Customer Reviews

Forge of Empires: Three Revolutionary Statesmen and the World They Made, 1861-1871

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Beran convincingly makes the argument that Abraham Lincoln saved the free-state ideal not only for the United States, but for the rest of the world. Alongside his gripping potrayal of the Civil War, Beran carries on a simulaneous dialogue covering the failed free-state "revolution" in Russia, and the expansion of the German "coercive state" that evenutally led to two world wars. All of these tales are interwoven throughout the years 1861-1871. Beran keeps the readers interested by jumping from tale to tale, often making connections between players involved.

I couldn't put the book down. My one complaint is that Beran is not always easy to read. He likes to flourish his writing with colorful, yet obscure references that might well be lost on most readers. While the reading is sometimes slow, I couldn't stop reading. It is a fascinating look at the rebirth of our nation and how, at the same time, Europe was headed in the other direction.

Michael Knox Beran has a fine grasp of the forces involved during the period of Lincoln, Alexander, and Bismarck, as well as the springs of their character. One learns a lot about the history of this period of romantic revolution that actually explains much about contemporary times.

Beran, even better than David McCullough, has a masterful gift for narration based on solid, creative scholarship. The book is chalk full of such devastating remarks as:

"That a scion of the [Enlightenment] luminaries should now become a policeman and a torturer might at first seem a historical irony; but the inquisitorial vocation comes easily to those who have embraced Voltaire's faith in the virtues of enlightened despotism."

It's interesting that Beran, a lawyer, is sensibly not involved professionally in the coils of sterile academia, though he has a solid background at Groton, Columbia, Cambridge, and Yale law.

The 1860s decade was tumultuous in many ways, though for many Americans the only thing that comes to mind is the Civil War. However, as Michael Knox Beran explores in his book Forge of Empires: Three Revolutionary Statesmen and the World They Made, much more was going on around the world than just that. The foundations of the 20th century in both Germany and Russia, as well as the rest of Europe, were also being forged at this time. In his excellent book, Beran gives readers a running narrative that often compares and contrasts the three main revolutions going on at this time, how they were different but also how they were similar.

Abraham Lincoln, of course, was forcing American society to change drastically, with the effect not only of freeing the slaves but also transforming Southern aristocracy from wealthy land-owning based on slavery to a much different class system. Otto von Bismarck, in turn, was in the process of accumulating power for his native Prussia (and for himself, of course) by uniting the various German states into one empirical power under one ruler, thus stamping his mark on the European balance of power for generations to come. Finally, Russian Tsar Alexander II was implementing policies to end serfdom, throwing Russian society into such upheaval that eventually that sniff of freedom turned into just another dictatorship.

Beran explores these three revolutions not only through the eyes of these great and powerful leaders, but also through those people caught up in these momentous events. Walt Whitman, Nietzsche, Leo Tolstoy, Mary Chesnut, Napoleon III and his empress Eugenie, all of them play a great role in illustrating the consequences of various actions. While Lincoln frees the slaves and goes to war to save the union, Mary Chesnut, the wife of a southern landowner, shows us how her society crumbles as the ravages of war reach the Confederacy and obliterate the society that she knew. The rise of Germany and Bismarck's thirst for power results in huge transformations in France as well, culminating in the Franco-Prussian war that finally solidifies the power of the new German state.

Beran uses a form of narrative history in Forge of Empires, with the book going from short section to short section, sometimes encompassing a month, sometimes a few months, and jumping from the US to Germany to Russia and back again. Beran sometimes leaves a section with a "cliffhanger" of sorts, which made the narrative even more gripping but wasn't truly necessary. Structuring the book this way allows Beran to highlight the similarities and differences between the various revolutions, mostly by illustration but occasionally Beran comes right out and compares/contrasts two or even all three.

As months and years progress, Beran shows us how Alexander was a man with big ideas yet with the inability to "sell" these ideas to the Russian people. Rebellion is widespread and there are many attempts on his life, which results in a crackdown and even less freedom. The mechanism of freeing the serfs results in many serfs suffering even greater than they did under serfdom, and the revolution that Alexander started swiftly spins out of his control. Meanwhile, we see the effects of Lincoln's revolution as it affects countries all over Europe. Will England and France recognize the Confederacy, or will Lincoln and the Union army be able to achieve a military victory that will keep them to the sidelines? And what's Bismarck doing during all this?

