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Common Knowledge

Canonical name: Bloy, Léon
Birthdate: 1846-07-11
Date of death: 1917-11-03
Gender: male
Occupations: novelist
essayist
pamphleteer
poet
Relationships: Bloy, Jeanne (wife)
Short biography: French novelist, essayist, pamphleteer and poet.
Nationality: France
Birthplace: Notre-Dame-de-Sanilhac, Dordogne, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France
Places of residence: Périgueux, Dordogne, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France
Paris, France
Chersonèse Cimbrique, France
Cochons-sur-Marne, France
Bourg-la-Reine, Hauts-de-Seine, Île-de-France, France
Place of death: Bourg-la-Reine, Hauts-de-Seine, Île-de-France, France
Burial location: Cimetière communal, Bourg-la-Reine, Hauts-de-Seine, Île-de-France, France
Associated Place (for map): France

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22 reviews

Joe.Olipo 245 reviews

The Soul of Napoleon by Léon Bloy

I don't think of him,
but I use his lines all the time
— Eileen Myles, Skies (2001)

On the Soul of The Soul of Napoleon

An attentive person, having observed contemporary events before they were secreted into history, can only conclude that the patina covering over the past is composed, primarily, of bullshit. In confrontation with the statement of record, her testimony is a discordant one: "Well, it wasn't quite like that . . . but who am I to say." Perhaps the task of the historian is to show more secret out the truth behind such so-called minor testimony; especially at those sites where one finds the historical patina particularly thick. Roberto Calasso makes such a claim in his early writing, arguing that: "The true historian [. . .] can compete with Plutarchian figures — those who have become invisible through too much testimony, a solid carapace secreted by history to distance them from us. At that extreme of his obstinate pursuit, the historian wants to encounter Napoleon as a stranger. Then he unites with the visionary and, like Léon Bloy, can have the impudence to start a book with the words: 'The story of Napoleon is certainly the least known of all stories'." (The Ruin of Kasch, 1983). This appears to be high praise indeed, (in fact, it's what lead me to search out this book), but Nota Bene there is another way to read this excerpt. Léon Bloy, who one might think is being praised as a "true historian", is actually receiving accolades for a certain style of prose. Calasso's praise is not necessarily a comment on the author's scholarship. He has rather been struck by impudence.

Where to place the soul of the Emperor. In Chateaubriand's writing (Memoirs from Beyond the Grave, 1850) we find The Great One depressed, dressed in his driver's livery; scenes in which the author himself makes a dubious appearance. In Tolstoy (War and Peace, 1867), the Emperor's battles — the outcomes of which, in retrospect, he had little power to influence — are projected upon the screen of material circumstance. The Corsican comet appears to track there-and-back across the continent as if on rails. In Contemporary historiography (Napoleon: A Life, 2014), abstracted from personal grievance by at least a century, Napoleon is but an exceptional case, a "product-of-the-times" nonetheless. He becomes, in somewhat sycophantic biography (Winner of the 2015 Grand Prix of the Foundation Napoleon and nominee for the 2015 Plutarch Award), almost-but-not-quite like those Plutarchan figures about whom a young Napoleon evidently read lots: ”Late in life, Napoleon called Pasquale Paoli 'a fine character who neither betrayed England nor France but was always for Corsica', and a 'great friend of the family' who had 'urged me to enter into the English service,' [. . .] He also claimed, with perhaps less truth, that Paoli had paid him the 'great compliment' of saying: 'That young man will be one of Plutarch's ancients'” (Andrew Roberts, Napoleon: A Life, 2014). Yet Bloy's text rejects the Plutarchan theme. It draws neither from the psychological reading nor the materialist one.

The texte propre, which commences according to those expectations engendered by Calasso, also signals the premature closure of an historical analysis: "The history of Napoleon is quite certainly the most unknown of all histories. Books that claim to recount it are innumerable, and there is no end to documents of every sort. In reality, Napoleon is perhaps less known to us than Alexander. The more one studies, the more one discovers that he is the man whom nothing resembles and that's all there is" (15). What follows, unfortunately, is a mystical-romantic reading with a particular Catholic bend. The Soul of Napoleon (1912) seems to have bounced off the patina of history as if stunned; or rather, in the process of drilling hard boards, seems to have slipped, "Assuredly, [Napoleon] did not know that he was an instrument, nothing more than a magnificent instrument, for the monstrance of a divine parable [. . .] All these things, and many others, that one does not know, were necessary, and the proof without rejoinder is that they happened in plain sight of God who does not make errors and who wanted these things from time immemorial" (92). Essentially, Bloy's text appears to be doing in fact the converse of what Calasso's praise would lead us to believe. It has not gotten further into the history, rather it has transubstantiated, in a frustrated mode, the slow work of obstinate pursuit into the mystical intuition which understands "Greatness" at a glance, and therefore doesn't have to drive hard. In this way, the text finds itself no longer capable of mounting an argument, like Napoleon's exhausted cavalry at Leipzig.

In the visionary mode, even the Corsican's weaknesses, the tactical blunders he could not help, become occasion for praise: "Such is the beauty of history, such is politics, and such was the recompense for the magnanimity of Napoleon, who almost always forgave and was never forgiven. It remains to be seen what became of his soul, his too great soul, in that horrible whirlwind of iniquities" (108). Here I am reminded of the massacre at Jaffa in which Napoleon had thousands of prisoners, euphemistically, "driven into the sea". This was not forgiving. It was also a tactical blunder. The massacre, like a Rubicon across which one does not retreat, more or less capped the failure of the campaign in the Levant. Such occasions seem to temper the political mistakes in which Napoleon forgave, perhaps too frequently, his friends and relations; such was his temperament, magnanimous, that he would not have done otherwise. Were it possible for Napoleon's Great Soul to have regrets, the Saint-Domingue affair is likely among them. We discover among Napoleon's letters the recognition that his attempt to re-enslave the people of that erstwhile French colony, modern-day Haiti, was always already a lost cause. He destroyed a million lives nonetheless, "'The Saint-Domingue business was a great piece of folly on my part,' Napoleon later admitted. 'It was the greatest error that in all my government I ever committed. I ought to have treated with the black leaders, as I would have done the authorities in a province,'" (Napoleon: A Life, 2014). Is it possible for an historian to spin "the Saint-Dominigue business" into an historic success without resorting to a mystical deliberation upon the Soul — perhaps this is possible, but only in a white-nationalist mode.

The Soul of Napoleon (1912) is not concerned with Saint-Dominigue, a so-called footnote in history of which it makes no mention. Mysticism is capable of stepping around this, as it steps around everything. When the text commences to argue that Napoleon is a "poet of the soul," one wonders whether this is meant in earnest or in jest. Perhaps the whole Saint-Dominigue expedition is to be considered mere material for a palinode (i.e. a poem in which the poet retracts a previous position). The way Bloy frames it, one might claim with equal veracity that Napoleon was a "playwright of the soul", a "doctor of the soul", or rather a "cobbler of the soul":

"One will be incapable of understanding anything about Napoleon as long as one does not see in him a poet, an incomparable poet in action. His poem is his entire life, and there is nothing that equals it. He always thought as a poet and could act only as he thought, the visible world being for him merely a mirage. His astounding proclamations bear sufficient witness [. . .] Napoleon is he then [sic] the poet of destiny? The events he speaks of [sic] have demonstrated historically the irreality [sic], or, if one prefers, the inanity of his great designs, but they did not demonstrate it in the soul of that Emperor of emperors, where they had, clearly, a prophetic consistency, a [sic] indemonstrable reality" (117).

An un-happy co-incidence of bad writing — the clarity of the argument in these final phrases seems to be reflected in the quality of the translation. The selection is notable for two Gallicisms and an improper indefinite article in the space of two sentences. In such circumstances I am sometimes tempted to turn back to the translator's forward to renew my stores of good will. My edition of The Soul of Napoleon (1912), translated by Richard Robinson, however, does not contain the expected translator's forward, i.e. a brief reflection on the task of the translator. There is no discussion of the translation process at all. Robinson's forward — in bizarre fashion — consists, instead, of a white nationalist harangue against the Black Lives Matter movement.

The forward is a muddle, being a presentation of history, an argument about history, and (inadvertently) a piece of history itself. In this way we have an opportunity to see what history is good for, if anything.

I'm a huge fan of Napoleon I, or Bonaparte. Until about a month ago, as i turns out, it wasn't my intention to translate this book, not yet. I had something else on my mind. I stumbled, tripped, fell over this article in the March 6, 2021 issue of The Economist: 'Despot, genius or both? France argues about Napoleon: As his bicentenary approaches, tempers rise.'

