Hello, I am currently doing a research paper on Prussia and the factors that made Prussia so successful. I was wondering if there are any necessary books to read about Prussia.
You may already have come across it, but I rate Christopher Clark's Iron Kingdom very highly. It's one of the definitive recent works on the history of Prussia, and Clark is one of the premier scholars of German history working today. As a general overview of Prussia from 1600 through to the partition of Germany after the Second World War, it's a great read. It's also pretty strongly focused on Prussia as an independent state; the period from German unification to the end of the Third Reich, and the gradual decline of Prussian culture and institutions, is only examined in the final two chapters.
Can you talk about what sources/books you already have found?