King, Kaiser, Tsar: Three Royal Cousins Who Led the World to War

Themes: family, duty, royalty, loyalty, education, politics, religion, patriotism, jealousy
Setting: Europe 1880s or so until 1919

This book is about three European rulers who were all caught up in World War I. But what makes it interesting is that the book focuses not on their politics, but on their relationships - the three men were cousins, all descended from England's Queen Victoria. George V of England, Tsar Nicholas of Russia, and Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany were roughly contemporaries and all knew each other very well. They didn't exactly grow up together, but there was a lot of visiting back and forth, a lot of correspondence, and a lot of family drama to go around.

As I read it, I couldn't help thinking how different everything show more could have been if Kaiser Wilhelm, or Willie as the family called him, had been raised differently. Caught between his Prussian grandfather and king and his English mother and grandmother, Queen Victoria, he was always in the middle of the tension. Prussia was an ambitious country, and there was plenty of room for drama, with the way everyone royal in Europe was related to everyone else. That made any war a family matter. And then Willie was deformed at birth, with a damaged arm and inner ear which made his mother reject him. He could have compensated for that, but there were a lot of other influences at work.

Then there was the tsar. Brought up in strict seclusion to protect him from the revolutionaries who eventually murdered his grandfather, the tsar and his family grew up out of touch with the mood of the country. He and his English cousins were close, but nothing could really have saved him from the violence which swept Russia.

I liked this book, but it was really more detailed than it needed to be. It would have been a much better read if she had cut about 150 pages. Too many names, too many details, and so much build up to get to the end. It must have been good, though, because I dreamed about saving the tsar last night. I was sure I could have prevented World War I if we had just assassinated the kaiser at the right time. Which may be true, but may have just been the sleep meds talking. Still, worth reading if you are interested in the subject and don't mind the many details. Good pictures helped. I think the kaiser was the clear winner in the looks department, but that may have been because the other two wore such heavy beards that you couldn't see their faces past the fuzz. 3.5 stars. show less

I always knew that George V of England, Wilhelm II of Prussia and Nicholas II of Russia were cousins, on an intellectual level, since they are all grandchildren of the great Queen Victoria. But I somehow never considered the idea that these royal cousins would have all known each other, and corresponded with each other, and even had fates that were destined to merge with World War I. As much the story of the Danish royal house into which two of the cousins married, this was a fascinating book, although the ending, with World War I, felt a little abrupt. Here's something I learned that will perhaps surprise few people - no one liked the Prussian.

This is a good book, but not a wonderful one. I've been interested in Nicholas II ever since reading Massie's Nicholas & Alexandra. One of my main reasons for reading King, Kaiser, Tsar was to learn more about how and why George V abandoned Nicholas (his counsin) and his family in Russia whereas he could have given them asylum. But whereas Clay talks a lot about Wilhelm and all the details of his reign, and of course about George, she talks much less about the Russian cousin. She hardly gives you a clue as to the severity and importance of the Tsarevich's hemophilia.

But what bothered me the most was her handling of the murder of the Russian royal family. She says that some pounds of jewelry was removed from the bodies after they were show more shot and being prepared for burial. But she doesn't say what that burial intailed. The Tsar, his wife, and their five children were cut up with axes, dosed with acid, burned so that not a trace would remain (although traces did) and buried, hidden in the woods so that no one could find them. How is it that after all the details of Wilhelm's scandals, and what the royals wore at this event or another, she neglected to tell about the barbaric murder of Nicholas and his family (including his son's spaniel!).

Overall it was an interesting book because it's an interesting history of three very powerful and important cousins. show less

4417. King, Kaiser, Tsar Three Royal Cousins Who Led the World to War, by Catrine Clay (read 4 Mar 2008) This is a mostly fluff book, but it deals with interesting subjects . It does not pretend to be a "study" of the men or their times. It has source notes and a bibliography, but I was sorry that it did not even explain how the Kaiser and the Tsar are related--they certainly are not first cousins, though I presume they are related by marriage and also may well be more distant cousins. George V is of course a first cousin to both the Kaiser and the Tsar. I have read good biographies of all three men so I did not have to read this, but I have trouble resisting reading royal biography intertwined with the First World War. Contrary to what show more another reviewer says, I do not believe that Nicholas II is a grandson of Queen Victoria. show less