Majestic and lyrically written, The Conquest of Nature traces the rise of Germany through the development of water and landscape. David Blackbourn begins his morality tale in the mid-1700s, with the epic story of Frederick the Great, who attempted by importing the great scientific minds of the West and by harnessing the power of his army to transform the uninhabitable marshlands of his scattered kingdom into a modern state. Chronicling the great engineering...