A lot has been written about Napoleone Buonaparte, or as history knows the colossus, Napoleon Bonaparte. In fact, many say that Bonaparte may be the second most written about figure in history after Jesus Christ – understandable for a man who has a whole era named after him, the Napoleonic era. Any comprehensive reading list on the great general and his era would run into hundreds of books, not to mention academic papers, that cover individual battles, campaigns, family life, the arts, legal reforms, military tactics, Egyptology, the nation-state, religion, foreign policy, his opponents, and so on. In order to keep this list short, I have resisted the temptation to add books about several key figures in the turbulent early 19th century. Most of his marshals surely deserve a book on their own, as do some of Napoleon’s admirals. There are also many other important figures on the battlefield and in the ballrooms like Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord, Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, Horatio Nelson, Joséphine de Beauharnais, Arthur Wellesley, Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, Mikhail Kutuzov, Denis Davydov, and Louis-Alexandre Berthier.
This list is a mix of academic and coffee table books, a nice mix of facts, trivia, and argument. It is not purely about Napoleon but also a little about his era – I do not know how to separate the two given his imprint on close of the 18th century and the bloody start of the 19th. I should also confess that I am somewhat partial to Le Petit Caporal; to ensure a balance, I have included a few works that are clearly and unfairly against Napoleon along with a few that are effulgent towards him and most that are, on the whole, balanced. If you are only looking for a quick introduction, Ladybird has an audiobook by Lawrence du Garde Peach from 1968 that I used when I was four.
- Adkins, Roy. Nelson’s Trafalgar: The Battle That Changed the World
- Asprey, Robert. The Rise of Napoleon Bonaparte
- —. The Reign of Napoleon Bonaparte
- Barbero, Alessandro. The Battle: A New History of Waterloo
- Bell, David. The First Total War: Napoleon’s Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It
- Bergeron, Louis. France Under Napoleon
- Bertaud, Jean-Paul. The Army of the French Revolution: From Citizen-Soldiers to Instrument of Power
- Beyle, Marie-Henri (Stendhal). The Red and the Black
- Black, Jeremy. The Battle of Waterloo
- —. The War of 1812 in the Age of Napoleon
- Blanning, Timothy CW. The French Revolutionary Wars, 1787-1802
- —. The Origins of the French Revolutionary Wars
- Boime, Albert. Art in the Age of Bonapartism, 1800-1815
- de Bourrienne, Louis Antoine Fauvelet. Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte
- Broers, Michael. Europe Under Napoleon, 1799-1815
- —. Napoleon’s Other War: Bandits, Rebels, and Their Pursuers in the Age of Revolution
- Carlson, Marvin. The Theatre of the French Revolution
- Caulaincourt, Armand Augustin Louis de. With Napoleon in Russia: The Memoirs of General de Caulaincourt, Duke of Vicenza
- Chalfont, Alun Arthur Gwynne Jones. Waterloo: Battle of Three Armies
- Chandler, David. The Campaigns of Napoleon
- —. Napoleon’s Marshals
- Chrisawn, Margaret. The Emperor’s Friend: Marshal Jean Lannes
- Connelly, Owen. Blundering to Glory: Napoleon’s Military Campaigns
- Cronin, Vincent. Napoleon
- Davydov, Denis. In Service of the Tsar Against Napoleon: The Memoirs of Denis Davydov, 1806-1814
- Dawson, Anthony. Napoleonic Artillery
- Duffy, Christopher. Austerlitz 1805
