MAURICE DE SAXE was the brilliant adornment of a brilliant age, one of the most renowned and admired men in the Europe of his day. It is not surprising that the writing of the biography of this vivid, talented and entertaining figure should have provided the author with a genial and absorbing task.
He came of extraordinary stock; the circumstances of his birth were remarkable; he was the lover of many celebrated women; he won the lifelong friendship of men of the stature of Voltaire; he aspired to a crown, and nearly became the Czar of Russia; his activities spanned a whole continent, from Paris to Dresden, from Dresden to Warsaw, from Warsaw to Moscow. Yet he was more, much more, than an energetic and flamboyant adventurer: he was acknowledged to be the outstanding general of his era, a military genius who linked the epoch of Marlborough with the epoch of Frederick the Great. He led great armies and won great victories.
It is part of the purpose of this book to restore him to the pre-eminent place in social and military history to which his achievements entitle him. The study of his campaigns has proved no dutiful or dreary labour, for he was among the wittiest and most elegant military practitioners who have ever lived. There was a touch of diablerie about the manner in which he gained his spectacular triumphs that set him apart from the other great captains of his era.