The Emperor and His Court (William II and the German Empire)

Author: (British) Lowel
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2004-10-01
Features: This book is a work of cultural and social history, aiming to analyze the structure and mentality of the German ruling elite during the reign of Wilhelm II. Wilhelm II, as，was a baffling "remarkable monster." The book begins with a sketch of the mentality and personality of this extraordinary ruler, and concludes by revealing the extent and nature of the emperor's antisemitism. It shows the world how his worldview became as close to that of Adolf Hitler as it was during his painful exile. Wilhelm II, in 1888, at the age of 29, inherited the "heaviest crown in the world." "He was a child, an eternal child." During his 30 years of reign, he remained a childish emperor, erratic, arrogant, and sadistic, considered by the French Minister of Foreign Affairs to be mentally ill and abnormal. "We must also demand our own place in the sun." He dreamed of expanding colonies in the East. In 1900, during the "Boxer Rebellion," he was the leader of the Eight-Nation Alliance's invasion of China and forcibly leased the Jiaozhou Bay from China. "A defeated one." He launched World War I, only to be defeated and then overthrown by a domestic revolution, losing his crown and dying in exile. His life spanned the history of the German Empire from the unification under Bismarck to the self-destruction under Hitler.