This book is, of course, chaotic, cruel and inconsistent, just like the time it is written about. But I sincerely hope, my reader, that you will at least slightly discover for yourself that great and terrible time, where the sweetness of speech so often turned into the bitterness of poison or the coldness of steel. And where great people created both amazing beauty and incomprehensible cruelty. Where passion only shaded love, and hopeless suffering suddenly turned into bright happiness. This world of contrasts, which is difficult to believe, but which really existed. So much time has passed since then. Everything has changed. And nothing has changed.