A landmark work of narrative history, Paris 1919 is the first full-scale treatment of the Peace Conference in more than twenty-five years. It offers a scintillating view of those dramatic and fateful days when much of the modern world was sketched out, when countries were created—Iraq, Yugoslavia, Israel—whose troubles haunt us still. Winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize • Winner of the PEN Hessell Tiltman Prize • Winner of the Duff Cooper Prize Between January and July 1919, after “the war to end all wars,” men and women from around the world converged on Paris to shape the peace. Center stage, for the first time in history, was an American president, Woodrow Wilson, who with his Fourteen Points seemed to promise to so many people the fulfillment of their dreams. Stern, intransigent, impatient when it came to security concerns and wildly idealistic in his dream of a League of Nations that would resolve all future conflict peacefully, Wilson is only one of the larger-than-life characters who fill the pages of this extraordinary book. David Lloyd George, the gregarious and wily British prime minister, brought Winston Churchill and John Maynard Keynes. Lawrence of Arabia joined the Arab delegation. Ho Chi Minh, a kitchen assistant at the Ritz, submitted a petition for an independent Vietnam. For six months, Paris was effectively the center of the world as the peacemakers carved up bankrupt empires and created new countries. This book brings to life the personalities, ideals, and prejudices of the men who shaped the settlement. They pushed Russia to the sidelines, alienated China, and dismissed the Arabs. They struggled with the problems of Kosovo, of the Kurds, and of a homeland for the Jews. The peacemakers, so it has been said, failed dismally; above all they failed to prevent another war. Margaret MacMillan argues that they have unfairly been made the scapegoats for the mistakes of those who came later. She refutes received ideas about the path from Versailles to World War II and debunks the widely accepted notion that reparations imposed on the Germans were in large part responsible for the Second World War. Praise for Paris 1919 “It’s easy to get into a war, but ending it is a more arduous matter. It was never more so than in 1919, at the Paris Conference. . . . This is an enthralling book: detailed, fair, unfailingly lively. Professor MacMillan has that essential quality of the historian, a narrative gift.” —Allan Massie, The Daily Telegraph (London)

Our One Common Country explores the most critical meeting of the Civil War. Given short shrift or overlooked by many historians, the Hampton Roads Conference of 1865 was a crucial turning point in the War between the States. In this well written and highly documented book, James B. Conroy describes in fascinating detail what happened when leaders from both sides came together to try to end the hostilities. The meeting was meant to end the fighting on peaceful terms. It failed, however, and the war dragged on for two more bloody, destructive months. Through meticulous research of both primary and secondary sources, Conroy tells the story of the doomed peace negotiations through the characters who lived it. With a fresh and immediate perspective, Our One Common Country offers a thrilling and eye-opening look into the inability of our nation’s leaders to find a peaceful solution. The failure of the Hamptons Roads Conference shaped the course of American history and the future of America’s wars to come.

Since at least 1876, Britain’s policy toward Bulgaria had been derivative of her policy toward the Turkish Straits, and it continued to be so during the period from the conclusion of the Armistice of Salonika until the signature of the Treaty of Neuilly. British policy was the main factor in shaping the Treaty of Neuilly and therefore exercised an important influence on the simultaneously unfolding Bulgarian power struggle and on setting that country’s political agenda for years to come.

John Maynard Keynes, then a rising young economist, participated in the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 as chief representative of the British Treasury and advisor to Prime Minister David Lloyd George. He resigned after desperately trying and failing to reduce the huge demands for reparations being made on Germany. The Economic Consequences of the Peace is Keynes' brilliant and prophetic analysis of the effects that the peace treaty would have both on Germany and, even more fatefully, the world.

The end of the Qajar era in Iran, despite the accepted narrative of decline, was in fact an occasion of modern and forward-thinking nationalism. Iran developed an imperial nationalism, which was informed by its experiences under British and Russian hegemony and the absorption of Western modern ideas and practices, and which now looked towards a future as a sovereign and independent state within the foundational framework of its previous Empire. Emboldened by post-WWI notions of self-determination and the development of international institutions devoted to peace, Iran spearheaded its new-found diplomacy by sending a delegation to the peace talks in Paris in 1919. This book shows how Iran's immediate post-war diplomacy came about, the conduct of Iran's delegation to Paris, frustrations with the Anglo-Persian Agreement, and ultimately how Iran's progress became the victim of British imperialism. Throwing a spotlight on an under-researched period of Iranian history, it will be of interest to readers of Iranian history, and those interested in the Paris Peace Conference of 1919.

Romania at the Paris Peace Conference studies the diplomacy of Ioan I.C. Bratianu during World War I and in its aftermath that led to the formation of Greater Romania. The book describes the successful struggle waged by the Romanian government for recognition of the provisions of the secret treaty of 1916 and, in addition, for approval of the de facto annexation of Bessarabia, carried out in 1918 with the encouragement of the Central Powers. A substantial share of the credit for this achievement, Spector asserts, must be given to Ioan I.C. Bratianu, a skillful negotiator who answered all attempts to delineate more equitable frontiers with a rigid restatement of Romania' s full claims.