Napoleon: A Sketch of His Life, Character, Struggles, and Achievements
Watson, Thomas E. (Thomas Edward), 1856-1922Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019
Rating 3.0- Word count
- 1.2M words
- Chapters
- 118
Tags
English Originals Political and Military Leaders Historical ReappraisalMilitary StrategyLeadershipLegendary LivesMilitary CommandersNapoleonPower GameAntiheroEuropean OrderFrench RevolutionSummary
Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Napoleon: A Sketch of His Life, Character, Struggles, and Achievements by WatsonAuthor: Watson, Thomas E. (Thomas Edward), 1856-1922,Language: English, Class: DC: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: France, Andorra, Monaco, Release Date: Apr 29, 2018Editor's review
This is an English biographical sketch of Napoleon's life and career by the late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century American author Thomas E. Watson. In narrative form it traces Napoleon's rise and fall, with assessments of character and historical judgment, bearing the clear imprint of its era and the author's personal views. As a free Project Gutenberg electronic text, it is easy to search and cite, and serves as an accessible introduction to early English-language accounts of Napoleon. Readers may note how the author selects his sources and organizes the portrait around morality and achievement, itself a window into nineteenth-century historical writing. It should be noted that this is not a modern scholarly biography; readers should treat it as a committed and stylish historical text rather than a neutral list of facts, and best read it alongside other reliable sources.Who it's for
A good fit for
- Readers with a budding interest in the Napoleonic era who want an English overview biography to start with
- History enthusiasts curious about how the late nineteenth-century English-speaking world judged Napoleon
- Students needing a free electronic text for classroom background reading or English extensive reading
- General readers who enjoy narrative history and do not mind the author's subjective commentary
Not a good fit for
- Professional researchers needing rigorous scholarship and the latest research findings
- Military enthusiasts expecting detailed battle accounts, maps, and data tables
- Readers unable to read English and without access to a reliable translation
Reading tips
- Begin with the table of contents and chapter summaries to grasp the life-stage structure, then read chapter by chapter.
- Jot down the author's evaluative statements as you read, distinguishing factual claims from personal judgment, and form your own view.
- Read alongside a chronology of the Napoleonic era or reliable encyclopedia entries to fill in background the book leaves out.
- For English study, closely read the character-assessment chapters to build up common expressions in historical narrative.
About the publisher
Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.
Contents
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FAQ
Is this a complete modern scholarly biography?
No. It is a biographical sketch colored by the author's personal judgment and his era, focused on narrating the life and assessing character rather than exhausting sources or engaging modern scholarly debates. It works as an introductory overview; verify specific historical facts against reliable academic works.Can readers with average English read this book?
The book is in English, with a late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century prose style and many long sentences. Readers with college-level English can get through it with a dictionary; those with weaker English should start with a Chinese translation or introductory material, then read selected chapters of interest rather than forcing themselves through cover to cover.What should I keep in mind when reading the electronic edition?
The text comes from Project Gutenberg as a free public-domain ebook, mainly plain text and possibly lacking maps and illustrations. Use reading software that supports annotation and dictionary lookup, and supplement with a chronology or maps to make up for the plain text's gaps in spatial and temporal information.This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.
About the author
Watson, Thomas E. (Thomas Edward), 1856-1922 AuthorThomas E. Watson (1856–1922) was an American author; his birth and death years and main period of activity can be confirmed from his byline, but otherwise public information is limited, and no reliable records of his nationality, education, or specific career are available. Two of his works are held in the collection, on markedly different subjects: one is a biography of Napoleon, Napoleon: A Sketch of His Life, Character, Struggles, and Achievements, which outlines the historical figure through his life, character, and career; the other, The Inevitable Crimes of Celibacy, turns to social issues and discusses the problems brought about by celibacy as an institution. Together the two books show Watson writing both as a commentator on historical figures and as a social critic, with an argumentative tone and an interest in the relationship between personal choice and institutional constraints. Given the limited material, the contemporary impact and later reception of his works are difficult to describe in detail.