Seaman - From Vienna to Versailles

The aim of this book is not to re-tell but to re-examine the story of European affairs from 1815 to 1920, chiefly, though not exclusively, from the point of view of international relations. Designed chiefly as a work of elucidation and interpretation, it is addressed mainly to those who already have some acquaintance with the main events and personalities of the period. The justification for producing such a book is that it is badly needed. No period of European history is more widely studied than that covered by this book; yet few periods seem to be more widely misunderstood, or more obscured by the perpetuation of generalizations that belong more properly to the status of legend.

Among the legends that mislead the student of nineteenth century history are, for example, the idea that there was such a thing as a congress system; that middle class discontent caused the 1848 revolutions; that Napoleon III overthrew the Second Republic; that the Crimean War was caused by the decline of the Turkish Empire; that Bismarck unified Germany and that Cavour wanted to unify Italy; that Bismarck secured Russian neutrality by his Polish policy in 1863, that he deceived Napoleon III at Biarritz, and that he regained Russian friendship by the Reinsurance Treaty; that the Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902 ended Britains splendid isolation; that a condition of international anarchy existed in the decade before 1914; and that the 1919 settlement weakened central and eastern Europe by balkanizing it.

Most of these statements are inaccurate; and though the writer naturally makes no claim to be the first to realize this, he does suggest that this is the first attempt within the covers of one conveniently-sized work to explain why they are inaccurate.

In its approach to the problems dealt with the book sets out to be provocative and emphatic. This is deliberate, and the writer does not feel it necessary to apologize if in some places he may appear somewhat dogmatic. The writing of history, and the study of it, have suffered much from what Sidney Smith accused Bishops of looking for in young curatesa certain dropping-down-deadness of manner. Historical study that does not challenge the reader to think hard is poor stuff. Our universities continue to complain that the schools send them too many students who regard history solely as a matter of acquiring information. They are right to complain if this is in fact true; but after vainly searching for twenty years for an authoritative one-volume book on the nineteenth century that provided students with an example of how to interpret facts as well as how to recite them in chronological order, the writer is inclined to direct the charge back upon those from whom it issues. He has written this book solely because those best qualified to produce such a work have so far failed to do so.

There is only a very short bibliography. There seems no point in encumbering these pages with yet one more list of the inevitable authorities. The writer does feel it necessary, however, to append a list of the works which might be described as the formative influences behind the treatment of some of the main topics dealt with in this volume. In mentioning these works, the writer hastens to disclaim all intention of saddling their distinguished authors with any responsibility whatever for any of the judgments contained herein.

L.C.B.S.