- —. Borodino and the War of 1812
- Dull, Jonathan. The Age of the Ship of the Line: The British and French Navies, 1650-1815
- Dwyer, Philip. Citizen Emperor: Napoleon in Power
- —. Napoleon: The Path to Power 1769–1799
- —. Napoleon and Europe
- Ellis, Geoffrey. The Napoleonic Empire
- Elting, John. Swords Around A Throne: Napoleon’s Grande Armee
- Englund, Steven. Napoleon: A Political Life
- Epstein, Robert. Napoleon’s Last Victory and the Emergence of Modern War
- Ermolov, Alexis. The Czar’s General: The Memoirs of a Russian General in the Napoleonic Wars
- Esdaile, Charles. Napoleon’s Wars: An International History
- —. Outpost of Empire: The Napoleonic Occupation of Andalucia, 1810-1812
- —. The Peninsular War
- Esdaile, Charles (ed). Popular Resistance in the French Wars: Patriots, Partisans, and Land Pirates
- Falk, Avner. Napoleon Against Himself: A Psychobiography
- Ferrero, Guglielmo. The Gamble: Bonaparte in Italy, 1796-1797
- Finley, Milton. The Most Monstrous of Wars: The Napoleonic Guerrilla War in Southern Italy, 1806-1811
- Fisher, Todd. The Napoleonic Wars: The Rise and Fall of an Empire
- Franceschi, Michel. Wars Against Napoleon
- Furet, Francois. The French Revolution, 1770-1814
- —. Interpreting the French Revolution
- —. Revolutionary France, 1770-1880
- Gallaher, John. The Iron Marshal: A Biography of Louis N. Davout
- Gates, David. The Spanish Ulcer: A History of the Peninsular War
- Geyl, Peter. Napoleon: For and Against
- Gill, John H. Thunder on the Danube: Napoleon’s Defeat of the Habsburgs (three volumes)
- Goetz, Robert. 1805, Austerlitz: Napoleon and the Destruction of the Third Coalition
- Gould, Cecil Hilton Monk. Trophy of Conquest: The Musée Napoléon and the Creation of the Louvre
- Hamilton-Williams, David. Waterloo: New Perspectives: The Great Battle Reappraised
- —. The Fall of Napoleon: The Final Betrayal
- Herbert, Robert. David, Voltaire, Brutus and the French Revolution: An Essay in Art and Politics
- Herold, J. Christopher. The Age of Napoleon
- —. Bonaparte in Egypt
- Hippler, Thomas. Citizens, Soldiers, and National Armies: Military Service in France and Germany, 1789-1830
- Holtman, Robert. Napoleonic Propaganda
- Horne, Alistair. The Age of Napoleon
- —. How Far From Austerlitz? Napoleon 1805-1815
- —. Napoleon: Master of Europe
- Ilari, Virgilio, and Giancarlo Boeri. Le Due Sicile nelle Guerre Napoleoniche, 1800-1815
- Johnson, Paul. Napoleon: A Life
- Jones, Richard Benjamin. Napoleon: Man and Myth
- Jorgensen, Christer. The Anglo-Swedish Alliance Against Napoleonic France
- Junot, Laure. At the Court of Napoleon: Memoirs of the Duchesse d’Abrantes
- Kagan, Frederick. The End of the Old Order: Napoleon and Europe, 1801-1805
- King, David. Vienna, 1814: How the Conquerors of Napoleon Made Love, War, and Peace at the Congress of Vienna
- Lefebvre, Georges. The Coming of the French Revolution
- —. Napoleon 1: From 18 Brumaire to Tilsit 1799-07
- Leggiere, Michael. The Fall of Napoleon: The Allied Invasion of France, 1813-1814
- Lieven, Dominic. Russia Against Napoleon: The True Story of the Campaigns of War and Peace
- Ludwig, Emil. Napoleon
- Lyons, Martyn. France Under the Directory
- —. Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution
- Mahan, Alfred T. The Influence of Sea Power Upon the French Revolution and Empire
- Markham, Felix. Napoleon
- Martin, Marc. Les Origins de la Presse Militaire, 1770-1799
- Mason, Laura. Singing the French Revolution: Popular Culture and Politics, 1789-1799
