Imperial Cauldron is a trilogy, plus a booklet of Appendices and background information. Volume 1 very roughly covers the period from 1820 up to 1880. Mid-19th century Vienna – a city of glitter and charm, of music and elegance, the home of the ruling Habsburg imperial family. The more you delve into the lives of the Habsburg family, the more you become aware of how very insecure, as individuals, so many of them were. Behind the masks were some very shaky personalities. They hid their insecurities and secret dreads behind formality and the glamour and prestige of their positions. As people, rather than as royal figures, they were far more flawed than is usually acknowledged, even today. Theirs was a horribly dysfunctional family. Their relationships fermented in a kind of cauldron. You end up with the question: could anyone have been even half-way happy in that cauldron? The Empress believed herself to be Titania, the most beautiful woman in Europe, angelic, a martyr to her people and to her family. He had to be the fairy-tale prince, the heir to the throne, the perfect, gallant Chevalier – “sans peur et sans reproche”. Then there was the princess who faced rejection before she even arrived in Vienna and who never found a home there. Their lives were made miserable because of the constant need to live up to the glorious image that had to be presented to the outside world. Can we understand today the lives they led and the thousand and one ways they struggled with issues they dare not admit to, not even to themselves?
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