Radetzky March (novel)

Radetzky March

Author	Joseph Roth
Original title	Radetzkymarsch
Country	Austria
Language	German
Genre	Novel
Publication date	1932
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
ISBN	(English translation by Joachim Neugroschel)
OCLC	124041549
Followed by	The Emperor's Tomb

Radetzky March (German: Radetzkymarsch) is a 1932 novel by Joseph Roth chronicling the decline and fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire via the story of the Trotta family. Radetzkymarsch is an early example of a story that features the recurring participation of a historical figure, in this case the Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria (1830–1916). Roth continues his account of the Trotta family to the time of the Anschluss in his The Emperor's Tomb (Kapuzinergruft, 1938). The novel was published in English translation in 1933, and in a new, more literal, translation in 1995.

Radetzky March relates the stories of three generations of the Trotta family, professional Austro-Hungarian soldiers and career bureaucrats of Slovenian origin — from their zenith during the empire to the nadir and breakup of that world during and after the First World War. In 1859, the Austrian Empire (1804–67) was fighting the Second War of Italian Independence (29 April – 11 July 1859), against French and Italian belligerents: Napoleon III of France, the Emperor of the French, and the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia.

In northern Italy, during the Battle of Solferino (24 June 1859), the well-intentioned, but blundering, Emperor Franz Joseph I, and his cavalry cohort, are almost killed; to thwart snipers, Infantry Lieutenant Trotta topples the Emperor from his horse. The Emperor awards Lt. Trotta the Order of Maria Theresa and ennobles him. Elevation to the nobility ultimately leads to the Trotta family’s ruination, paralleling the imperial collapse of Austria-Hungary (1867–1918).