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Description: This long overdue book gives an intelligent discussion of British reactions to Napoleon. Most notable is the treatment of the way in which opposition politicians in Britain used Napoleon as a point of departure for a reconsideration of British history, the legitimacy of the house of Hannover and how to interpret the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Using sources ranging from contemporary journalism and broadsides to contemporary poetry, Semmel ably shows how Napoleon himself occupied a much more complicated and ambiguous place in British political culture than either knee-jerk British (or for that matter French) national history has allowed for to date. Indeed, he justifiably claims that 'this is the first book to undertake a thorough reconstruction of Napoleon's place in the broad political culture of late Hanoverian Britain.' A must read!
Stuart Semmel is assistant professor of history at the University of Delaware.
Contents:
1 Classifying Napoleon
2 National character and national anxiety
3 The pious proteus and the nation's destiny
4 The imperial sans-culotte
5 From Elba to St. Helena
6 Radicals, "Legitimacy" and History
7 The politics of exile
8 fallen greatness
Epilogue: the historical Napoleon
Place and publisher: London: Yale University Press
Date of publication: 2004
Number of pages: 354
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