We see not only the revolutions as they unfold, but Beran ends the book wrapping up the lives of all his "characters," giving us a brief synopsis of what happened in the rest of their lives. He also gives an overview of the far-reaching effect each revolution had on society and world politics, such as how German extreme nationalism eventually ended up with World Wars I and II.

I encourage you to pick this book up. It's interesting, you'll find out a lot about things you may not have known (I'm a history buff, and I had no idea that Prussia and Austria fought a brief war in the mid-1860s). The best thing is that you will get a foundation for much of what happened in the world in the 20th century, told in a fashion that will keep you reading to the final page.

Creating an American historical narrative that integrates events and ideas into the broader global story is the most urgent task facing American historians today. Forge of Empires is a substantial contribution to this emerging literature and deserves the close attention of every student of American affairs and of every working historian. Beran combines vast erudition and great narrative gifts to create a mosaic that not only illuminates the stories of the statesmen he follows (Abraham Lincoln, Otto von Bismarck, Tsar Alexander II, and, to a lesser degree, Napoleon III) but also provides readers with new insights into the ways world events affected the United States. Beran's narrative strategy is a gamble that pays off. Sweeping pictures emerge from short mini-narratives that function like pebbles in a mosaic -- or like the dramatic brushstrokes of the impressionist painters active in the era he so brilliantly portrays. Like Lincoln, Bismarck engaged in a project of national consolidation; like Alexander II, Lincoln was a liberator who freed millions of human beings. In Beran's skilled hands, the similarities and differences between the situations these statesmen faced and the consequences of their decisions gradually build up to form a revealing and insightful portrait of a vital historical era that will increase American readers' understanding of the relationship between U.S. domestic history and events in the rest of the world.

An interesting look at three important leaders over one critical decade in world history. Those who tend to see political events through the narrow prism of a single country will benefit from the lively text of Mr. Bernan as he takes readers through the interrelated revolutionary happenings during the late middle 1800s in Russia, Germany, and the United States.

Of the three featured statesman, only Lincoln truly transcended his time and place.

As facts gush from Mr. Bernan's pen, a reader should be somewhat cautious. For example on page 196, in his zeal to tie Lincoln to the South's heroic Cavaliers, the author cites a quote from Lincoln concerning his strong intellectual debt to his birth mother--who was from Virginia. However, my understanding is the quote was really aimed at his beloved stepmother.

All in all a good history tale with lingering echoes affecting current events in Germany, Russia, and the United States.

Very good book if you need to write a paper on any of these three men. Writen in a clear and easy to understand language by a leading historian of the day. Nice margins to write notes. An overall very good book. I purchased this book from Amazon and was very pleased with the overall price and results. Before you puschase the book, it is helpful to have a general grasp of any of the three men in this book.

Once on a Star Trek documentary I heard Leonard Nimoy discuss an old Chinese curse, `may you live in interesting times.' In that documentary, Nimoy is referring to the 1960s. However, this book talks about times that may have been far more interesting, the 1860s. Often, we in the United States are so obsessed and fascinated with ourselves that we forget the rest of the world exists. Which is why are sports champions are always titled the `World Champions' despite the fact that they are just playing in the United States*. I, myself, am certainly guilty of this. I often mark book reviews on historical events outside the United States with the labels `World History' and `Western Civilization' and inside the United States is labeled just `U.S. History.' The U.S. Civil War has been a source of fascination for us ever since it ended, but often we ignore the wider world that our conflict played out. Moreover, we should not ignore it, for foreign affairs is a big part of why that conflict played out the way it did.

David Donald's Lincoln played out the life of one man, Doris Goodwin's bookTeam of Rivals showed an administration, but Michael Beran's book gives us the world that was. The focus is on the three legendary statesmen: Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States; Otto Von Bismarck, Prime Minster of Prussia and then Chancellor of Germany; and Tsar Alexander II, Emperor of Russia. Lincoln would hold his nation together that was being torn apart by the Civil War and would succeed in eradicating slavery from the Union. Bismarck would unify his county into a single nation, and Tsar Alexander sought to modernize his nation by liberating his nation's serfs and providing for a constitutional monarchy.

