Based on an interview with book blogger Deborah Kalb How did you first learn about Napoleon’s effort to write a novel, and at what point did you decide to write Finding Napoleon? Years ago, I came across a mention that young Napoleon Bonaparte had tried to write a romantic novel of love, war, and betrayal. When I […]
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During my travels to do research on Napoleon Bonaparte, I’ve taken hundreds of photographs of Napoleonic sites, art, memorabilia, and related objects. I’ve learned a lot about about military campaigns, geopolitics, and daily life in his times. I’ve become fascinated (and distracted by) the countless characters who surrounded Napoleon, from his birth in Corsica through
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I’ve been doing research into Napoleon’s older brother, Joseph Bonaparte―the ex-king of Naples and Spain―and his twenty-year stay in the United States. Along the way, I learned to my surprise that Jacques-Louis David’s grand painting of Napoleon’s coronation (see my recent blog) had visited the United States in 1826. That set me off investigating. I
As I wrote in an earlier post, the Corsican assembly, in 1793, voted unanimously “to inflict on the individuals making up [the family] Bonaparte an eternal brand that renders their name and their memory detestable to [all Corsican] patriots.” Six years later, however, during a stopover on Napoleon’s return from the Egyptian campaign, the Corsicans
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The Encyclopedia Britannica has announced that the 2010 publication is its last print edition. First published in 1768, the year before Napoleon Bonaparte’s birth, this venerable reference source is going totally digital. Although I love hard-copy books, the announcement wouldn’t normally bother me. After all, the internet is a practical way to keep information up-to-date
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A BOOK REVIEW: To Befriend an Emperor: Betsy Balcombe’s Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte on St Helena, edits and introduction by J. David Markham, Ravenhall Books, 2005. (Originally published in 1844 as Recollections of the Emperor Napoleon on the Island of St Helena, by Lucia Elizabeth Balcombe Abell.) As I covered in my last blog, Napoleon’s
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Finding Napoleon at the Louvre was harder than I expected. After unsuccessfully searching their website, I wrote in advance for a list of Napoleon-related paintings: no response. I queried several agencies for a specialized guide: no luck. So, when we arrived, we headed straight for the Information Desk. Did I know about the Coronation painting
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Yesterday, we met with Professor Peter Hicks, historian and international director of the Fondation Napoléon, here in Paris. He generously gave me many suggestions for books and sources I might pursue, particularly about Napoleon’s youth. The Fondation maintains an extremely useful website at www.napoleon.org and Professor Hicks publishes their electronic newsletter. Both are available in
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The breadth of Napoleonic material amazes and at times overwhelms me. Of course, its volume results from the huge impact he had in so many physical, political and cultural areas of the world, but I am grateful to the multitude of scholars who have painstakingly recorded the details, both small and large. I’m not a
