#book is called A Life: Napoleon Bonaparte by Alan Schom | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

napoleondidthat · 7 years

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Could you recommend books about Napoleon that focus on him as a person? There are so many about his military campaigns.

The struggle is real. Napoleon, of course, is primarily known for his campaigns, Napoleonic warfare and all the politics that go with that. If you’re wanting to get behind all that, it can be difficult. I’ve studied Napoleon for 25 plus years and I was never into the military side of his history. So with my experiences behind me, here’s what I suggest.

1. The Memoirs.

Memoirs are always a good place to start, if you can track them down. Yes, some are faulty, some aren’t accurate, but that doesn’t make them total garbage either. It’s just important to do some research if you can on the writer, know their bias and judge accordingly. Of course, this should be done with the memoirs written today, both auto and not. Memoirs are always going to contain biases and points of views of their writers and their agendas. Welcome to History!

You can break down your memoirs into sections. There are the military memoirs (de Segur, Caulaincourt etc). There will be moments of what I will term “candid life” but be prepared to wade through a lot of military (de Segur was aide-de-camp to Napoleon and wrote about the Russian Campaign) and statesmanship (Caulaincourt was Ambassador to Russia among other things and wrote extensively on Russia as well as the whole political scene after Russia).

There is the court memoirs. These can be a bit more candid but still can have biases of course. Duchess d’Abrantes (Junot) wrote a great set of memoirs that unfortunately are more than likely not all true but make entertaining reading. Claire de Remusat (lady in waiting to Josephine) wrote a set of memoirs but there is some belief that Talleyrand influenced her perhaps and her view of Napoleon isn’t that great. Napoleon’s secretaries wrote memoirs (Bourrienne, Meneval, Fain). Bourrienne is suspect because he was fired from Napoleon’s cabinet due to money issues and he may have an ax to grind. However, he is also one of the few who knew Napoleon as a “kid” due to their years in military school together. Meneval is considered a pretty solid source for the most part and Fain’s memoirs don’t get the attention as much as the other two, but having read them, they’re decent. There will also be political and military matters here of course but not as constant as the pure military memoirs. Constant (Napoleon’s valet) wrote memoirs along with Roustam and St. Denis (bodyguard/valet). There is some question on those and some (like in Roustam’s case) who become apologists for why they left when they left and how it’s really not their fault. Same goes for the mistress memoirs or accounts that are out there. But again, this goes back to the problem with any set of memoirs past or present.

There are the family memoirs…namely Lucien Bonaparte and Hortense de Beauharnais. Lucien, who happens to be my very favorite Bonaparte outside of Napoleon, of course had a very volatile relationship with Napoleon, keep that in mind. Hortense, who happened to be married to my least liked Bonaparte, had a legacy and reputation to protect as well as that of her brother, mother and children.

Last set we’ll call the St. Helena memoirs. I have four sets of St. Helena memoirs (O’Meara, Bertrand, Gourgaud, Marchand). Bertrand is very dry, if you like reading status reports, Bertrand is your guy. He doesn’t put a lot of emotion one way or another into his views, so that may give them a bit more accuracy. O’Meara was an English/Scottish doctor and Gourgaud is the dramatic, over the top, want-to-be best friend of Napoleon. Marchand (Napoleon’s last valet) writes a great memoir that are trusted for the most part. Antommachi is suspect for various reasons in his memoirs.

I am only listing a few here, off the top of my head, but the short version of this would be, memoirs are still your best go-to source (and where most biographies get their content). Just remember that when you read them, you are getting agendas and personalities, just as you do in real life.

2. Biographies

There’s scores of these of course. It’s an old one but I feel pretty good biography on Napoleon is “Napoleon” by Emil Ludwig. Vincent Cronin’s biography is also good. I wouldn’t recommend Alan Schom’s biography as it tends to be a bit titled in the anti-Napoleon line. Some historian’s obviously take a stance on where they see Napoleon and find information that confirms their stance, which is fine. They’re presenting an argument, these are pretty easy to spot. And of course, for every historian that wants to paint Napoleon an ogre, there is one who wants to paint him a saint. Those are as easy to see and obviously, like memoirs, need to be taken into consideration. Biographies can be either a mixture of personality and poli-sci or can favor one over the other.

3.Misc.

These books are probably my favorite. Try to find books that aren’t 100% biography but break down into sections of a life or a personality. If you want to see Napoleon outside of a military camp, sometimes you have to skip the Napoleon biographies and jump into the biographies of the family. Felix Markham and Theo Aronson (author of “The Golden Bees”) both wrote biographies on the Bonapartes as a family. There are biographies written on the various siblings (all of them in fact) that will show more personal sides to Napoleon as son and brother and not so much as commander-in-chief. R. F. Delderfield wrote a book called “Napoleon in Love” which concentrates only on Napoleon’s love life and there have been several books written by various authors (Octave Aubry for example wrote a book titled “Private Life of Napoleon”). Scores have been written about Josephine, and even if you don’t have a primary interest in her or her life, the books dedicated to her are a good place to find Napoleon’s personality more. And there is a ton of books written on the marriages (more on Josephine as wife probably) that are good places to find the more personal side to Napoleon. (Theo Aronson “Josephine and Napoleon; A Love Story.” Frances Mossiker “Napoleon and Josephine; An Improbable Marriage.” Evangeline Bruce “Napoleon and Josephine; A Biography of a Marriage”, to name but a few). Be prepared for agendas there too, on who was the better spouse, who manipulated who, who was ultimately to blame for what. Check out the biographies done on the mistresses, the step-children, the children etc. as all places to find more personal history versus political history.

St. Helena also gives you the memoirs of Betsy Balcombe (there are several versions out there. A popular one is “St. Helena Story” by Dame Mabel Brookes who was a descendant of Balcombe’s). There are two books that show a more human side to Napoleon, one called “The Black Room at Longwood” by Jean Paul Kauffmann and the other is “The Emperor’s Last Island” but Julia Blackburn. Both of which I would recommend.

There are also books where authors have given Napoleon the main voice, one being “Napoleon on Napoleon”. But like memoirs, remember Napoleon himself had an agenda and a bias.

And lastly, there are some books that have focused purely on Napoleon as a personality. “Napoleon Against Himself” by Avner Falk is a biography written purely from a psychological point of view. I have the book “The Riddle of Napoleon” by Raoul Brice that I found an interesting read that is also written on a personality/psychology point of view.

These are but a small few. I didn’t even touch the “historical fiction” that authors have written that are based on their researches of source materials.

This may have turned out to be a more detailed account than what you were looking for. But I shortened as much as I could! If you like, and are willing to wait a week or so, I can generate a list of the books I have (but it’ll be a bit of time as my collection is rather big) that I found to be good. Of course, you’ll have to keep in mind that I am also giving only an opinion and that I will also be biased.

After you have read enough, you will be able to pick out the common themes and threads and find some truth.

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