Glory and Remorse

Admiration or hyperbole is just a matter of judgement of degree. If you are a fellow admirer, you see a fair assessment. You might even delude yourself into believing it to be a fact rather than an opinion. If you have a more balanced outlook, you see hyperbole. Hyperbole, like beauty, is therefore in the eyes of the beholder. “‘Vive L’Empereur’ that echoes yet across the centuries” Just too hyperbolic and romantic for me, I’m afraid. It sells books though, especially in the US where admiration for Napoleon (if that’s what we are calling his personality cult these days) is more widespread. But that’s probably saying more about me, the dry, soulless, boring empiricist. I think times have moved on from Swords, and that style is less appropriate to the Google Books and Gallica generation. Today I think there is more desire for a more open evidence-analysis-conclusion rather than the older ‘trust me, I’m an expert’ approach of three or four decades ago. Why trust the opinions of an open admirer, when the source material is readily available? No criticism of Elting personally or even Napoleon. As a friend of one and an admirer of the other, of course our opinions are likely to differ. However, I have little brains, but having applied them have to speak as they direct me. That doesn’t mean Swords will be eliminated from my bookshelf, just used carefully and cognisant of the perspective of the author.