![]() He also wanted a balance of power with the emphasis on balance and was reluctant to use force, preferring moderation, compromise, reconciliation and agreement. It was in the introduction to that book that he complimented my own work, although it is hardly mentioned at all in the long historiographical review in this, his ‘big Metternich’ nevertheless we still agree on many aspects of Metternich’s career, especially that Metternich was a peace-loving statesman with a warm and generous disposition who loathed the shedding of blood and was averse to executing prisoners. Some of this was revealed in Siemann’s ‘little Metternich’, the short biography of the Austrian Chancellor, which he published in 2010. Siemann writes fluently and as promised his use of the Metternich family archives in Prague has enabled him to cast unprecedented light on Metternich’s private and family life, his role as a surprisingly progressive landowner and later factory owner, his economic ideas and his previously unknown love of England, a country he believed knew how to marry authority with the rule of law. This is a curate’s egg of a book, good in parts, not so good in others. ![]()
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