Italy and the World War

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1920. First Edition [stated], presumed first printing. Hardcover. Good. Walter O. Reese and Emily Shaw Reese. xiii, [2], 422, [2] pages. Maps, Footnotes. Index. Cover has some wear and soiling. Corners bumped. Some edge soiling. Some page discoloration. Thomas Nelson Page (1853 - 1922) was a lawyer and American writer. He also served as the U.S. ambassador to Italy under the administration of President Woodrow Wilson during World War I. Admitted to the Virginia Bar Association, he practiced as a lawyer in Richmond between 1876 and 1893, and also began his writing career. Page popularized the plantation tradition genre of Southern writing, which told of an idealized version of life before the Civil War, with contented slaves working for beloved masters and their families. Page was popular amongst the Capital elite, and was regularly invited to socialize with politicians. President Woodrow Wilson, appointed Page as U.S. ambassador to Italy, he served between 1913 and 1919. Page wrote: "To understand fully Italy's relation to the great war, we must go back to the historic causes. To have a complete conception of the underlying principles and motives which controlled her action, one must have a reasonably complete knowledge of her relation to France and Austria during the period of the reconstruction of Europe---and especially during the last century. Where the problem is so complex, one must know the clew to find the true solution....Italy claims officially that she lost in the war a half-million men killed; that she had... nearly a million and a half more wounded, of whom some two hundred thousand are permanently disabled; and that she spent more of her wealth in proportion ... than any other of the Allies. That after efforts so heroic, losses so great, and sacrifices so immeasurable, she should be left with ... a feeling of injustice to her on the part of her former allies is...a malign fortune."