NAPOLEON

A study of Napoleon Bonaparte’s life with an emphasis on horticulture that, believe it or not, works.

For sheer numbers, books on Napoleon (1769-1821) vie for first place with those on Lincoln, Churchill, Hitler, and other major historical figures, so there doesn’t seem to be an unexamined area of his life. However, historian and literary critic Scurr has found one. “Napoleon spent five years at the military school in Brienne-le-Chateau and six in St. Helena,” she writes. “These blocks of time enclose his life like bookends….In between his first and last gardens, the arc of his life rose toward the sky, before falling back down to earth.” There is no doubt that he paid a great deal of attention to a garden during his captivity on St. Helena, and a “highly embellished claim that he loved and tended a small garden at school” may not be wrong. Always fascinated by science, he established many of France’s educational institutions, museums, zoos, and botanical gardens that still exist, and he recruited a small army of scholars that accompanied him to Egypt during his 1798 invasion. Inevitably, as he accumulated power, he acquired land and properties—many abandoned and decayed since the French Revolution—and hired architects and gardeners to produce estates worthy of an emperor, a process to which his wife, Josephine, contributed enthusiastically (one of her goals “was to collect every variety of rose in the world”). Readers will learn a lot about the design and layout of the gardens as well as the controversy and expense involved. A diligent historian, Scurr does not ignore the wars and politics that dominated Napoleon’s life, and she concludes with a vivid account of the battle of Waterloo, in which the chateau of Hougoumont, with its “high garden walls,” played a central role. Those seeking more details will want a traditional work. Andrew Roberts’ 2014 biography should be the first choice, but this is a welcome addition to the literature.

A wealth of natural history and a fine Napoleon biography.