Scandal in Konigsberg

This is a new book. Condition: Brand New.

A remarkable micro-history from the author of The Sleepwalkers and Revolutionary Spring

Now part of the Russian Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad, the former Prussian and German port of K nigsberg has always been a somewhat sleepy place, doomed to be famous for having once been the residence of Immanuel Kant. But in the late 1830s, just for a short while, it became famous for all the wrong reasons.

Christopher Clark's brilliant new book is the result of many years of fascination with this strange case. Sensational accusations were bandied about, implying that beneath the town's somnolent surface there were dark erotic currents and wrenching betrayals of trust. For the Prussian authorities this was just the sort of moral collapse they feared most. In the aftermath of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, which had unsettled a generation, every lapse could be seen as the harbinger of new storms.

A Scandal in K nigsberg beautifully brings to life a time and a place that we would now situate in the tranquil 'Biedermeier' years between the seismic upheavals of the 1810s and 1840s. But there is a timeless quality to this small vortex of turbulence, in which spiritual hunger, vanity, professional rivalry, sexual incontinence, naivety and sheer human waywardness threatened to tear a city apart.

Book details and technical specifications

Format: Hardback
ISBN13: 9780241767887
Published: September 2025

Number of pages: 192
Width: 144 mm
Height: 224 mm
Depth: 20 mm

Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd