”Den olycklige Kuylenstierna”: Om ett socialt nätverk och en omstridd Karl XII-biograf

Abstract

”The unfortunate Kuylenstierna”: A historical revaluation of King Charles XII in danger due to an indiscreet biography

In the early 20th century several historians and military officers sought to shed new light on the actions of the Swedish warrior king Charles XII (1682–1718). In 1910, they founded an academy – Karolinska förbundet – to promote the memory of the sovereign ruler. Its members undoubtedly had a political agenda – they hoped that an awakened interest in the life of Charles XII would affect public opinion and lead to a mobilisation of the Swedish armed forces.

The new school dismissed the previous studies as unscientific and biased. The popular storyteller Anders Fryxell and author August Strindberg both belonged to this so called ”old school”, which held the king ultimately responsible for the collapse of the Swedish Empire.

In 1912, Oswald Kuylenstierna, a Swedish army captain connected to the new school in the study of Charles XII, published his popularly written book Charles XII: His destiny and personality (originally: Karl XII: Hans öde och personlighet). The author’s aim was to summarise the results of the latest research. But some of the leading members of the new school dismissed Kuylenstierna’s book, publicly as well as privately. They thoroughly criticised his work in newspapers and in private correspondence. The captain was called ”a fool” and ”the unfortunate Kuylenstierna”. According to some reviews, sympathetic to the new school, the book was full of misleading facts and statements, while other more independent critics appreciated the work. Kuylenstierna presented the latest research that was to be regarded as purely scientific in a popular and thus unscientific manner. The biography was released way too early – well, several decades too early – stressed Professor Arthur Stille, and it jeopardised the whole revival of Charles XII.

Furthermore, in Kuylenstierna’s book, the king has too many flaws: the author fails to see the historical importance of Charles XII and his ingenious solutions to difficult political problems. Some critics even stated that the author of the biography in fact belonged to the old school, and not the new one. The two history professors Harald Hjärne and Arthur Stille, almost certainly the two greatest authorities within this particular historical field, had advised the author not to publish a biography at this stage. The time was not right – further research had to be done, especially in foreign archives. The captain went against the will of these two leading men. Thus, to his friends and colleagues he was ”the unfortunate Kuylenstierna”.