«Captivating ... this will be his masterpiece» - Andrew Roberts, The New York Times

«For the grand, the bold, and the fascinating, it is impossible to ignore Kissinger» - John Bew, New Statesman, Books of the Year

«This is an exceptional history of the modern world as well as a biography of Kissinger ... a work of art» - William Shawcross, The Times

No American statesman has been both so praised and so reviled as Henry Kissinger. Hailed by some as the “indispensable man” whose advice has been sought by every president from John F. Kennedy to George W. Bush, Kissinger has also attracted immense hostility from detractors who have dubbed him an amoral Machiavellian—the ultimate “realist.” In this remarkable new book, the first of two volumes, Niall Ferguson has created an extraordinary panorama of Kissinger’s world and a paradigm-shattering reassessment of the man. Only through knowing Kissinger’s early life (as a Jew in Hitler’s Germany, a poor immigrant in New York, a soldier in the Battle of the Bulge, a Nazi interrogator, and a student of history at Harvard) can we understand his debt to the philosophy of idealism. And only by tracing his rise, fall, and then resurrection as an adviser to Kennedy, Nelson Rockefeller, and, finally, Richard Nixon, can we appreciate the magnitude of his contribution to the theory of diplomacy, grand strategy, and nuclear deterrence. Drawing not only on Kissinger's hitherto closed private papers but also on documents from more than a hundred archives around the world, this biography is Niall Ferguson's masterpiece.