Word: napoleons
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...novel itself is divided into four movements corresponding to the parts of Beethoven's Third Symphony, "The Eroica." (Beethoven originally dedicated "The Eroica " to Napoleon, but tore up the dedication after the First Consul of France crowned himself Emperor.) At times the Burgess Bonaparte resembles a cross between Charles de Gaulle and Douglas MacArthur. At times he is an 18th century Mafia capo trying to manage overextended holdings and control his greedy relatives. Burgess seeks to evoke the heaving spirit of the Napoleonic age by rouging (and noiring) the historical facts with catchy dialogue and fantasy. As he points...
...comes indolent Josephine cuckolding her warrior-husband while he is off subjugating the Mamelukes in Egypt. Then his Empress-the mother of his only acknowledged son-homesick Marie-Louise, who stuffs herself with Austrian chocolate and drinks coffee in clear violation of the Emperor's trade-war embargo. Napoleon's mother, Madame Mere, casts a practical Corsican eye on ephemeral pomp and circumstance, while prudently stuffing gold in her socks. And of course Talleyrand appears, ceaselessly tacking for advantage and trimming his sails at the hint of rough weather...
...broader screen of history, Burgess gets his effects by balancing the horrors of war with some of the absurdities of political power and private weaknesses. Napoleon is at times almost lovable, particularly when he discovers that the people of France are so blinded by the myth of Bonaparte that they do not even recognize him when he chooses to walk the streets as an ordinary citizen. Burgess also locates Napoleon's own blind spots. On drama, for example: "Tragedy must never have chairs on the stage. Tragic characters never sit down." And the Emperor's effort to abolish...
...attitude and policies regarding the German states, for example, actually helped drive the Teutonic princes together. As a result, Napoleon helped lay the foundation for German nationalism and France's conqueror, Bismarck...
Burgess grants Napoleon both genius and idealism, but he has great fun exploring the Emperor's lack of moral sensitivity and aesthetic judgment. As the torch carrier of the Enlightenment, a kind of social engineer who believed man was perfectible through political institutions, Burgess's Napoleon ignores the intransigent nature of evil...