Young Wilhelm: The Kaiser's Early Life, 1859-1888

by John C. G. Röhl

Overview

This rich and compelling volume describes the life of Kaiser Wilhelm II from his birth in 1859 to his accession to the Prusso-German throne in 1888, a story so extraordinary that it will fascinate anyone interested in the psychology and the throng of personalities of the period. Its aim is to set the characters on the stage and let them speak for themselves, which in their letters and diaries the Victorians and Wilhelminians did with quite extraordinary clarity and persuasive power. The central theme is the bitter conflict between the handicapped Prince and his liberal parents, and in particular with his mother, the eldest child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and the utter failure of a daring educational experiment intended to turn the young Prince into a liberal Anglophile.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781107565968
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	03/30/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	998
Product dimensions:	6.85(w) x 9.72(h) x 1.54(d)

About the Author

John C. G. Röhl is Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Sussex. His many previous publications include The Kaiser and his Court (1994) which was awarded the Wolfson History Prize as well as the two other volumes of his biography of Kaiser Wilhelm II – Wilhelm II: The Kaiser's Personal Monarchy, 1888–1900 (Cambridge, 2004), which have won the Einhard Prize for the biography of a major European figure in 2012, and Wilhelm II: Into the Abyss of War and Exile, 1900–1941 (2014).

Table of Contents

Preface to the English edition; Introduction to the German edition; 1. Birth trauma: 'It's alive and it's a prince'; 2. Disorder and early sorrow; 3. Ambivalent motherhood; 4. An English princess at the Prussian court; 5. Blood and history; 6. Education fit for a king; 7. The doctor; 8. Trials and tribulations; 9. Experiment in Kassel; 10. Spring dreams and awakening; 11. Coming of age; 12. The student prince; 13. A question of balance: the inner-ear illness of Kaiser Wilhelm II; 14. Cabal and love; 15. Estrangement; 16. Politics; 17. First steps in foreign affairs: Prince Wilhelm between England and Russia; 18. Eros and Austria; 19. 'W. W. W.': Wilhelm-Wedel-Waldersee; 20. Prince Wilhelm and the Battenberg conspiracy; 21. The crown prince's nightmares; 22. The gradual seizure of power; 23. Waldersee and the world conflagration; 24. The edge of darkness: the crown prince on the eve of catastrophe; 25. The flight of the crown prince in the face of death; 26. Prince Wilhelm and Queen Victoria's Jubilee; 27. Crisis in San Remo; 28. The Stoecker meeting and the break with the Bismarcks; 29. Prince Wilhelm and the war party; 30. Preparing for power; 31. The macabre race for the throne; 32. Impotence and agony; Notes; List of archival sources; List of books cited; Index.

Editorial Reviews

"...historical biography at its best, and simply not to be missed." -Blaine Taylor

From the Publisher

...[T]he first of three projected volumes....deeply researched, unsurpassed in detail, stylishly written....John Rohl is a terrific historian who knows more than anyone else in the world about Wilhelm, and he has written a fascinating book...
— London Review of Books

David Blackbourn