When I saw the title to the article, I got excited. Anything and everything about Napoleon, his history, his achievements, his battles, his administration, his legacy, his personal life, the ground he stood on —excite [sic] me. Always has, always will. Call me naïve or childish: I'm a fan of Napoleon.

But as I started to read the article, quickly my enthusiasm changed. True to the article's subtitle, I got incensed, and my temper rose. It rose to the degree where I nearly put down the article (well, nearly clicked away from it) when I got to this section: 'The Black Lives Matter movement has emboldened those who reject any celebration of a leader who reintroduced slavery to the French West Indies in 1802. Nicholas Mayer-Rossignol, the Socialist mayor of Rouen, says he wants to replace the imposing bronze statue of the emperor on horseback that stands outside his Normandy town hall.'

Now, I'm not a proponent of slavery. It's almost silly that I should feel the need to say that. But [sic] it is a historical fact, slavery, and not just a recent one. To talk of slavery in the context of Napoleon seems self-serving to me. Slavery is one of the last things that comes to anyone's mind when thinking or talking about Napoleon. Napoleon's greatness does not stand on whether he sent or did not send slaves anywhere. To judge him on that count is like judging a doctor as if he were a pastry cook. And how is it that the BLM [sic], or those who subscribe to it [sic], get to measure Western [sic] leaders and heroes, culture, achievements, and marvels [sic] by the yardstick they choose? Did I agree to that? Did you?

[. . .]

No one needs their temper raised, which often begets violence. When it's a question of a statue or a monument, or a book that one does not like or approve of, we should just look the other way, turn the other cheek, like I do when I see the signs and slogans on so many lawns, in so many windows, ad nauseam, in my neighborhood and city, proselytizing to me, about something I don't subscribe to, and co-opting my nation. 'In Our America…' Our? That includes me, right? Or did I give my neighbors and fellow citizens the right to speak exclusively on my behalf all of a sudden? No, I did not, but I leave the signs in place on their lawns and in their windows all the same." (10)

Well, one can put anything in a book, I suppose. A few things are notable here. First, the translator appears to have completed his work some time between the publication of the Economist article under discussion (March 6th, 2021) and the date this text was accepted for publication (April 5, 2021). Noting that this text was put together in less than a month, perhaps we have an inadvertent answer to our initial question regarding its somewhat dubious quality. The quality of his loose, chatty prose also seems to speak to this.

It's striking how the writer of this section appears more or less entirely misinformed. I do not mean merely his evaluation of the Black Lives Matter movement, what he calls "the BLM". (The grammatical inconsistency of this phrase is apparently part of its intended use as a right-wing catchword.) I am regarding in particular the details of Napoleonic history he seems to get wrong. To me, it is inconceivable that someone who calls himself a "fan" of Napoleon twice in the first two paragraphs of the text hasn't managed to read a detailed biography. Yet Robinson's presentation of the Saint-Domingue expedition as a question of, "whether he sent or did not send slaves anywhere," is so euphemistic as to be outside of history. It seems that being a "fan" means working to rehabilitate errors which even the Big Man himself considered folly.

Though the foreword drags on, there is no line in which a coherent argument is being made. This despite what the translator appears to think. It is apparently unfair to judge Napoleon because, "[slavery] is one of the last things that comes to mind when thinking of him," as if history were a word association game. Judging Napoleon is like, "judging a doctor as if he were a pastry cook," as if the dictates of an absolute monarch should be evaluated on the scale of his hobbies. More perplexing is the rhetorical question, "How is it that the BLM [sic], get to measure Western [sic] leaders by the yardstick they choose," as if this were not the entire point of the Napoleonic saga: there is no divine authority dispensing heroes from on-high. Ask a Jacobin, a Bourbon, and a Bonapartist whether the statue of Napoleon at Rouen should be torn down and you'll get a four different answers. There's a certain parallel here between methodologies of the translator's forward and the translated text. Both seem to go no deeper than the patina. In the translator's case, it's not clear whether he has read the history at all.

