The extraordinary and amorphous Hapsburg Empire--"that ramshackle realm" as Lloyd George called it--extended from cultivated Vienna to the remote hamlets of the Ukrainian East, and comprised a wide mixture of peoples: Magyars, Czechs, Poles and Ruthenians, Slovenes, Croats. Mr. May discusses the many elements of this diverse realm, its society, culture, economy, politics, diplomacy, and great men; the burgeoning forces of nationalism which eventually were to tear the empire apart, and the reasons why it held together as long as it did--reasons which had much to do with the personalities at...