- McCranie, Kevin. Admiral Lord Keith and the Naval War Against Napoleon
- McLynn, Frank. Napoleon: A Biography
- Mikaberidze, Alexander. The Battle of the Berezina: Napoleon’s Great Escape
- —. The Battle of Borodino: Napoleon Against Kutuzov
- Moiret, Joseph-Marie. The Memoirs of Napoleon’s Egyptian Expedition
- Moon, Joshua. Wellington’s Two-Front War: The Peninsular Campaigns at Home and Abroad
- Muir, Rory. Salamanca 1812
- —. Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon
- Noli, Bishop Fan Stylian. Beethoven and the French Revolution
- Nosworthy, Brent. Battle Tactics of Napoleon and His Enemies
- Palmer, Robert Roswell. Twelve Who Ruled: The Year of the Terror in the French Revolution
- Parkinson, Roger. The Peninsular War
- Pelet, Jean Jacques Germain. French Campaign in Portugal
- Phipps, Ramsay Weston. The Armies of the First French Republic and the Rise of the Marshals of Napoleon I (five volumes)
- Popkin, Jeremy. Revolutionary News: The Press in France, 1789-1799
- Quimby, Robert. The Background of Napoleonic Warfare: The Theory of Military Tactics in Eighteenth Century France
- Riehn, Richard. 1812: Napoleon’s Russian Campaign
- Riley, Jonathon. Napoleon and the World War of 1813: Lessons in Coalition Warfighting
- —. Napoleon as a General: From Battlefield to Grand Strategy
- Roberts, Andrew. Napoleon and Wellington
- Warren Roberts. Jacques-Louis David, Revolutionary Artist: Art, Politics, and the French Revolution
- Robinson, Andrew. Cracking the Egyptian Code: The Revolutionary Life of Jean-Francois Champollion
- Rodger, AB. The War of the Second Coalition, 1798-1802: A Strategic Commentary
- Rothenberg, Gunther Erich. The Art of Warfare in the Age of Napoleon
- —. The Napoleonic Wars
- Schechter, Ronald. Obstinate Hebrews: Representations of Jews in France, 1715-1815
- Sherwig, John. Guineas and Gunpowder: British Foreign Aid in the War Against France, 1793-1815
- Schmuel, Moreh. Napoleon In Egypt: Al-Jabarti’s Chronicle Of The French Occupation, 1798
- Schom, Alan. One Hundred Days: Napoleon’s Road to Waterloo
- —. Napoleon Bonaparte: A Life
- Schneid, Frederick. Napoleon’s Conquest of Europe: The War of the Third Coalition
- Schur, Nathan. Napoleon in the Holy Land
- Schwarzfuchs, Simon. Napoleon, the Jews and the Sanhedrin
- Scott, Samuel F. From Yorktown to Valmy: The Transformation of the French Army in an Age of Revolution
- Ségur, Philippe-Paul de. Napoleon’s Expedition to Russia: The Memoirs of General de Ségur
- Smith, Digby George. The Greenhill Napoleonic Wars Data Book: Actions and Losses in Personnel, Colours, Standards and Artillery, 1792-1815
- Stuart, Andrea. The Rose of Martinique: A Life of Napoleon’s Josephine
- Sugden, John. Nelson: A Dream of Glory, 1758-1797
- Tombs, Isabelle. That Sweet Enemy: Britain and France – The History of a Love-Hate Relationship
- Tone, John. The Fatal Knot: The Guerrilla War in Navarre and the Defeat of Napoleon in Spain
- Tulard, Jean. Napoleon: The Myth of the Savior
- Urban, Mark. The Man Who Broke Napoleon’s Codes: The Story of George Scovell
- Walter, Jakob. The Diary of a Napoleonic Foot Soldier
- Weider, Ben. Assassination at St. Helena Revisited
- Weller, Jac. Wellington in India
- —. Wellington in the Peninsula
- Woolf, Stuart. Napoleon’s Integration of Europe
- Zamoyski, Adam. Moscow 1812: Napoleon’s Fatal March
- —. Rites of Peace: The Fall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna
Extra:
Eroica (2003) [TV movie]:
Beethoven’s Symphony Eroica:
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