Pieter Judson gives us something we have desperately needed: a new history of the Habsburg Empire. At least in the English-speaking world, general knowledge of the Habsburg Empire has been reliant on older studies, studies which have adhered to a few narrative tropes of Habsburg despotism, economic backwardness, national renaissance, and the idea that the monarchy was a prison of the peoples from which the peoples were able to eventually break free. One of the few histories of the Habsburg Empire that is still in print is A. J. P. Taylor’s 1948 volume which viewed the monarchy as a medieval holdover, a monstrosity unfit to survive in the modern era.1 C. A. Macartney began his magnum opus, published in the late 1960s, with the death of Joseph II. At that point, the Habsburg Empire entered a long, steady decline that culminated in the suicide committed in the First World War.2 Other volumes followed, offering a deeper experience for tourists, for people who want to learn a little more about the names that grace the statutes from Vienna to Trieste. But they also have convinced generations of students and scholars that the Habsburg Empire was always behind the times and generally not worth studying. This has been the case even as Europe underwent a massive integration project which now has brought almost all the former territories of the empire under one European roof. For years, then, the general histories of the monarchy have been dominated by these old stories, written either directly after the fall of the monarchy or, more likely, during the Cold War. The Iron Curtain cut off the former lands of the Habsburg Empire from each other, but the cold war histories lumped the Habsburg Empire into the prehistory of the East and therefore used the monarchy to explain how the East became backward and undemocratic. We know now that the discourses which split Europe between a progressive west and a backward east have themselves a long history, one that stretches into the mind of the Enlightenment.3 But there has been no general history of the monarchy that faces up to the old narratives of doom and gloom, long decline, or as Gary Cohen pithily labelled it, ‘Absolutism and Anarchy’.4 Judson has recently laid down the editorship of the Austrian History Yearbook after ten years at the helm. The result of his service to the academic community is a volume that deftly synthesizes new work and research on the monarchy and is able then to offer a fundamentally new and revised interpretation of Habsburg history. Judson’s book aims to disrupt and destroy those narratives of absolutism and anarchy that have characterized the Habsburg Empire for so long, while also offering a work of historical reorientation that actually integrates this great land empire more into a wider history of Europe. This book is therefore not a textbook and not a general history — though it can be read that way. Judson’s ‘new history’ defies genres as it deftly moves between narrative and analytical sections

中文翻译：

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哈布斯堡帝国：新的历史

彼得·贾德森为我们提供了我们迫切需要的东西：哈布斯堡帝国的新历史。至少在英语世界，哈布斯堡帝国的一般知识依赖于较早的研究，这些研究坚持哈布斯堡专制、经济落后、民族复兴和君主制是监狱的想法的一些叙事比喻人民最终能够脱离的人民。为数不多的仍在印刷的哈布斯堡帝国历史之一是 AJP Taylor 1948 年的卷，该卷将君主制视为中世纪的遗留物，一种不适合在现代时代生存的怪物。 1 CA Macartney 开始了他的巨著，出版于后期1960 年代，约瑟夫二世去世。那时，哈布斯堡帝国进入了一个漫长的、稳步下降，最终导致第一次世界大战中的自杀事件。2 其他卷宗紧随其后，为游客提供更深入的体验，为那些想要更多地了解从维也纳到的里雅斯特的法规的名称的人。但他们也说服了一代又一代的学生和学者，哈布斯堡帝国总是落后于时代，通常不值得研究。即使欧洲经历了一项大规模的整合项目，现在几乎将帝国的所有前领土都置于一个欧洲屋檐下，情况也是如此。多年来，君主制的通史一直被这些古老的故事所主宰，这些故事要么是在君主制垮台后直接写成的，要么是在冷战期间写成的。铁幕将哈布斯堡帝国的前土地彼此隔绝，但冷战历史将哈布斯堡帝国归入东方史前史，因此用君主制来解释东方是如何变得落后和不民主的。我们现在知道，将欧洲分裂为进步的西方和落后的东方的话语本身有着悠久的历史，它一直延伸到启蒙运动的脑海中。 3 但是，没有任何君主制正视旧有的通史厄运与阴郁、长期衰落的叙述，或者正如加里·科恩 (Gary Cohen) 简明扼要地给它贴上的标签，“绝对主义和无政府状态”。4 贾德森在掌舵 10 年后最近任命了《奥地利历史年鉴》的编辑职位。他为学术界服务的结果是一本巧妙地综合了关于君主制的新工作和研究的书，然后能够提供对哈布斯堡历史的全新和修订的解释。贾德森的书旨在打破和摧毁长期以来一直以哈布斯堡帝国为特征的专制主义和无政府主义叙事，同时还提供了一部历史重新定位的作品，实际上将这个伟大的土地帝国更多地融入了更广泛的欧洲历史。因此，这本书不是教科书，也不是通史——尽管可以这样阅读。贾德森的“新历史”在叙事和分析部分之间巧妙地移动时，无视流派 同时还提供了历史重新定位的作品，实际上将这个伟大的土地帝国更多地融入了更广泛的欧洲历史。因此，这本书不是教科书，也不是通史——尽管可以这样阅读。贾德森的“新历史”在叙事和分析部分之间巧妙地移动时，无视流派 同时还提供了历史重新定位的作品，实际上将这个伟大的土地帝国更多地融入了更广泛的欧洲历史。因此，这本书不是教科书，也不是通史——尽管可以这样阅读。贾德森的“新历史”在叙事和分析部分之间巧妙地移动时，无视流派