Napoleon: A Political Life
Steven Englund
Winner of the J. Russell Major Prize, American Historical Association
Best Book on the First Empire by a Foreigner, Napoleon Foundation
“Englund has written a most distinguished book recounting Bonaparte’s life with clarity and ease…This magnificent book tells us much that we did not know and gives us a great deal to think about.”—Douglas Johnson, Los Angeles Times Book Review
“Englund, in his lively biography…seeks less to rehabilitate Napoleon’s reputation and legacy than to provide readers with a fuller view of the man and his actions.”—Paula Friedman, New York Times
“Napoleon: A Political Life is a veritable tour de force: the general reader will enjoy it immensely, and learn a great deal from it. But the book also has much to offer historians of modern France.”—Sudhir Hazareesingh, Times Literary Supplement
“Englund’s incisive forays into political theory don’t diminish the force of his narrative, which impressively conveys the epochal changes confronting both France and Europe…A strikingly argued biography.”—Matthew Price, Washington Post
This sophisticated and masterful biography brings new and remarkable analysis to the study of modern history’s most famous general and statesman. As Englund charts Napoleon’s dramatic rise and fall—from his Corsican boyhood, his French education, his astonishing military victories and no less astonishing acts of reform as First Consul (1799–1804) to his controversial record as Emperor and, finally, to his exile and death—he explores the unprecedented power Napoleon maintains over the popular imagination.
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About Steven Englund
Reviews for Napoleon: A Political Life
David A. Bell
The Nation
Englund has written a most distinguished book recounting Bonaparte’s life with clarity and ease… This magnificent book tells us much that we did not know and gives us a great deal to think about.
Douglas Johnson
Los Angeles Times Book Review
Englund, in his lively biography…seeks less to rehabilitate Napoleon’s reputation and legacy than to provide readers with a fuller view of the man and his actions.
Paula Friedman
New York Times
Napoleon: A Political Life is a veritable tour de force: the general reader will enjoy it immensely, and learn a great deal from it. But the book also has much to offer historians of modern France.
Sudhir Hazareesingh
Times Literary Supplement
Englund’s incisive forays into political theory don’t diminish the force of his narrative, which impressively conveys the epochal changes confronting both France and Europe… A strikingly argued biography.
Matthew Price
Washington Post
Englund’s luminous prose, and, yes, his romanticism, allow him to appreciate a quality that was central to Napoleonic experience, but which has virtually disappeared from contemporary political life, namely, grandeur… By far the best biography currently available.
David A. Bell
The New Republic
Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821) has inspired countless films, plays and books—five biographies since 1997 alone. This one is a marvelous read, all 575 pages of it, even if you’re not a historian. As a political biography, it looks at the man’s motives rather than at the details of his battles… This is a sophisticated, often witty biography. Englund sweeps across a brilliantly crowded canvas with clarity and dash, and he enriches his own fine writing with Napoleon’s pithy aphorisms and the tart remarks of his contemporaries.
Barbara Black
Montreal Gazette
It is Napoleon’s politics, not explicitly his battles, that interest this biographer, who subtitles his study A Political Life… His is no narrow study of how those in politics operate, hang on to power, or scratch each others’ backs… All things considered, this is the best of the recent crop of Napoleonic biographies.
David P. Jordan
Journal of Modern History