Kaiser Wilhelm II

by Christopher Clark

First published 2000

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4.0(206)

Christopher Clark traces Wilhelm II from his upbringing at the Hohenzollern court and accession in 1888 through the dismissal of Bismarck and the political conflicts of the Wilhelmine era. The biography follows the emperor’s public performances, court relationships, diplomatic interventions and support for naval and imperial ambitions.

Rather than treating Wilhelm as either an all-powerful ruler or an irrelevant figurehead, Clark examines how influence moved between the monarch, ministers, military leaders and competing institutions. The final chapters assess Wilhelm’s role in the crisis of 1914, his diminishing authority during the First World War, the collapse of the monarchy in 1918 and his long exile in the Netherlands.