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Authors: Daniel Meyerson
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to a lovestruck, struggling general called Menou. While the demoralized army Napoleon had abandoned, decimated by disease, disintegrates before Menou’s eyes, and while Napoleon, in Paris, is fêted and applauded, the middle-aged Menou, swathed in white robes, publicly converts to Islam in the vast courtyard of the Ibn Tulun Mosque, where the French conquerors had stabled their horses when they first arrived.
“There is no God but God and Mohammed is his prophet!” the general declares in the presence of his broken, sorrowful officers, and before those of the savants who choose to attend. Perhaps this is a genuine profession of faith. Or perhaps it is a desperate political gesture, a last, futile attempt to gain popular support. Or perhaps it is neither of these but a case of violent, romantic passion overtaking a middle-aged man. Menou had fallen head-over-heels in love with a virtuous sixteen-year-old beauty who would not marry a Christian. In any case, this conversion does not save the situation: The French are forced to surrender.
The surrender is a long, drawn-out task, entailing much emotional back-and-forth and much senseless delay. By the time the surviving soldiers straggle back to France, by the time the appalling stories of what happened in Egypt become public knowledge, it no longer matters. Napoleon has, by then, seized power and, at the head of a new army, has gone on to achieve one victory after another.
With dazzling speed, Napoleon regains his Italian conquests, lost by the incompetent Directors while he was in Egypt, and achieves a decisive victory at Marengo that will lead the Austrians, the Prussians, and the Russians to sue for peace. The first coalition against France is vanquished.
Peace. Finally, there is a brief interval, a breathing space that lasts long enough for Napoleon to declare himself emperor before returning to his art. For he is an artist by nature, a temperamental, moody, passionate artist whose medium is war.
He is intractable. He is stubborn and provocative. Soon a second coalition against France must be defeated. But now it is as emperor that Napoleon leads the French armies to triumph—through Italy, Belgium, the German Kingdoms, the Austrian Empire, and finally the battle of Austerlitz, his masterpiece.
It is fought under a clear winter sky which becomes a catchphrase:
the cold sun of Austerlitz.
Indeed it can be taken as a metaphor for the stage in his career at which Napoleon has arrived. For unlike the Egyptian campaign—all furious heat, all willfulness and passion—by the time Napoleon fights at Austerlitz, he has achieved a balance between instinct and reason, boldness and prudence, passion and dispassion. He tempts the tsar to pursue the supposedly “retreating” French troops, drawing him into an untena-ble position. Then he surrounds the combined Russian-Prussian-Austrian force and cuts it to bits.
It is a brilliant piece of strategy conceived the night before when, sleepless and brooding, Napoleon makes the rounds of his troops, stalking back and forth on next-day’s battlefield, giving his imagination, his intellect, his instincts free play.
Half-abstracted, distant, he stops every so often to scrutinize some insignificant detail: the slope of a small hillock, the buttons on a soldier’s jacket. He mutters to himself or stares into the distance. Then he jokes with his soldiers—coarse jokes, talking obscenely of the “impatiently waiting” women of the enemy. He becomes eloquent about glory, practicing the genius he had for “getting others to die for him.” Finally, he falls silent. Looking over the dark field, he comes up with the inspired plan which brings Russia to its knees a second time, along with Prussia and the haughty Austrian Empire. The second coalition against France is vanquished.
Thus Napoleon dazzles the world. On a raft in the middle of the Nieman River, at a point equidistant from both army camps, Tsar Alexander publicly embraces the
“There is no God but God and Mohammed is his prophet!” the general declares in the presence of his broken, sorrowful officers, and before those of the savants who choose to attend. Perhaps this is a genuine profession of faith. Or perhaps it is a desperate political gesture, a last, futile attempt to gain popular support. Or perhaps it is neither of these but a case of violent, romantic passion overtaking a middle-aged man. Menou had fallen head-over-heels in love with a virtuous sixteen-year-old beauty who would not marry a Christian. In any case, this conversion does not save the situation: The French are forced to surrender.
The surrender is a long, drawn-out task, entailing much emotional back-and-forth and much senseless delay. By the time the surviving soldiers straggle back to France, by the time the appalling stories of what happened in Egypt become public knowledge, it no longer matters. Napoleon has, by then, seized power and, at the head of a new army, has gone on to achieve one victory after another.
With dazzling speed, Napoleon regains his Italian conquests, lost by the incompetent Directors while he was in Egypt, and achieves a decisive victory at Marengo that will lead the Austrians, the Prussians, and the Russians to sue for peace. The first coalition against France is vanquished.
Peace. Finally, there is a brief interval, a breathing space that lasts long enough for Napoleon to declare himself emperor before returning to his art. For he is an artist by nature, a temperamental, moody, passionate artist whose medium is war.
He is intractable. He is stubborn and provocative. Soon a second coalition against France must be defeated. But now it is as emperor that Napoleon leads the French armies to triumph—through Italy, Belgium, the German Kingdoms, the Austrian Empire, and finally the battle of Austerlitz, his masterpiece.
It is fought under a clear winter sky which becomes a catchphrase:
the cold sun of Austerlitz.
Indeed it can be taken as a metaphor for the stage in his career at which Napoleon has arrived. For unlike the Egyptian campaign—all furious heat, all willfulness and passion—by the time Napoleon fights at Austerlitz, he has achieved a balance between instinct and reason, boldness and prudence, passion and dispassion. He tempts the tsar to pursue the supposedly “retreating” French troops, drawing him into an untena-ble position. Then he surrounds the combined Russian-Prussian-Austrian force and cuts it to bits.
It is a brilliant piece of strategy conceived the night before when, sleepless and brooding, Napoleon makes the rounds of his troops, stalking back and forth on next-day’s battlefield, giving his imagination, his intellect, his instincts free play.
Half-abstracted, distant, he stops every so often to scrutinize some insignificant detail: the slope of a small hillock, the buttons on a soldier’s jacket. He mutters to himself or stares into the distance. Then he jokes with his soldiers—coarse jokes, talking obscenely of the “impatiently waiting” women of the enemy. He becomes eloquent about glory, practicing the genius he had for “getting others to die for him.” Finally, he falls silent. Looking over the dark field, he comes up with the inspired plan which brings Russia to its knees a second time, along with Prussia and the haughty Austrian Empire. The second coalition against France is vanquished.
Thus Napoleon dazzles the world. On a raft in the middle of the Nieman River, at a point equidistant from both army camps, Tsar Alexander publicly embraces the
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