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Loading... Napoleon's Family (original 1986; edition 1986)by Desmond Seward
Work InformationNapoleon's Family by Desmond Seward (1986)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. 2926 Napoleon's Family, by Desmond Seward (read 11 Nov 1996) This is a fantastic book, and is really hard to believe. Seward is a popularizer and there are no footnotes, so the book reads fast--too fast, really, to soak up the fantastic story of Napoleon and his unbelievable relatives. He had seven siblings. What an immoral lot--I was dismayed by the sexual excess they all indulged in. This is a good book--it has a genealogical table and tells what became of each sibling and of their descendants. But not serious history, the way Seward writes it. no reviews | add a review
No family in history ascended the thrones of Europe so quickly - or were deposed so fast - as the Bonapartes. Like some mafia capo, Napoleon heaped honors and riches on his siblings, giving them the crowns of Spain, Naples, Tuscany, Rome, Holland and Westphalia. In Napoleon's Family Desmond Seward recounts the saga of this extraordinary clan of social-climbing Corsican emigres. Their back-biting and bickering for honors was incessant, often vicious if deplorably entertaining, a constant embarrassment to their august brother. They had small talent for government and even less for battles, saving all their energies for dissipation. One brother was a drunken wastrel, another a venal womanizer, a third a paranoid depressive. The sisters were notorious for their innumerable lovers - among whom were Metternich and the violinist Paganini - and the emperor himself called them whores. Napoleon's Family is more than a scandalous family chronicle, however. It offers a penetrating view of the inner Napoleon - a military genius who brought France to the height of glory, a farsighted ruler who initiated social and economic reforms, yet also a man who could not escape from his Corsican background and was unable to control worthless brothers and sisters. - Author's agent. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)944.05History and Geography Europe France and region France First empire 1804-1815LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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It's just really cringeworthy. ( )