Life of Napoleon Buonaparte
Scott, Walter / Michaelis, Richard Six years after the death of Napoleon, Sir Walter Scott wrote the first, hugely successful biography of Napoleon that riveted Britain and the continent and led to him being challenged to a duel by former Napoleon generals. It was probably the first book ever to be extracted in a newspaper. Scott's bracing but fair portrait of his contemporary inspired a new wave of historians to engage with history in a way that we now recognise as modern. Ori...