Frederick the Great: A Military Life

"On the one hand, you have new, enlightened ideas. On the other hand, you have the more traditional role of a monarch, and Frederick fulfills this down to the ground. He is personally commander-in-chief of the Prussian armies. He acts as commander in the field, which is not unprecedented at the time, but he certainly goes further than most contemporary monarchs. Many monarchs in this period are taking the field. They expose themselves to danger and encourage the troops. But they are not generally there to oversee every detail personally. But Frederick is. I have argued that this is actually a response to enlightened ideas in many ways, because the idea is now that you need to show personal merit: it’s not just about being ruler through descent. Christopher Duffy’s book is the essential description of Frederick’s activities as a general and very much accessible to the general reader. It’s 40 years old. When my own book comes out, I hope it will help us understand Frederick’s military leadership in slightly new ways. But Duffy’s is a very good book, and definitely the first stop shop for anybody who wants to understand Frederick as a soldier."