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.
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Part One: A Sea of Troubles1 The Inheritance2 Heiress Apparent3 The Clouds Gather Around4 Rape of Silesia5 The Queen Commands6 The War of the SuccessionPersonal Interlude7 The Queen's ConsciencePart Two: Reflections of the Age8 Imperial Splendour9 The Court at Vienna10 Glimpses of the Other Half11 Music and the Individual VoicePart Three: The Reigns of Government12 Unification and Reform13 Prince Kaunitz14 The Loss of Innocence15 The Seven Years WarPart Four: The Queen Mother16 The King of the Romans17 The Great Change18 The Betrayal of an Idea19 Reaction and Enlightenment20 The Burden of the YearsSources and Select Bibliography
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Produktdetaljer

ISBN
9781448205189
Publisert
2013-02-28
Utgiver
Vendor
Bloomsbury Reader
Vekt
487 gr
Høyde
234 mm
Bredde
153 mm
Aldersnivå
G, 01
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Heftet
Antall sider
440

Forfatter

Om bidragsyterne

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

Born in London, Crankshaw was educated in the Nonconformist public school, Bishop's Stortford College in Hertfordshire. He started working as a journalist for a few months at The Times. In the 1930s he lived in Vienna, Austria, teaching English and learning German (his competent grasp of German caused him to become part of the British Intelligence service during World War II). On his return he went back to write for The Times and 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 and in 1963 he began to produce the ambitious literary works, often on historical or monumental moments in Russian Political history.