Introduction by Peter Paret

1. Frederick and His Age: The System of Absolutism
2. The Brandenburg-Prussian Heritage
3. The Development of Frederick's Personality
4. The King's View of the World
5. The King's View of the State
6. The Conquest of Silesia
7. Maintenance of Prussia's New Power
8. Frederician Warfare
9. The Character of Frederician Government and Society
10. The Old King: Foreign Policy in the Last Decades of His Reign

“Ritter’s book is complex, subtle, and scholarly, and deserves to be read two or three times. . . There is no aspect of Frederick’s government or wars that Ritter does not analyze with subtlety and usually with conviction.”—New York Review of Books

"Occasionally in historical literature the profession is treated to a work which transcends the bounds of raw, everyday history to assume the dimensions of a great piece of art. This little volume by the late Rita is such a work. There are no footnotes other than a parenthesized phrase here and there. Dates are kept to a minimum, and, but for the famous—almost traditional—portrait by Anton Graph, there are no illustrations, maps, or charts. And yet the fortunate reader will put down the book with a considerably better comprehension of the Great Frederick than he might gain from reading Drones, Carlyle, or Reddaway. He will probably also have a better understanding of the 18th-century Prussia than from a study of Treitschke or Rank. The book is the product of a long lifetime of dedication and scholarship. Parrot's translation (based on the third edition) is the felicitous marriage of an inspired translation and a profound comprehension of Rioter's intentions. The little book replaces nothing, and yet in a sense, it supersedes everything written."—Choice

"This book is not a detailed account of a man and his times in the usual sense, but a critical examination of Frederick the Great, the institutions of absolutism, the difference between Germany's past and that of its western neighbors. Dr. Rita chronicles Frederick's life, his foreign and domestic policies, his military doctrines, and his beliefs and ideas."—Military Affairs