Radetzkymarsch

Joseph Roth's fiction
Dec 5th 2002 From The Economist print edition

IN A lull at the battle of Solferino in 1859, the young emperor, Franz Joseph, asks for a spy-glass to survey the field. Aghast, an infantry lieutenant, Joseph Trotta, hurls him to the ground as French and Italian marksmen open fire on the figure who has so foolishly identified himself as the Austrian commander. Trotta, the son of a Slovene watchman, takes a bullet in the shoulder. In gratitude, the emperor promotes and ennobles him. So opens one of the gravest and grandest of all 19th-century novels written in the 20th century.
The story traces the varying fortunes of the Trotta family. The hero of Solferino, a stranger to the social heights, grows eccentric. His son, a cautious district commissioner, lives dutifully in the paternal shadow, hoping that his own son, Carl Joseph, a well-meaning but feckless young officer, will somehow justify the newly glorious Trotta name. …

I actually have the book (It was recommended in the trabel book on Vienna, so I was tepted to buy it). Die Frage ist blos--- The quiestion is only--- when do I read it?

I am browsing through The Economist articles to find new material for classes, and found this excerpt by chance (all the interesting articles seem to have premium status).