Having read the screed in full, we know it wasn't curiosity that caused the translator to "stumble" over the article that set him off. Likely, it curated for his Feed. He clicked the link because he read the headline and wanted to engage with ragebait. The feelings came first, then the thoughts followed. He did not "nearly put down the article" nor "nearly click away". He got exactly what he wanted out of it: he got mad. Rage with the patina of an argument, and more ammunition against "the BLM". And though it is obvious to us, the translator does not appear self-aware. He doesn't seem to realize it, but this inadvertent document of the reactionary working himself up, of everything he has written, seems to be the one thing true to history itself.

Of course, such an emotional response is disproportionate. Even a dyed-in-the-wool white nationalist when prompted by the same article, writing in his academic mode, might manage a couple pages on Napoleon's "contentious legacy" and "modern relevance". One wonders what brought on this surge of emotion for a statue in Rouen, which the author, with his implied American identity, will likely never visit. Whom is he threatening when he writes "no one needs their temper raised, which often begets violence" (10), as if he weren't always already the angriest person in the room. A presumptive conclusion does not require a close reading. Evidently, the translator consumes a lot of right wing media.

The question becomes more interesting when we investigate beneath the patina of this explanation. The translator has done us the courtesy of providing some corroborating evidence, but the details are not what we expect. In an interview published earlier this year, a Richard Robinson, who fits the description, is a British ex-pat working as a translator and musician. He has lived in Hungary for the past thirty years. But if this is true, his statements in this section become, then, even more bizarre. For someone who has never resided in the United States, why does the author present himself as an American citizen indignant about not having been consulted for his opinion, "[. . .] co-opting my nation. 'In Our America…' Our? That includes me, right?" (10). Evidently, it does not. Unless the Black Lives Matter movement has taken Budapest by storm, his statement that, "I see [Black Lives Matter] signs and slogans on so many lawns, in so many windows, ad nauseam, in my neighborhood and city," (10) is also a patent falsehood.

These stretchers are so large, the statements so discordant, that one wonders whether we have the right person at all. Is it possible we're talking about a different soul. The translator, who is also a Goodreads author, has posted as review of the text in which he quotes the forward. So, so much for the theory that an aberrant editor had his hands in the mix. This is the right guy. But is it possible to imagine a Hungarian national having consumed so much right-wing media that he repeats the rhetorical flourishes of American white nationalism by rote, even when it requires he misrepresent himself. (Do I have to ask?) Were this the case, one would discover nothing beneath the patina of fabricated rage lying beneath his argument. Rage deriving from rhetoric intended for a different "target audience"; an emotion with no material connection to his situation. One imagines an equivalent situation: discovering a modern-day American to be a vehement Bonapartist. In the rhetoric of Bloy, "The more one studies the more one discovers that [beneath his rage] there is nothing and that's all there is." And yet, were we satisfied in our certainty that the man's soul could be characterized thus, we might conclude with the same methodology Bloy employs here. We would have merely developed our own taxonomy of minor souls. There's a certain patina covering over our translator, the ex-pat Hungarian, who might be American nonetheless, a translator of children's books, some French texts, a musician, a white nationalist, and yet perhaps a subaltern who has someone else translating under his good name. The crucial lesson: one should not proceed straight to the soul. The trick, to get beyond bullshit, is to maintain all this in tension. show less

Dec 31, 2025

GlennRussell 507 reviews

Disagreeable Tales by Léon Bloy

“I am the Parlor of Tarantulas!” he cried in a voice destined for the straightjacket, making the little factory women hasten their steps on the street.” Thus begins one of the short intense tales in this collection authored by French Decadent Léon Bloy (1846-1917). Bloy despised the materialist, mechanized Americanization of European society and culture and yearned to connect with the spiritual dimensions of life, and thus, similar to fellow French Decadent Joris-Karl Huysmans, turned show more to Catholicism. Subsequently, although these tales are soaked in the juice of perversion, cruelty or depravity, a good number have decidedly religious overtones. However, the ones I particularly enjoy have nothing of religion. For the purpose of this review and to share a taste of Bloy’s finely tuned, highly polished prose, I will include several direct quotes in capsulizing two of my favorites:

The Parlor of Tarantulas
The narrator recalls as a young man in his twenties meeting a larger than life poet who wore his mane of shaggy, white hair like a lion. “His small face of smashed bricks staring out from under the snowflakes boiled more and baked redder each time one looked at him. . . . a poetaster, altogether incapable of resigning himself to any attention, however distinguished in kind, that did not grant him first place, or, better yet, exclusive consideration.” A reader has the impression Bloy is describing a flesh-and-blood embodiment of the late 19th century myth of the self-styled literary genius as madman.

