Roberts makes clear that there is no debate as to what he considers Napoleon’s greatest victories: Recognizing Napoleon’s legacy as “one of the most fiercely debated in all of modern historiography,” Mr. What brought Napoleon down was not some deep-seated personality disorder but a combination of unforeseeable circumstances coupled with a handful of significant miscalculation: something altogether more believable, human and fascinating.” “My own interpretation is very different from other historians. Roberts dispels the notion that “the Napoleon Complex” led to Napoleon’s demise:

Helena and the discovery of new and crucial archived documents.įurthermore, Mr. Roberts believes that his book stands apart from the vast majority of Napoleon biographies in detailing a more accurate portrait of Napoleon’s character and personality, aided by his visit to 53 of Napoleon’s 60 battle sites, a boat trip to St. Roberts, as he wrote in the introduction, “longer than Napoleon spent on Elba and St.

Robert’s book is a “biography worthy of its subject: magisterial, insightful, beautifully written, by one of our foremost historians.” It is, as The Economist writes, the “first single-volume general biography to make full use of the treasure trove of Napoleon’s 33,000-odd letters, which began being published in Paris only in 2004.”Īn exhaustively researched book that took Mr. With a small amount of effort, but without being a strenuous chore like so many history lessons can be, Mr. For a pleasurable holiday read, Andrew Roberts biography, Napoleon: A Life (2014), is a 810-page gift to be enjoyed for the fascinating and easily accessible history lesson about the “founder of modern France and one of the great conquerors of history.”Ĭonsidered the definitive biography of the soldier-statesman who once said, “What a novel my life has been,” it has received numerous awards, such as Winner of the Grand Prix of the Foundation Napoleon, and was listed as a New York Times Notable Book and included in Amazon’s “100 Biographies and Memoirs to Read in a Lifetime” list.

Napoleon bonaparte andrew roberts