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Metternich
Desmond Seward

Metternich

During the nineteenth century, a great Central European statesman, Cleroens von Metternich - whose diplomacy had destroyed Napoleon - tried to build his own form of European unity in order to create lasting peace. From 1815 until 1848, he controlled not only the Habsburg empire but Germany and Italy his skill at preserving the balance of power maintaining Austrian primacy. Having brought Austria through the Napoleonic maelstrom, his brinkmanship at the Congress of Vienna had saved Europe from another continental war for a hundred years, while he created a European Alliance foreshadowing NATO.

Desmond Seward1s exciting biography, based on the latest scholarship and including previously unpublished material, tells with pellucid readability the story of a very great statesman.

Book Details:

  • Author: Desmond Seward
  • Published Year: 1991
  • Rights Sold
    • US: Viking
    • Switzerland: Benziger Verlag
Desmond Seward

Desmond Seward

Desmond Seward was born in Paris and educated at Ampleforth and St Catharine's College, Cambridge. He is the author of many books including The Monks of War: The Military Religious Orders, The Hundred Years War, The Wars of the Roses, Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry V as Warlord, Josephus, Masada and the Fall of Judaea (da Capo, US, April 2009), Wings over the Desert: in action with an RFC pilot in Palestine 1916-18 (Haynes Military, July 2009) and Old Puglia: A Portrait of South Eastern Italy (Haus August 2009). Forthcoming is The Last White Rose: the Spectre at the Tudor Court 1485-1547 (C...
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Book Reviews

  • "It really is an excellent, elegant work in the tradition of Duff Cooper's Talleyrand...It strikes me as, if anything, much more likely to appeal to a British readership."
    Andrew Roberts
  • "Readers interested in the seeds of modern politics will be fascinated by Seward!s pen portrait of the man he calls 'the first European'"
    The Chicago Tribune
  • "Klemens von Metternich has inspired a wealth of interpretive biographies. Few of these characterisations are as refreshing and positive as Sewardfs. Seward portrays Metternich as the consummate statesman of his time ... and argues that much of the chancellor's work anticipated many of the arrangements surrounding the current European community. The book relies heavily on Metternich's personal and state papers and contains superb sections on his rather tragic family life."
    Library Journal
  • "highly readable ... A shadowy figure becomes a person."
    Die Presse, Vienna
  • "The English historian Seward, using fresh sources, has created a completely new portrait ... brilliantly written."
    Peter Vodzek, eks-informationsdienst
  • "...this short, workmanlike book … helps us to see Metternich’s achievement and his personality."
    The Washington Times