In this vivid fifty-year history of Germany from 1871-1918--which inspired events that forever changed the European continent--here is the story of the Second Reich from its violent beginnings and rise to power to its calamitous defeat in the First World War.
Before 1871, Germany was not yet a nation but simply an idea.
Its founder, Otto von Bismarck, had a formidable task at hand. How would he bring thirty-nine individual states under the yoke of a single Kaiser? How would he convince proud Prussians, Bavarians, and Rhinelanders to become Germans? Once united, could the young European nation wield enough power to rival the empires of Britain and France--all without destroying itself in the process?
In this unique study of five decades that changed the course of modern history, Katja Hoyer tells the story of the German Empire from its violent beginnings to its calamitous defeat in the First World War.
This often startling narrative is a dramatic tale of national self-discovery, social upheaval, and realpolitik that ended, as it started, in blood and iron.
"Hoyer peppers her trim narrative with some lovely frills. The mark of a really good short book is its ability to inspire curiosity. Blood and Iron achieves just that. What this story reveals is how easily governmental institutions can be destroyed when people are led astray by intoxicating notions of a place in the sun. That, perhaps, is a lesson for us all."--Gerard DeGroot "Washington Post"
"Superb... Hoyer roots the gathering unity of the German states in a 'defensive nationalism' caused by the Napoleonic Wars of the early 19th century and skillfully unveils how nationalism can come into being out of a sense of comparative inferiority. It's hard to imagine a better, more up-to-date history of its subject."-- "Kirkus, Starred Review"
"Hoyer's well-researched and well-written book is the best biography of the Second Reich in years. It will undoubtedly become the essential account of this vitally important part of European history."--Andrew Roberts, New York Times bestselling author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny
Katja Hoyer is a German-British historian specializing in modern German history. She was born in East Germany and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in London and a Visiting Research Fellow at King's College London. She is a columnist for the Washington Post and has written for History Today and the BBC's History Extra. Katja now lives in Sussex, England.