Edward Crankshaw

Maria Theresa (eBook, ePUB)

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

When Edward Crankshaw's Maria Theresa was published in 1969, it was the first full length study of Maria Theresa to be written in English for sixty years. Called to the throne in 1740, at the age of twenty-three, Maria Theresa was wholly unprepared for the events that were to confront her, and trusting in the honour of her fellow monarchs, the young queen found herself with a virtually nonexistent army at the head of a bankrupt and disaffected empire - an empire shortly to be set upon by half Europe intent on shattering the Habsburg power for ever. Married to an amiable but ineffectual husband whom she adored, surrounded by shortsighted advisers senile to the point of decrepitude, her only weapons were her charm, her unbreakable will, and her almost reckless courage. With these, and by her own immense exertions, she first held her powerful enemies at bay; then, choosing new advisers with astonishing skill, and discovering in herself a fund of commonsense amounting almost to genius, she instituted wide-reaching reforms which were to unify the Empire's bewildering mixture of lands and peoples, and bring it to the threshold of the revolutionary age. With all this she remained a wife and a mother - most touchingly so in her vast correspondence with her many children.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Bloomsbury UK
• Seitenzahl: 380
• Erscheinungstermin: 28. September 2011
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781448204748
• Artikelnr.: 38310549

Autorenporträt

Edward Crankshaw (1909 - 1984) was a British writer, translator and commentator on Soviet affairs.

Born in London, Crankshaw was educated in a non-conformist public school, Bishop's Stortford College in Hertfordshire. He began his career as a journalist at The Times, a position he only held for a few months. In the 1930s he lived in Vienna, Austria, teaching English and learning German (his competent grasp of German led him to become part of the British Intelligence service during World War II). On his return to England he went back to working for The Times and also began to write reviews-mostly musical-for The Spectator, The Bookman, and other periodicals. Crankshaw wrote around 40 books on Austrian and Russian subjects and after the war began his research in much more depth. Crankshaw's book on Nazi terror, Gestapo (1956), was widely read; in 1963 he began to produce more ambitious literary works, often on historical or monumental moments in Russian Political history.

Inhaltsangabe

Part One: A Sea of Troubles 1 The Inheritance 2 Heiress Apparent 3 The
Clouds Gather Around 4 Rape of Silesia 5 The Queen Commands 6 The War of
the Succession Personal Interlude 7 The Queen's Conscience Part Two:
Reflections of the Age 8 Imperial Splendour 9 The Court at Vienna 10
Glimpses of the Other Half 11 Music and the Individual Voice Part Three:
The Reigns of Government 12 Unification and Reform 13 Prince Kaunitz 14 The
Loss of Innocence 15 The Seven Years War Part Four: The Queen Mother 16 The
King of the Romans 17 The Great Change 18 The Betrayal of an Idea 19
Reaction and Enlightenment 20 The Burden of the Years Sources and Select
Bibliography