Napoleon: A Biography

all good says it all ....no surprises or disappointments !!

I had been wanting to get around to reading a biography of Napoleon, and after searching the books reviews and comments on the internet, particularly this site, I chose this one by McLynn. I was over all impressed. It's not easy to capture such an immense figure who fought sixty major battles, had a couple of dozen field marshals, ruled on and off for 20 years, and had a bunch of siblings (four brothers, three sisters), two wives, and countless mistresses with seemingly everyone hopping in and out of bed with everyone. So McLynn does a pretty good job of capturing it all and presenting it to you. But I do have some peeves. He engages in way too much psychobabble about N's oedipal, misogynistic, and oriental complexes. There are very few maps. If you are going to spend so much time talking about the campaign in Egypt, a map would be nice, likewise the campaign in Spain which N didn't even personally participate in was covered in detail with no map of Spain. In fact, a map of France would have been nice considering all the time the author tells you of N's processions and maneuvers from town to town. There is a map of the Russian campaign, but as luck would have it, a lot of the action seemed to take place at the center fold on the map between facing pages (not sure how you prevent that). It would also be nice if the author included a graphic time line, and a family tree or list of N's relatives and spouses, that the reader can refer back to. Unfortunately neither was included.The author devotes chapters to aspects of France under N such as its economy, culture, education, law, political system etc. But I sometimes got annoyed since it was done in way that interrupted the narrative. Likewise, all the analysis of N's personality throughout, led me to want to say "get on with the story"! All of N's marshals and diplomats are either placed on pedestals or the in the doghouse with adjectives such as good, bad, worthless, or treacherous. And McLynn has some dubious opinions. The Russian peasants who rose against N's Grand Army were described as really not hating the French, it was just that they had no way of getting get back at their Russian overseers, so they "projected" their anger unto the French! Near the end, while N is a prisoner at St. Helena, the author seems to concentrate solely on N's physical state and the relations with captors and his staff. I had thought this was when N accomplished some important writing and interviews, looking back at his career...this aspect was barely touched on. The author's lengthy analysis of why he thinks N was poisoned by arsenic belongs more in a peer reviewed journal. At the very end the author presents a chapter of "conclusions" on N, weighing him against Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Castro etc, that I thought was sophomoric and forced. The reader would have been better served by an epilogue that told something of what happened afterwards to N's relatives and other key players,and their descendents. This was entirely left out. He mentions in a single by the way sentence that both Marshals Ney and Murrat had been executed (it made N sad).The author assumes the reader to have a wide ranging view of history. For example, he compares N to "Tamerlane, who at Angora in 1402 overwhelmed the Ottoman Turks under Bayazid, fresh from his triumph over the flower of Christian chivalry at Nicopolis". Huh? Also the author has an elegant vocabulary, and frequently uses french sayings in italics that had me constantly turning to my IPAD.On the plus side the book delivers what it promises, a good overview of Napoleon's life and associated events. McLynn writes in an opinionated, breezy, readable style that I found enjoyable. So I do recommend the book, but there are caveats.Stanley R. Schneider

McLynn knows his stuff inside out! Unfortunately, the novice or intermediate academist in the Napoleonic era may not know it as well. Meaning, although McLean writes in an interesting style, much of it involves details that are not explained well enough to a novice of this era and Napolean. He writes about the intimate details of Napolean, Josephine, Joseph, countless other characters and their mistresses and paramours. He uses many lines of quotations and letters that are not footnoted, but gives the multiple references for each chapter at the end of the book. He describes Napolean's juxtaposition in and after the French Revolution marvelously. I think I finally understand how Napolean fit in to the revolution and what happened in France during and afterward. Although the revolution is not the focus of any of the book. McLynn does not go into much military detail about any of Napolean's campaigns, just the basics. Napolean's grand strategy and tactics seems to be emphasized. I was dissapointed in the lack of maps. I found 3 only, 1 of Europe, 1 of Austerlitz, and 1 of the Russia campaign. I did enjoy reading the book and I learned a lot. It could have been better with more maps and a little more explanation about the concomitant 18th century European cultures and world events. The best aspects of the book were the many short interpretations of the just described events found in each chapter by an expert like Frank McLynn. Thank you for writing it!

Mr. McLynn's book confirms my long held view that a fair account of a great man's life (well, shall we say a famous man, because opinions on Napoleon's supposed greatness may differ...) is better approached through a biographer who does not emanate from the same country. Although I read somewhere that Mr. McLynn is supposed to be "worshipping at the shrine", I found his biography thoroughly fair and balanced, very well written, constantly interesting and free of the rubbish very often found in French books on Napoleon. For sure, there are some Freudian explanations of Napoleon's attitudes, which appear somewhat speculative (why, for example, should the young Bonaparte have been "ambivalent" towards Louis XVI just because of his supposed attitude toward a protector who may or may not have gone to bed with Laetizia Buonaparte?). Other points are funny and entertaining, such as a comparison between the infamous Fouché and....J. Edgar HOOVER!!Napoleon's military skills are frankly acknowledged, but so are his tendencies to sudden depression and the story of his campaigns is told with precision, yet the reader is never lost in the minutiae of some strategy. One may have wished for a few more maps but here is a very good biography, easily read, well written and entertaining, which can be highly recommended to anyone with a general interest in this strange Corsican, whose similarities with his sinister twentieth century successor (Adolf Hitler) are indeed striking.

Just about everything that can be known about Napoleon (exept perhaps whether he was poisoned) are known today. So this book adds little value in terms of historical importance. Given this, I put higher emphasis on the readabilty and the entertainment value of the book. Although not badly written, I felt the writing could have been more salacious. It is written somewhat like a college history textbook. More than a few times, I put this book down and fell asleep. Very few lives have been as remarkable and as interesting as Napoleon's. This book is a classic case in which the author fails to emphasize on the interesting aspects of his life (his rise, historical significance, brilliance, lovers, marriage life, and how people worshipped him etc). Instead, each aspect of his life seems to be given even distribution. The book could have had more sizzle without compromising historical integrity.