One evening the narrator accepts an invitation to visit this white-haired, flaming-eyed lion. Most unwise since he is forced to listen to every word of the muse-inspired poet’s five act play. We read, “At first the exercise did not displease me. The reader had a bizarre, gastralgic voice, which rose effortlessly from profound basses up to the sharpest, childlike tones. He spoke like this and truly played his drama, performing gestures that included falling to his knees in prayer when events so required. The curious spectacle amused me for an hour – that is, for as long as the first act. The unconscionable monster went so far as to take whole scenes from the top when he feared I might not have felt all their beauty; no word of admiring protest could restrain him. . . . I had to swallow it whole, and it took to midnight.”

And after this five hour ordeal the narrator makes a move for the door. But no, there’s more, much more -- the leonine artiste insists his young visitor listen to every word of his sonnets, all one thousand five hundred of them! So, the visitor takes a seat once again, suppressing a groan of despair. And when the young narrator makes the mistake of falling asleep, he is woken by a cowbell. Then, to make sure there isn’t a repeat violation, the poet opens a drawer, pulls out a revolver, loads it carefully and places it on the table. The narrator tells us the torture lasted until sunrise. The tale ends with two more unexpected twists true to the spirit of French Decadence.

The Old Man of the House
With signature Decadent spleen and humorous cynicism, Bloy begins his tale: “Ah! How Madame Alexandre could pride herself on her virtue! Just think! For three years she had tolerated him, that old swindler – that old string of stewed beef disgracing her house. You can just imagine that if he hadn’t been her father, she’d have long since slapped a return ticket on him: off to rot in the public infirmary!”

Bloy’s language has the acerbic bite of Friedrich Nietzsche or Maxim Gorky; matter of fact, with his beetling brow and pronounced moustache, Bloy even looks a bit like Nietzsche and Gorky. And, that’s acerbic bite, as in hearing of dad’s fatherly touch when Madame Alexandre was just a mere girl: “Readied for field exercise from a tender age, at thirteen she assumed the distinguished position of a virginal oblate at the house of a Genevan millionaire esteemed for his virtue; this man called her his “angel of light” and perfected her ruination. Two years were all the debutante needed to finish off the Calvinist.”

And then when the old man is forced to live with his daughter to stay alive (she runs a house of prostitution), Bloy observes caustically, “Unaccustomed to commerce and no longer commanding his old tricks, he resembled an old fly without the vigor to make its way to a pile of excrement – a creature in which even the spiders took no interest.” And then to underscore the scorn and cruelty with which Madame treated her old father, Bloy pens; “He was given a scarlet leotard with decorative braids and a kind of Macedonian cap which made him look like a Hungarian or a Pole facing adversity. Then, he received the title of count – Count Boutonski! – and he passed for a wreck decorated with glory, a ruin of the latest insurrection.” Madame’s ruthlessness and brutality continues right up to the breaking point. No wonder Franz Kafka wrote of Léon Bloy, “His fire is nurtured by the dung-heap of modern times.”

(Thanks to Goodreads friend MJ Nicholls for bringing this fine collection to my attention.) show less

Feb 16, 20176 other reviews

Glenn_Russell 713 reviews

Disagreeable Tales by Léon Bloy

“I am the Parlor of Tarantulas!” he cried in a voice destined for the straightjacket, making the little factory women hasten their steps on the street.” Thus begins one of the short intense tales in this collection authored by French Decadent Léon Bloy (1846-1917).

Bloy despised the materialist, mechanized Americanization of European society and culture and yearned to connect with the spiritual dimensions of life, and thus, similar to fellow French Decadent Joris-Karl Huysmans, turned show more to Catholicism.

Subsequently, although these tales are soaked in the juice of perversion, cruelty or depravity, a good number have decidedly religious overtones. However, the short stories I particularly enjoy in this collection have nothing of religion. Thus, for the purpose of this review and to share a taste of Bloy’s finely tuned, highly polished prose, I will include several direct quotes in capsulizing two of my favorites:

THE PARLOR OF TARANTULAS
The narrator recalls as a young man in his twenties meeting a larger than life poet who wore his mane of shaggy, white hair like a lion. “His small face of smashed bricks staring out from under the snowflakes boiled more and baked redder each time one looked at him, a poetaster, altogether incapable of resigning himself to any attention, however distinguished in kind, that did not grant him first place, or, better yet, exclusive consideration.”

