Charles I was crowned to administer the Empire that at that time set the pace for a world in which European sailors still dreamed of new places to colonize. Europe was the center of power and the rest of the continents were being drawn at the whim of the cartographers of the old continent.
In that world, the great Hispanic monarch faced all kinds of setbacks already known through the written legacy of History. But José Luis Corral, an impeccable connoisseur of all those historical vicissitudes, somehow humanizes the figure of the king.
Beyond the titles and formalities, the dates, the official documents and the evocative quotes, Carlos I of Spain and V of Germany (as we were always told at school) was also the son of the indomitable (more than crazy ) Juana and ended up marrying her cousin Isabel de Portugal. I say all this because History also leaves a trace of the most personal, of the king's feelings, of his way of acting and developing.
Knowing Carlos I beyond his strictly historical milestones should be a pleasant task for a historian, and surely José Luis Corral will have known how to capture that "way of being" that slides among all kinds of testimonies of the time, to better outline whether It fits the events and circumstances of the 40-year reign in which he resolved conflicts or led them to war.
Ultimately, The Austrias. Time in your hands, is a novel turned into an exhaustive account of the early years of the emperor, by the hand of this great teacher and connoisseur of history and its stories ...
You can now buy the novel The Austrias. Time in your hands, the new book by José Luis Corral, here: