Napoleon: A Life by Paul Johnson (English) Paperback Book

Description: Napoleon by Paul Johnson Offering a vivid look at the life of the strategist, general, and dictator who conquered much of Europe, this volume follows Napoleon from the barren island of Corsica to his exile and death, revealing the source of his ferocious ambition. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description From New York Times bestselling author Paul Johnson, "a very readable and entertaining biography" (The Washington Post) about one of the most important figures in modern European history: Napoleon Bonaparte In an ideal pairing of author and subject, the magisterial historian Paul Johnson offers a vivid look at the life of the strategist, general, and dictator who conquered much of Europe. Following Napoleon from the barren island of Corsica to his early training in Paris, from his meteoric victories and military dictatorship to his exile and death, Johnson examines the origins of his ferocious ambition. In Napoleons quest for power, Johnson sees a realist unfettered by patriotism or ideology. And he recognizes Bonapartes violent legacy in the totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century. Napoleon is a magnificent work that bears witness to one individuals ability to work his will on history. Author Biography Paul Johnsons many books, including A History of Christianity, A History of the Jews, Modern Times, Churchill, and Napoleon: A Penguin Life, have been hailed as masterpieces of historical analysis. He is a regular columnist for Forbes and The Spectator, and his work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and many others publications. He lives in London. Table of Contents IntroductionChapter One: The Corsican BackgroundChapter Two: Revolutionary, General, Consul, EmperorChapter Three: The Master of the BattlefieldChapter Four: The Flawed and Fragile EmpireChapter Five: The Graveyards of EuropeChapter Six: Elba and WaterlooChapter Seven: The Long Good-byeFurther Reading Review Praise for Napoleon by Paul Johnson: "Paul Johnson . . . is a historian at the top his game. His judgments are sure. His historical range is sweeping. His storytelling is crisp and his writing elegant."—The Baltimore Sun "The selection of the venerable British historian . . . Paul Johnson to write on Napoleon . . . has turned out to be a wise one: Johnson is succinct, critical, and deeply skeptical of the Napoleonic legend."—The Atlantic Monthly "This is a jewel of a book; comprehensive, brief, and passionate."—The Economist "Johnson provides an excellent overview . . . [He] presents a concise appraisal of Napoleons career and a precise understanding of his enigmatic character."—Booklist "[A] succinct yet lively biography . . . very readable and entertaining."—The Washington Post Long Description A bestselling historians vigorous and searching biography of the towering figure who cast his shadow over two centuries In an ideal pairing of author and subject, the magisterial historian Paul Johnson offers a vivid look at the life of the strategist, general, and dictator who conquered much of Europe. Following Napoleon from the barren island of Corsica to his early training in Paris, from his meteoric victories and military dictatorship to his exile and death, Johnson examines the origins of his ferocious ambition. In Napoleons quest for power, he sees a realist unfettered by loyalty or ideology; in his violent legacy, a model for the totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century. "Napoleon" is dramatic testimony to a single individuals ability to work his will on history. Review Quote Praise for Napoleon by Paul Johnson: Excerpt from Book Introduction Few individuals have had more impact on history than Napoleon Bonaparte. He is the grandest possible refutation of those determinists who hold that events are governed by forces, classes, economics, and geography rather than by the powerful wills of men and women. Though Bonaparte exercised power only for a decade and a half, his impact on the future lasted until nearly the end of the twentieth century, almost two hundred years after his death. Indeed, his influence may not yet be spent. People love reading about him and his spectacular rise, just as in Roman and medieval times they read about Alexander. And they ponder the question: Might I, in comparable circumstances, have done as well? Few persons of ambition have failed to see Bonaparte as an exemplar or a spur. It is significant how many of those who exercise various forms of power, and wish for more-media tycoons, for example-have decked their offices or even their persons with Napoleonic memorabilia. It is one of the contentions of this book that Bonaparte was not an ideologue but an opportunist who seized on the accident of the French Revolution to propel himself into supreme power. I say "accident" because the example of Britain and the Scandinavian countries showed that all the desirable reforms that the French radicals brought about by force and blood could have been achieved by peaceful means. As it was, the horrific course of the Revolution led, as was almost inevitable, to absolutism, of which Bonaparte was the beneficiary. And once installed in power he relentlessly sought further power by extending his rule to encompass most of Europe. It does not seem to have occurred to him to study the example of his older contemporary George Washington, who translated military victory into civil progress and renounced the rule of force in favor of the rule of law. But Bonaparte always put his trust in bayonets and cannon. In the end, force was the only language he understood, and in the end it pronounced a hostile judgment on him. In the meantime, though, Bonaparte unleashed on Europe the most destructive wars the continent had ever experienced. For the first time, large-scale conscription played a notable part in swelling the armies, and their encounters became battles of entire nations. As the wars proceeded, the military casualties increased relentlessly, but the civilian populations also suffered in growing measure. First Italy, then Central Europe, finally Spain and Russia became victims of Bonapartes wars of conquest. The German-speaking lands in particular were fought over again and again, and the eventual revulsion against Bonaparte played a critical part in creating a spirit of German nationalism that was to become aggressive and threatening itself. A new concept of total warfare was born, and alongside it grew other institutions: the secret police, large-scale professional espionage, government propaganda machines, and the faking of supposedly democratic movements, elections, and plebiscites. France herself, though fought over only in the final phases of the wars, suffered bitterly, and some of her losses were permanent. At a time when other European populations were growing fast, Frances slowed down and began to stagnate, and in due course France inevitably began to slip from her position as the leading power in Europe to second-class status-that was Bonapartes true legacy to the country he adopted. The statesmen who gathered in Vienna after the military collapse of Bonapartist France were determined to restore not only the old legitimist thrones but, so far as they could, the old conventions and rules of law that had kept the peace, or limited the impact of hostilities when war broke out. The Congress of Vienna must be regarded as one of the most successful peace settlements in history. With some exceptions, it determined the frontiers of Europe for a century, and though it did not prevent all European wars, it made a general conflagration far less likely. The nineteenth century was, in general, a time of peace, progress, and prosperity in Europe, until the old system finally broke down in 1914-18. Thereafter, however, the Bonapartist legacy, aided by Frances decision to treat the dead ruler as a national hero and exemplar to the world, came into its own. The First World War itself was total warfare of the type Bonapartes methods adumbrated, and in the political anarchy that emerged from it, a new brand of ideological dictator took Bonapartes methods of government as a model, first in Russia, then in Italy, and finally in Germany, with many smaller countries following suit. The totalitarian state of the twentieth century was the ultimate progeny of the Napoleonic reality and myth. It is right, therefore, that we should study Bonapartes spectacular career unromantically, skeptically, and searchingly. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, anxious as we are to avoid the tragic mistakes of the twentieth, we must learn from Bonapartes life what to fear and what to avoid. Chapter One The Corsican Background Napoleon Bonaparte was born on 15 August 1769 at Ajaccio on the island of Corsica. It is a paradox that this man who thought in terms of conquering entire continents should have had his life bounded by three islands: Corsica, less than half the size of Wales, no bigger than Vermont; Elba, much smaller, where a parody of his glory was enacted; and Saint Helena, a mere speck on the ocean, his death-prison. It was a vintage time to be born: 1769 was also the birth year of Bonapartes nemesis, the duke of Wellington, and the politician who backed him, Viscount Castlereagh; and in and around this date were born many of the greatest spirits of the coming age: Chateaubriand and Madame de Stal, two more of Bonapartes dedicated enemies; Wordsworth and Coleridge, who cursed him in prose and verse; Beethoven, who dedicated his Eroica Symphony to the First Consul, then tore out the page in anger when he became emperor; and a host of others-Hegel and Schlegel, Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams, George Canning, Metternich, and Sir Walter Scott. It was a vintage year in other ways. The Industrial Revolution was just taking off in Britain, with textiles leading the way; and Captain Cook, landing at Botany Bay, brought the final continent, Australasia, into the Wests compass. But Corsica was very remote from these and other great events. It was poor, wild, neglected, exploited, politically and economically insignificant. Exactly a hundred years later, the English artist Edward Lear descended on the island with his sketching materials and produced a scintillating visual record of its appearance, unchanged in a century: spiny, vertiginous mountains, almost impenetrable pine forests, vast fields of rocks and rare cataracts, and endless barren scrubland, known locally as le maquis, a word that was to become synonymous with guerrilla country. Its total income was tiny. The courts of Europe regarded it as almost worthless. The British took it twice in the eighteenth century, and twice relinquished it as more trouble than it was worth. It had belonged for hundreds of years to the Italian city-state of Genoa, which had acquired it in the age when Genoa was, next to Venice, the richest maritime power in the Mediterranean. But Genoese rule had never penetrated much inland from the sea towns, Bastia, Calvi, Bonifaccio, and Ajaccio. There was no profit in it. So local insurgents ruled the interior and occasionally struck at the walled coastal towns. In the 1760s, increasingly weak Genoa turned to the French for assistance, which the French provided. But they disagreed with Genoas policy of allowing in the hated Jesuits, banned in France. They withdrew their forces, and in 1767 the insurgents took Ajaccio. For Genoa, this was the last straw, and in 1768 it sold the entire island to France by treaty, in return for a paltry sum. This was a critical event for Bonaparte for, born the next year, he automatically became a French citizen. Not everyone despised Corsica. In his Du contrat social (1762), Jean-Jacques Rousseau remarked that, while government corruption was universal in Europe, one tiny country was still capable of legislating against it, in a spirit of primitive simplicity. That was Corsica, and he added that he had a presentiment that this island of nature would one day astonish Europe. In consequence, the sage was invited by the insurgents to come to Corsica and draw up a constitution, which would serve when they won their independence by the sword. He did not go. But he persuaded his young friend James Boswell, the future biographer of Dr. Samuel Johnson, to include the island in his grand tour, and arranged for him to see the leader of the insurgents, Pasquale Paoli, who bore the title of "General of the People." Boswell went, formed a lifelong admiration and friendship for Paoli, and left a vivid record of his journey, both in his diaries and in the book about Corsica he published on his return to Britain. The book made him famous-he was known as "Corsica Boswell"-and it was widely read in Europe. Among his readers was the young Bonaparte. It gave him ideas. Not that Bonaparte ever had the ambition to become Corsicas liberator. That was Paolis thankless role, and a small-time part at best. To people of Bonapartes background, the future lay not inland but outward-on the high seas and the great landmasses beyond. People moved into and out of Corsica all the time. Among the ambitious of the coastal towns, there was no such thing as the timeless stability of the interior. The Bonapartes originally came from the minor nobility of sixteenth-century Tuscany. In Ajaccio they had become, as it were, hereditary lawyers, while retaining their titles of nobility, sixteen quarterings (ancestors with titles of nobility), and so forth. They operated on a Details ISBN0143037455 Author Paul Johnson Short Title NAPOLEON Language English ISBN-10 0143037455 ISBN-13 9780143037453 Media Book Format Paperback DEWEY B Year 2006 Audience Age 14-18 Subtitle A Life DOI 10.1604/9780143037453 Place of Publication New York, NY Country of Publication United States AU Release Date 2006-05-02 NZ Release Date 2006-05-02 US Release Date 2006-05-02 UK Release Date 2006-05-02 Pages 208 Publisher Penguin Putnam Inc Publication Date 2006-05-02 Imprint Penguin USA Audience General We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:6755927;

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