George F. Kennan (1904 -2005) was the U.S. Ambassador to Russia and Yugoslavia, and professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. He is the author of many books, including Soviet-American Relations, 1917-1920 (two volumes) and From Plague After Munich: Diplomatic Papers, 1938-1940 (both from Princeton).

"Mr. Kennan takes full advantage of the colorful opportunities that the Franco-Russian romance presents. He has not only advanced our knowledge significantly by impressive research; he presents his results with great skill; he writes beautifully, harmoniously, and vividly. He is at his best when revealing how human frailties played havoc with national interests."--Theodore Zeldin, The New York Times Book Review "Our former Ambassador to Russia and Yugoslavia brings to this study the attributes of a seasoned diplomat, historian, and linguist. With admirable clarity and fluency, Kennan ... untangles the skein of European and Balkan politics of the late 1800s ... and traces the rise of nationalism and militarism which led to W.W.I."--Publishers Weekly "The world which George Kennan describes with great elegance and skill and with much lively atmospheric detail is the world of traditional nineteenth-century diplomacy... The great achievement of George Kennan's book is that he uses his scholarship and his extensive knowledge of the large body of secondary literature on the Franco-Russian Alliance to remind us how high diplomacy of the late nineteenth century looked to contemporaries."--James Joll, The New York Review of Books "This is a serious historical volume, but the people it involves, those who influenced or controlled Franco-Russian relations from 1875 to 1890, are ... a most astonishing set of zanies, scalawags, and fanatics, all vividly characterized by Mr. Kennan."--The Atlantic Monthly

George F. Kennan (1904 -2005) was the U.S. Ambassador to Russia and Yugoslavia, and professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. He is the author of many books, including Soviet-American Relations, 1917-1920 (two volumes) and From Plague After Munich: Diplomatic Papers, 1938-1940 (both from Princeton).

"Mr. Kennan takes full advantage of the colorful opportunities that the Franco-Russian romance presents. He has not only advanced our knowledge significantly by impressive research; he presents his results with great skill; he writes beautifully, harmoniously, and vividly. He is at his best when revealing how human frailties played havoc with national interests."--Theodore Zeldin, The New York Times Book Review "Our former Ambassador to Russia and Yugoslavia brings to this study the attributes of a seasoned diplomat, historian, and linguist. With admirable clarity and fluency, Kennan ... untangles the skein of European and Balkan politics of the late 1800s ... and traces the rise of nationalism and militarism which led to W.W.I."--Publishers Weekly "The world which George Kennan describes with great elegance and skill and with much lively atmospheric detail is the world of traditional nineteenth-century diplomacy... The great achievement of George Kennan's book is that he uses his scholarship and his extensive knowledge of the large body of secondary literature on the Franco-Russian Alliance to remind us how high diplomacy of the late nineteenth century looked to contemporaries."--James Joll, The New York Review of Books "This is a serious historical volume, but the people it involves, those who influenced or controlled Franco-Russian relations from 1875 to 1890, are ... a most astonishing set of zanies, scalawags, and fanatics, all vividly characterized by Mr. Kennan."--The Atlantic Monthly