bout de papier, Vol. 20, No. 3 (2004) — Winter/Spring 2004 // Hiver/Printemps 2004, pp. 21–22
THE LAST KAISER: WILLIAM THE
IMPETUOUS, by Giles Macdonogh,
Published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2001.
pp. 480.
A biography is often read with the hope of discovering some untold truth or a dirty little secret. A new biography can often help change our view of an historical figure and shed light on an entrenched reputation leading us to a better understanding of what made the subject tick. In this new biography of Wilhelm II, the last Kaiser of Germany, Giles Macdonogh presents the complex life of a man not well liked nor remembered by many, who nonetheless is enjoying somewhat of a rehabilitation in Germany, 60 years after his death.
The popular historical picture of Wilhelm is not a pretty one – the often-caricatured scowling face behind the up-turned Prussian moustache leading the world into the ugliness of the The Great War. It is also a picture of a man who lost his throne, was exiled and said to have doomed his country to unhappiness, economic failure and the horrors of the Nazi Dictatorship. Was he the horrible figure of the newsreels and propaganda posters, or was he the caring grandson in whose arms his beloved grandmother Queen Victoria died? This book succeeds in presenting a very different picture of Wilhelm II, the man, the Kaiser, his world and the events of the time.
Macdonogh through careful and detailed research describes Wilhelm’s stormy and often tense family life, his relationships with men and women around him, the politics of a new unified German state, the events which marked his time but also ours in the XXth century. Macdonogh also connects Germany to England, a link which started with the Hanoverian Princes and continues to this day. We are given many personal details on Wilhelm and his family, their personalities and motivations. The reader feels like a close family confidant, you are drawn into the secret, you want to know more. Many family photos are included in this book which makes the telling of Wilhelm’s story more compelling.
The book starts with Wilhelm’s birth. His mother was Queen Victoria’s eldest daughter. It was a difficult birth which left him with a useless, deformed left arm and permanent neck injuries which affected his sense of balance and prevented him from enjoying horse riding in an age when the monarch was often called to parade on horseback. It continues with the intrigue at Court, a world whose concept of discipline and duty belonged to another age. His childhood influenced by his grandfather, the first German Kaiser, an affable old man who did not want to become Kaiser of a unified German state, and the dark presence of the un-democratic Iron Chancellor, Bismarck. Macdonogh leaves nothing out of the story. He tells you of Wilhelm’s difficult relationship with his parents often ridiculed at Court for being anglophiles and liberal, the acrimonious relationship with the cousins in England, wedding plots, the constant jockeying for position.
Macdonogh presents Wilhelm not in isolation but surrounded by the political and social events around him using correspondence and well-researched texts to help the reader see the German side of the story. This book is a rich and complete portrait of Wilhelm the man and the Kaiser. He wasa man in love with great uniforms and decorations; a bon vivant — somewhat lazy, but at the same time open to intellectual pursuits — who loved archaeology and ethnology. The impetuosity of Wilhelm returns time and again in the book, his embarrassing public speeches contradicting government policy, his inability to understand his role in a changing society, his boredom with Cabinet meetings and all matters involving actual work, yet at his attempts to emulate his great uncle, the King of Prussia, Frederick II (the Great).
Macdonogh does not simply end the story with the fall of the Empire in 1918. Instead, he continues with the later life in comfortable exile in Holland, his second marriage to Hermine of Reuss, the rise of Nazism in Germany, his dislike of Hitler and his belief in his continuing role as Kaiser, and, finally, his death at Doorn in 1942, a virtual prisoner of the SS in occupied Holland.
Throughout this biography Macdonogh never forgets that he is telling us about the life of a very real person, a man who could be caring, impetuous, thoughtless, a dreamer; unable to understand that the age of Princes had passed, too quick to believe flatterers and unable to reconcile himself with the emerging idea of democracy in Germany and change in the world. A very good read!
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 20, No. 3 (2004) — Winter/Spring 2004 // Hiver/Printemps 2004, pp. 21–22. Read the rest of this issue →
