Author:Brian Masters
The origins of the non-royal dukes in the British peerage divide nicely into Tudor looters, Royal bastards, opportunist generals, territorial, metropolitan or Scottish magnates. Lloyd George said that a duke, fully equipped, cost more than a dreadnought to maintain and with their palaces, possessions and retinues, they are nearly all splendid. Some of them are, of course, now poor; some of them have great wealth; some of them hit every headline and others are obscure. But within each duchy, Brian Masters tells the story of quaint grandees determined to survive.
The Dukes is an essential guide that provides vital biographical information and explores the history of the dukes in unprecedented depth. This revised edition includes new information which was not available on first publication, and brings up to date the accounts of families whose titles have passed to a subsequent generation in the intervening years.
Excellent mightily researched and readable. Absorbing through so many pages
—— ScotsmanSplendidly painstaking and enormously readable
—— Arthur Marshall , New StatesmanWith a keen sense of precedence and an admirable grasp of the British peerage system, he darts from duke to duke... racing up and down the genealogies
—— The EconomistA uniquely stimulating and individual portrait of the heart of Europe
—— Colin Thubron , Sunday TelegraphThis book is full of wonder and delights...Magris writes beautifully; he seems to have read everything. His reading has not made just clever but wise. On almost every page there are passages that make the heart life... Danube is a masterpiece
—— John BanvilleThis is the best introduction to the culture of central Europe, its genius and its tragedy...a work of great originality, which builds up to a mosaic of spectacle, incident and reflection from which the personalities of the narrator and the Danubian lands emerge
—— Daily TelegraphErudite and original
—— New York Review of BooksMagris proves a gracious, erudite, engaging and fair-minded companion on a journey no reader will forget
—— Irish TimesHis forte is a wealth of literary and historical allusions from Austrian, French, Italian and German sources, which makes this book not only a treasure chest but also a profoundly perceptive study of central European history... wonderfully stimulating and constantly surprising
—— The TimesLike the river itself, Magris carries all along with him. Philosophy, war, natural history and politics are blended together with a mixture of curiosity, stylishness and all-encompassing knowledge
—— ObserverItalo Calvino described a classic as a book to which one can return and always find something new. Such a book is Magris’s Danube. In another 30 years we will find the same words and yet another book, fresh revelations divining a different world, a river that never ends, forever lighting out for the mythical territory of freedom.
—— Richard Flanagan , GuardianIt is the small revelations about the character of Blair that make this book worthwhile
—— Ross Clark , The ExpressIt's a gripping insight into the ex-PM's ten years of power . . . It will take a lot for many people to read his own take on the rise and fall of New Labour, but those that do might be reminded of the charm and vision that swept him to power
—— News of the WorldI have read many a prime ministerial memoir and none of the other authors has been as self-deprecating, as willing to admit mistakes and to tell jokes against themselves
—— Mary Ann Sieghart , The IndependentPaints a candid picture of his friend and rival, Gordon Brown, and of their relationship
—— Patrick Hennessy , The Sunday Telegraph
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