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A review by siria
Blood and Iron: The Rise and Fall of the German Empire by Katja Hoyer
2.5
A whistle-stop tour of the German Empire from its foundation in 1871 to its collapse in the aftermath of the First World War. I was hoping for a deeper dive on the topic than I got from Leaving Cert History back in the day, but with the exception of a couple of quirky anecdotes (did you know that Wilhelm II spent his post-war exile obsessively cutting down trees?) didn't get it. This brief synthesis of the period is adequate, but tries to subtly normalise Bismarck and Wilhelm II—make them just Some Guys responding to Ineffable Historical Forces—in ways I found a bit hinky.
Slightly clunky translation from the original German. The audiobook narrator made a number of pronunciation errors—oddly enough, mostly of English words rather than of German ones, although there was the weird, repeated tic of pronouncing "Somme" as if it were the German die Summe rather than the French river/battle.
Slightly clunky translation from the original German. The audiobook narrator made a number of pronunciation errors—oddly enough, mostly of English words rather than of German ones, although there was the weird, repeated tic of pronouncing "Somme" as if it were the German die Summe rather than the French river/battle.