Napoleon: A Concise Biography

This was just what I was looking for. I didn't want all the detail in a 600 page book (tried a good one but only made it through a third of the book), but I also didn't want one that was over-simplified. This was just right. It reviews the important parts of his character and events of his life, and explains the historical context that allowed him to do what he did, including through his final downfall after Waterloo. I'm not a historian, but I love reading good history books. I put this right up there with the best ones I've read. I highly recommend this to anyone who wants to learn about Napoleon's life and times, and his place in history - without the time or inclination to read a 600 page book.

As promised in the title, this is truly a concise biography of Napoleon. It is beautifully written and eminently readable. I could hardly put it down. And not concise in simple terms like a children's book - it is truly comprehensive in in explaining his life and the evolving political situation of Europe at the time. The French Revolution in particular is elegantly explained. At one point the author compares the stages of Napoleon's life to various Greek myths; heroic and victorious Hercules in his early years, Icarus flying too close to the sun at his zenith, and Prometheus chained to an island rock at the end. It was these early sections that made me fall in love with the book. However, Napoleon's military genius and battle tactics are almost entirely glazed over. Obviously the goal is a concise volume, but most of us are drawn to Napoleon in the first place to understand how it was that he managed to win more battles - usually outnumbered - than any commander in history. The Trachenberg plan is not even mentioned. Not only was it instrumental to his downfall, but it clarifies how the allies viewed him as nearly invincible - even after Russia. I think this omission (and the conclusions toward the end) suggest much about the author: he is too much of a modernist to write an inspiring account of The God of War. He favors the "trends and forces" view of history and spills much ink on how Napoleon was allegedly pulled along by events outside his control. While the trends of the time certainly provided opportunities, Napoleon stunned the world for twenty years with the manner in which he continually capitalized on those opportunities. This author is a brilliant writer, and this book is a quick, enjoyable read. That is no easy task on such a complex topic. I struggled with how to rate this book. Ultimately, I recommend it as the best one I have yet found describing Napoleon's life in a reasonable number of pages - but please don't make it the only one you read.

Superb CD on the life of Napoleon. His military genius is explained through a concise chronicle of the battles and rise to power. His flair for showmanship and propaganda did much to create his success. A lesson for today. Highly recommended!

I picked-up this book because I wanted to review a historical character that had quite a significant and somewhat controversial impact. While there are a lot of books on Napoleon and Bonapartism is covered in a lot of historical and geopolitical text books, David A. Bell has written a focused book that sufficiently covers the man and his legacy with a sufficient level of detail to keep you engaged and well informed about his period in history.

Covers his subject well. But some of his interpretations do smack of pre-conceived bias. For instance he does not give the background to rhe 'massacre at Jaffa'. Napoleon had earlier freed Turkish prisoners of war, but after a later battle discovered his new prisoners of war included men he had freed earlier, who had vowed not to take up arms again. With no extra rations, this time around the circumstances of war left him with no choice but to put this new batch of POWs to the sword. Otherwise he would keep swelling the ranks of his enemies. The author also liberally quotes the discredited Bourrienne. Making you wonder about his other sources. It is quite strange how some historians keep painting Napoleon as a war monger while excusing the 'Allies who raised seven coalitions against France after the revolution. Napoleon was not even in power when the first two were launched. It is pretty clear that Napoleon or not, these 'Allies would not have rested until a Bourbon was placed back on the French throne. Napoleon's 'crime' was continually defeating these coalitions in battle, until eventually overcome by British money and Russian, Prussian and Austrian manpower. It is also ironic that Napoleon is continually referred to as a 'dictator, as if his enemies were modern liberal democracies. There is no question that the French under Napoleon enjoyed greater rights than any other country of the time except arguably Britain. Who can doubt that Russians - especially serfs - would have been far better off had they been conquered by the French and granted the Code Napoleon? His enemies were all hereditary monarchs who ruled by decree. Which other ruler of the time - Britain again accepted - gave the public a chance to vote for or against him? As for the dismissal by some historians of Napoleon's 'loaded plebiscites', well surely his acclamation by the people on the return from Elba was concrete proof of his genuine popularity among the French masses? Perhaps there can be no greater calumny against Napoleon than to compare him to Hitler. Hitler the architect of the holocaust was the butcher of the Jews. Napoleon was greatest liberator of the Jews in European history, freeing them from the ghettos wherever he went. This was one of the main reasons why his enemies like Russian Czar dubbed him 'the anti-christ'. When he fell, the laws freeing the Jews were reversed. Historical what ifs can only speculative. But had Napoleon succeeded in creating a Europe governed by the Code Napoleon, the odds of a Stalin and Hitler coming to power would surely have been greatly reduced. Napoleon was in Lord Acton's words 'the ablest of historic men'. And yet in the end, perhaps it was for the better that even such a humane and tolerant genius did not attain the control he would have wished for? As Lord Acton also wrote, power corrupts even the best of men.

It was a pretty good starter for the history of the Napoleon time. Needed more details about the French Revolution and about the battles he was in. It was an average book on him just wished had more details about the above stuff.

I enjoyed reading this book. Lots of history.

Strangely, less is more in this extraordinary biography of Napoleon. David Bell takes only little more than 100 pages to tell the remarkable story of the last great emperor of Europe. It takes full control of the facts about the rise and fall of Napoleon, facts that draw on his military genius, the chaotic state of European politics in the early-19th century, and a supine French government more than willing to crown a little known boy from Corsica as its “Emperor”. Along the way, Napoleon virtually redrew the map of Paris, changed the structure of its government, fused rural and suburban France into a functioning European power, and came close to ruling all of Europe. As Professor Bell says in the opening lines of his book, bookshelves are groaning under the weight of biographies of Napoleon. His contribution is to describe only the most pivotal moments of Napoleon’s life, relate them to the context of European history at the time, and move his story rapidly to its sad conclusion – sad for Napoleon, who stood at the top of Europe’s power structure and ended all but forgotten on a remote island in the middle of the South Atlantic ocean. This is a familiar story but Professor Bell makes it understandable by fitting it effortlessly into the broader history of Europe in the early 19th century. One cannot come away from this short book in awe of what a talented individual Napoleon was. He was a superb and inspiring leader, a genius at picking his battles and then executing them almost without any major errors, a great leader of a complicated nation recovering from a bloody revolution that ended in the decapitation of a king and queen. All this is packed into just over 100 pages. It is a great little work of history.