Of the three leaders, only Lincoln would succeed in every way possible. Bismarck would unify Germany but he was always dependent on the patronage of his sovereign for unlike Lincoln, who served in a Republic, Bismarck served a King who he transformed into an Emperor. Bismarck would live to see a new Emperor come to the throne had he built and begin a process to ruin it all. Tsar Alexander was an emperor already, and in theory absolute. Unfortunately, after the centuries of serfdom, transforming the entire nation's population from serfs to citizens would take some doing and when undermined by both conservative and radical elements it would become impossible.

Tsar Alexander was just following example that other monarchs, and Bismarck, were making with `Tory Democracy.' For the monarchs and aristocrats of the mid-nineteenth century were a far more cleaver breed then their late eighteenth century counterparts. They would embrace popular reform as way of maintaining their hold on power.


"The free-state men were every day becoming more impatient with his rule. He imposed a censorship on the press; but this, he knew, was a shopworn tactic, and only strengthened the opposition. He must try something else. He had been intrigued by the way in which Europe's craftiest politicians used (or proposed to use) the power of the lower orders against the liberal middle--against the bourgeois and professional classes. In France, Napoleon III organized mass plebiscites to ratify his power. In England, Benjamin Disraeli envisioned a union between the common people and the aristocracy, and alliance which Winston Churchill's father, Lord Randolph Churchill, was later to christen `Tory Democracy.' Others called it `neofeudal paternalism' or `English Tory Socialism.'

It was and ingenious strategy. Use democratic paternalism to subvert the institutions of freedom. Today, when democracy and liberty are practically synonymous, such a policy seems paradoxical. But it did not seem so in the nineteenth century. In England and the United States, the rule of law, bills of rights, independent judiciaries, and legislative control of the purse and the army developed before the advent of universal suffrage. When, during the nineteenth century, democracy grew up in England and America, the institutions of the free state were relatively stable; the broader franchise did not destroy free constitutions, it made them stronger. But in countries without such stable constitutions, it made them stronger. But in countries without such stable constitutions, unscrupulous leaders used democratic instruments--plebiscites and manhood suffrage--to subvert fledgling institutions of freedom." p.175

This book also connects the dots on how these events all tied into each other. Generally, I and most other historians both professionals, and us amateurs, are aware of the British and French support for the Confederacy during the U.S Civil War. However, I do not believe that most are equally aware of the Prussian and Russian support for the Union. Bismarck could not support the South since he was trying to unify his own nation, and Alexander equally supported the Union in his outright refusal even to consider recognizing the Confederacy. This book also gives detail on how the United States, angry at the French for their support of the Confederacy, was able to play a role in the Franco-Prussian War.

"The advice of Philip Sheridan, General Grant's cavalry master, made a deep impression upon him. Sheridan had come to the Prussian camp as an observer. He urged the Germans to embrace the policy of total war to which Lincoln and Grant had been driven to during the Civil War. `The proper strategy,' Sheridan told Bismarck over dinner at Rheims, `consists in the first place of inflicting as telling blows as possible on the enemy's army, and then in causing the inhabitants so much suffering that they must long for peace, and force their Government to demand it. The people must be left with nothing but their eyes to weep with over the war...' `You know how to hit an enemy as no other army does, but you have not learned how to annihilate him. One must see more smoke of burning villages, otherwise you will not finish the French.'" (p.353)

This book opens a window into another time, one that sees all these dramatic events and actors great and small take part. The History Channel should a documentary based on it. For, I found this book more entertaining than a movie. This book has a brilliant narrative and I highly recommend to anyone.

*Now granted the amount of foreign players in our pro leagues might give those titles more legitimacy but we have always had those titles.

Despite many interesting anecdotes, this book is a failure. The trouble starts with the use of the words "revolution" and "revolutionary". Nowhere are these defined. If you are going to advance a thesis, you have to start with some fundamental theory but this book contains none. The effect of "revolution" seems much like that of the purple prose used too often throughout the book: the author's case is undermined. And what is the purpose of the insertion of anecdotes about multiple non-state actors? Mary Chestnut, Leo Tolstoy, Prince Kropotkin, Nietzche--they really add nothing to the story or the thesis of revolution. In all, the author knows alot about alot of different things, but what we have here is a jumbled mess: he mixes everything together and tries to connect them to an unsubstantiated theory of revolution. In the end, it looks like the author was grasping at reasons to write a book and found one: by mixing all he knows into a concoction prepared on the most flimsy of foundations.