Napoleón Bonaparte

Napoleon is first and foremost the son of a time of transition, that of the passage from the old feudal world to a new bourgeois society. He embodies all the contradictions of this time, his name is associated with an inordinate ambition and despotic power, cruel and bloody wars, evokes the horrors of Zaragoza, the sack of overwhelmed Germany, the invasion of Russia. But he also reminds us of the courage and audacity shown in the Italian campaigns, the talent that he knew how to dare, the statesman who dealt mortal blows to an already decrepit feudal Europe. The Soviet historian Albert Manfred, a genuine master in the art of narrating history, begins by drawing an excellent portrait of the young Bonaparte, a disciple of Rousseau and Raynald, Jacobin and Robespierrist, defender of the republican ideals of the Revolution in order to reel off its gradual evolution and his transformation into an autocrat, an overrunner of Europe, a builder of an Empire at the blow of the bayonet. He considers that Bonaparte betrayed the great secret of his glittering military triumphs: the revolutionary enthusiasm of the people that drove his soldiers, which led to his ultimate failure. Manfred manages to capture in these pages all the nuances of an extraordinary man, as well as the excellent psychological portraits of numerous historical personalities that accompanied him, presenting a true and faithful portrait of Bonaparte and the time that he gave birth to.