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During the last days of July 1914 telegrams flew between the King, the Kaiser and the Tsar. George V, Wilhelm II and Nicholas II, known in the family as Georgie, Willy and Nicky, were cousins. Between them they ruled over half the world. They had been friends since childhood. But by July 1914 the Trade Union of Kings was falling apart. Each was blaming the other for the impending disaster of the First World War. 'Have I gone mad ' Nicky asked his wife Alix in St Petersburg, showing her another telegram from Willy. 'What on earth does William mean pretending that it still depends on me whether war is averted or not!' Behind the friendliness of family gatherings lurked family quarrels, which were often played out in public. Drawing widely on previously unpublished documents, this is the extraordinary story of their overlapping lives, conducted in palaces of unimaginable opulence, surrounded by flattery and political intrigue. And through it runs the question: to what extent were the King, the Kaiser and the Tsar responsible for the outbreak of the war, and, as it turned out, for the end of autocratic monarchy
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR How did one man go from Nazi Youth indoctrination to English footballing icon? Bert Trautmann is a football legend. He is famed as the Manchester City goalkeeper who broke his neck in the 1956 FA Cup final and played on. But his early life was no less extraordinary. He grew up in Nazi Germany, where first he was indoctrinated by the Hitler Youth, before fighting in World War Two in France and on the Eastern Front. In 1945 he was captured and sent to a British POW camp where, for the first time, he understood that there could be a better way of life. He embraced England as his new home and before long became an English football hero. This is his story. 'A gripping story of an unlikely redemption through football' Sunday Times 'He was the best goalkeeper I ever played against. We always said, don't look into the goal when you're trying to score against Bert. Because if you do, he'll see your eyes and read your thoughts.' Bobby Charlton
A sensational, eye-opening account of Emma Jung’s complex marriage to Carl Gustav Jung and the hitherto unknown role she played in the early years of the psychoanalytic movement. Clever and ambitious, Emma Jung yearned to study the natural sciences at the University of Zurich. But the strict rules of proper Swiss society at the beginning of the twentieth century dictated that a woman of Emma’s stature—one of the richest heiresses in Switzerland—travel to Paris to "finish" her education, to prepare for marriage to a suitable man. Engaged to the son of one of her father’s wealthy business colleagues, Emma’s conventional and predictable life was upended when she met Carl Jung. The s...
After 1933, as the brutal terror regime took hold, most of the two-thirds of Germans who had never voted for the Nazis - some 20 million people - tried to keep their heads down and protect their families. They moved to the country, or pretended to support the regime to avoid being denounced by neighbours, and tried to work out what was really happening in the Reich, surrounded as they were by Nazi propaganda and fake news. They lived in constant fear. Yet many ordinary Germans found the courage to resist. Catrine Clay argues that it was a much greater number than was ever formally recorded. Her ground-breaking book focuses on six very different characters. They are not seen in isolation but as part of their families. Each experiences the momentous events of Nazi history as they unfold in their own small lives - Good Germans all.
Since its formation in 1916, the School of Oriental and African Studies - or SOAS as it is better known - has built an enviable reputation around the globe for the calibre and quality of its courses, teaching and research. As part of the University of London, the School, which is home to around 3,700 students and includes the Brunei Gallery and the unique collection of Sir Percival David Chinese ceramics, continues to enhance its position as the world's leading centre for the study of a highly diverse range of subjects concerned with Asia, Africa and the Middle East.SOAS - A Celebration in Many Voices is a richly illustrated hardback portrait of SOAS, reflecting the exceptional nature of the School and the extraordinary range of interests and outreach, captured through first-hand memories, anecdotes and memorabilia from all those who have worked and studied there and the remarkable set of people who have passed through its doors.''Over and over again the stories in this book describe, with joy, the magical experience of studying at SOAS.'' Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws, President of SOASEdited by Catrine Clay
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In the years before the First World War, the great European powers were ruled by three first cousins: King George V of Britain, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. Together, they presided over the last years of dynastic Europe and the outbreak of the most destructive war the world had ever seen, a war that set twentieth-century Europe on course to be the most violent continent in the history of the world. Through brilliant and often darkly comic portraits of these men and their lives, their foibles and obsessions, Miranda Carter delivers the tragicomic story of Europe’s early twentieth-century aristocracy, a solipsistic world preposterously out of kilter with its times.
Published to accompany a BBC1 television series in celebration of The Queen's 70th birthday, this book offers an account of her public and private life from childhood to coronation. It begins with her attendance at her father's coronation at the age of 11, looks briefly at the Royal Family from Victoria until Elizabeth's birth, and then takes readers through Elizabeth's childhood and adolescence, to her own coronation in 1953. Containing archive stills as well as contemporary accounts from letters and diaries, the book offers insights into aspects of The Queen's private life such as her courtship and marriage to Prince Philip.
The Three Emperors by Miranda Carter is the juicy, funny story of the three dysfunctional rulers of Germany, Russia and Great Britain at the turn of the last century, combined with a study of the larger forces around them. Three cousins. Three Emperors. And the road to ruin. As cousins, George V, Kaiser Wilhelm II and the last Tsar Nicholas II should have been friends - but they happened also to rule Europe's three most powerful states. This potent combination together with their own destructive personalities - petty, insecure, bullying, absurdly obsessive (stamp collecting, uniforms) - led not only to their own dramatic fallouts and falls from grace, but also to the outbreak of the First Wo...
‘As my future crumbled before my eyes, I grasped for the rope. My entire life’s struggle was ending here, in plain view of my enemies. How was it possible? How had I let things come to this?’ This is not the story of a celebrity sportsman. It’s not the story of a life covered in glory with its attendant cavalcade of famous friends, easy wins and glamorous encounters. Errol Christie may have been one of the most promising British boxers of his generation – a Fight Night poster boy, captain of the England boxing team, English and European champion, and a cocky, Ali-esque dancer with a reputation for devastating early knockouts – but this is not that story. This is a story about fig...