A reader has the impression Bloy is describing a flesh-and-blood embodiment of the late nineteenth century myth of the self-styled literary genius as madman, a cross between Edgar Allan Poe and Gérard de Nerval.

One evening the narrator accepts an invitation to visit this white-haired, flaming-eyed lion. Most unwise since he is forced to listen to every word of the muse-inspired poet’s five act play. We read, “At first the exercise did not displease me. The reader had a bizarre, gastralgic voice, which rose effortlessly from profound basses up to the sharpest, childlike tones. He spoke like this and truly played his drama, performing gestures that included falling to his knees in prayer when events so required. The curious spectacle amused me for an hour – that is, for as long as the first act. The unconscionable monster went so far as to take whole scenes from the top when he feared I might not have felt all their beauty; no word of admiring protest could restrain him. I had to swallow it whole, and it took to midnight.”

And after this five hour ordeal the narrator makes a move for the door. But no, there’s more, much more - the leonine artiste insists his young visitor listen to every word of his sonnets, all one thousand five hundred of them!

So, the visitor takes a seat once again, suppressing a groan of despair. And when the young narrator makes the mistake of falling asleep, he is woken by a cowbell. Then, to make sure there isn’t a repeat violation, the poet opens a drawer, pulls out a revolver, loads it carefully and places it on the table. The narrator tells us the torture lasted until sunrise. The tale ends with two more unexpected twists true to the spirit of French Decadence.

THE OLD MAN IN THE HOUSE
With signature Decadent spleen and humorous cynicism, Bloy begins his tale: “Ah! How Madame Alexandre could pride herself on her virtue! Just think! For three years she had tolerated him, that old swindler – that old string of stewed beef disgracing her house. You can just imagine that if he hadn’t been her father, she’d have long since slapped a return ticket on him: off to rot in the public infirmary!”

Bloy’s language has the acerbic bite of Friedrich Nietzsche or Maxim Gorky - as a matter of fact, with his beetling brow and pronounced moustache, Bloy even looks a bit like Nietzsche and Gorky.

And, that’s acerbic bite, as in hearing of dad’s fatherly touch when Madame Alexandre was just a mere girl: “Readied for field exercise from a tender age, at thirteen she assumed the distinguished position of a virginal oblate at the house of a Genevan millionaire esteemed for his virtue; this man called her his “angel of light” and perfected her ruination. Two years were all the debutante needed to finish off the Calvinist.”

And then when the old man is forced to live with his daughter to stay alive (she runs a house of prostitution), Bloy observes caustically, “Unaccustomed to commerce and no longer commanding his old tricks, he resembled an old fly without the vigor to make its way to a pile of excrement – a creature in which even the spiders took no interest.”

And then to underscore the scorn and cruelty with which Madame treated her old father, Bloy pens; “He was given a scarlet leotard with decorative braids and a kind of Macedonian cap which made him look like a Hungarian or a Pole facing adversity. Then, he received the title of count – Count Boutonski! – and he passed for a wreck decorated with glory, a ruin of the latest insurrection.”

Madame’s ruthlessness and brutality continues right up to the breaking point. No wonder Franz Kafka wrote of Léon Bloy, “His fire is nurtured by the dung-heap of modern times.”

(Thanks to Goodreads friend MJ Nicholls for bringing this fine collection to my attention.) show less

Nov 13, 20186 other reviews

datrappert 3,495 reviews

Disagreeable Tales by Léon Bloy

The translator says notes have been left out so as to not affect the readability, but a brief context for some of the historical references would have helped. If you aren't conversant with France of that era--I'm not--some of this will go right over your head. Neverthless, after you get into the stride of reading these short tales, they do begin to have an effect on you. They are disagreeable, but there is also much truth about human behavior here. It's hard, maybe impossible, to put show more yourself in the author's frame of mind, so you just have to take whatever lessons from them you can and apply them to our equally fucked 21st century society. show less

Jun 30, 20256 other reviews

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