Books on Napoleon

I read Napoleon: A life - it was a great book with fascinating insights.

For example, Napoleon's first big break came not particularly from outstanding competence but because, in the midst of the french revolution, all reputable officers had fled for the hills in fear of getting guillotined. Napoleon was one of the only halfway competent officers still around in Paris, so they picked him for a mission where he performed heroically.

Additionally, the myth that Napoleon only slept for 4 hours a night is both true in false. It's literally true, but he was known for falling asleep in the middle of roundtable meetings, and all those who were afraid of him didn't dare wake him - so his lieutenants just sat in silence for an hour while he dozed off!

Lastly, his infamous defeat in Russia was initially a sound plan - he was going to capture Moscow and spend the winter there - and he actually defeated the Russian army in combat, forcing them into a retreat. What was incredibly audacious of the Russians was that they burned their own capital city to the ground in order to prevent Napoleon from wintering there, which was incredibly brutal and unexpected. It's like the modern equivalent of American military command nuking NYC to prevent its federal gold reserves from being taking.

If anyone here wants more info regarding the French Revolution, I heartily recommend listening to the Revolutions podcast by Mike Duncan. He really goes into detail into the French Revolution and of course covers the period Of Napoléon.

I was just listening to an audiobook recording of Resolute Determination: Napoleon and the French Empire by Donald MG Sutherland, which was ok.

As someone almost completely ignorant of the history of the French Revolution and of Napoleon, I was surprised by a number of things:

First, that Napoleon was Corsican, and actually originally a militant Corsican nationalist, and not from the French mainland. He had an Italian accent for which he was made fun of. He wasn't a good orator, though he was a master of written French.

Second, that Napoleon was poverty stricken and completely unknown, though well read, before his rise to fame. Right up to the point of becoming emperor, he was greatly underestimated, even by some of the most perspicacious of minds, partially due to prejudices that might at first glance seem to be of his time and place, but many similar prejudices that could blind people to others' potential are alive and well even now.

Third and most depressing, was the brutality with which Napoleon, the soldiers under him, many in the Revolution and various wars acted, with the wanton slaughter of their enemies, prisoners, and civilians.

Listening to this just made me ever more convinced that revolutions only bring endless bloodshed, cruelty, and sorrow.

I haven't read Andrew Roberts's book but picked up and enjoyed an even more recent bio by Adam Zamoyski also titled Napoleon: A Life. It's much less focused on the military details and is framed more like the story of an ambitious Corsican family, centered on its very successful son.

> Britain and France are continuously at war from 1803 onwards until Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo in 1815, a period of war unmatched in any of the other coalitions. What do you think is the main motivation for why the Brits are so uncompromising?

This actually short-changes how much Britain and France actually fought during this time. This is the tail end of what some historians call the Second Hundred Years' War:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Hundred_Years%27_War

Here is the list of conflicts during that time

Nine Years' War (1688–1697)

War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1714)

War of the Austrian Succession (1742–1748)

Father Le Loutre's War (1749–1755)

2nd Carnatic War (1749–1754)

Seven Years' War (1756–1763)

Anglo-French War (1778–1783)

French Revolutionary Wars (1792–1802)

Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815)

Also, for those interested in the military side, check out Swords Around a Throne, John Elting’s excruciatingly detailed history of the Grande Armee, or anything by Brent Nosworthy.

Napoleon is underrated not only as a military general, but as a builder of civilization and a visionary of what it could be. Too often he's just seen as another general who was pretty good during that time when warfare was very orderly and everyone wore garish uniform. But countries were scared of him, deftly scared of him (especially Great Britain, but mainly because they didn't want another country that wanted to conquer the world as much as they did). There's a reason why Europe went ~100 years without another continent-wide war.