Guido Gerosa
Napoleone: un rivoluzionario alla conquista di un impero

There are personalities, not people, who disrupt history in such a way that even our beloved and acclaimed art, the most illustrious artists and the most majestic works, step aside and yield. They retreat into a corner and watch, with reverence and admiration, hoping for the inspiration that the figure can bring them as a gift, and remain silent. After all, isn't what inspires the world, creating an aura of mystery and elusive charm, a living representation of the artistic fact?

So, by chance, while wandering through a market of "Give me twenty euros and I'll give you ten kilos of books," you find the biography of one of the top three most famous and popular characters in history: the gentleman you admire on the cover. Needless to say, I dived right in, feeling lucky and grateful for the general indifference towards this brick (530 pages, excluding bibliographic notes) displayed nicely, compared to the rest.

You say: "Biography of Napoleon."

You think: "Great book, cool, awesome regardless."

If you love history as much as I do, if biographies and autobiographies are your bread and butter, this is the book for you. If you have a critical spirit always active, so fierce in the quest for your truth, you absolutely should not buy this book.

Guido Derosa, a student of Spadolini, what cannot be called irreproachable, attempts to comment on Napoleon's life in the most straightforward and interesting way possible. The result is only half successful. The ease with which a book with Bonaparte on the cover gets a passing grade is embarrassing, so great is the interest the character arouses in the reader's mind. Is it a coincidence that Napoleon is one of the most famous characters and (paraphrasing the book) the one with the most biographies (surpassing Christ and Caesar) dedicated to him? Indeed, it's a pleasure to move from his rough and stimulating childhood in Corsica, under the guidance of the eagle-mother Letizia Ramolino, to his very early adolescence. The future emperor demonstrates, through the many anecdotes presented gradually, a precocious warrior spirit, capacity, and will to succeed, and thus enters the best and most prestigious military schools. You run with delight through these dense pages, devouring it all, arriving in the heat of the action almost without noticing.

In no time, Napoleon is ready, to fight at the legendary siege of Toulon. Captain "cannon" he would be nicknamed by his men, this genius of the artillery and batteries. His courage is relentless. But not all that glitters is gold. A subject like this is not enough to make a book successful or simply something truly valuable. Gerosa begins to describe the various battles that follow with meticulous detail but somehow forgets to provide us with even a scrap of a map, a chart; forcing the reader to struggle to imagine the unimaginable: the reality of the places and locations, the surgical maneuvers orchestrated first by the French army and then by the grand army.

To this not insignificant limitation, adds a narratively hasty attitude, where, in an attempt to fill the inevitable gaps that a half-preparation on the subject poses, concepts or even entire quotations from previous paragraphs are repeated, all to gain space. And this note is much more than a vague presage confirmed by the asymmetrical, disharmonious structure of the work itself that goes from incredible lengths, especially in the initial parts of the Frenchman's life (unbelievable is the digression on the Egyptian campaign, almost a hundred pages) to skim some of the most salient and famous moments of the Napoleonic epic. The battle of Jena, Wagram, the rise to the throne of Maria Luisa of Austria are glossed over within a space equal to or less than the very early stages of his ascent.

Fortunately, the last act of the downfall has a vast literature to support it, and we have a description of the events that is overall good, at least initially with the Russian campaign playing the role of the lion. All the rest, the hundred days, Waterloo and Saint Helena, seem insubstantial based on the author, who, evidently stingy with information, tries to wrap up as best he can a second part of the volume full of weaknesses.

Luckily, Napoleon himself comes to our rescue, with his quotes, his plans, interesting and curious anecdotes. An incredible charm that denotes greatness in total, in genius and madness. More than one doubt arises about his mental health, whether he was bipolar or not, but no doubt about his importance, first and foremost iconographic. Guido Gerosa himself tries in a modest (and unskilled) final chapter to gauge Napoleon's actual importance, delivering us the usual Manzonian question: "Was it true glory?" and an unintended but served reply to the closing credits: "Yes, it was true glory."

Yes, it was true glory, because facts are facts, and beyond empty rhetoric, the interest towards the Napoleon totem and his glory is irresistible, indeed one wonders: "Should I read another biography?"