several semi-connected chapters.Īnd… …they’re worthless from a historical perspective. My man really loves his parades, and he’s pretty sure everyone else does too: Wilhelm is out to counter the narrative that he caused World War One. So, ex-Emperor Wilhelm II published his Memoirs in 1922, appropriately clocking in at a double-ply tissue-paper creaking 306 pages. Millions are dead, the concert of Europe is in tatters and your Crown is back in the gutter.Īnd everyone says: It’s. You’re a blowhard, a blunderer, a sabre-rattler, the unwelcome culmination of centuries of monarchical inbreeding.
0 kommentar(er)
