Napoleon today is still a figure who fascinates both his admirers and detractors because of his seminal role in European history at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries, straddling the French Revolution and the enormous empire that he fashioned through military conquest. Napoleon in the Russian Imaginary focuses on the response of Russia's greatest writers—poets, novelists, critics, and historians—to the idea of "Great Man" as an agent of transformational change as it manifests itself in the person and career of Napoleon. After Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo in 1815 and his subsequent exile to St. Helena, in much of Europe a re-evaluation of Napoleon's person, stature, and historical significance occurred, as thinkers and writers witnessed the gradual reestablishment of repressive regimes throughout Europe. This re-evaluation in Russia would have to wait until Napoleon's death in 1821, but when it came to pass, it continued to occupy the imagination of Russia's greatest writers for over 130 years. Although Napoleon's invasion of Russia and subsequent defeat had a profound effect on Russian culture and Russian history, for Russian writers what was most important was the universal significance of Napoleon’s desire for world conquest and the idea of unbridled ambition which he embodied. Russian writers saw this, for good or ill, as potentially determining the spiritual and moral fate of future generations. What is particularly fascinating is their attempt to confront each other about this idea in a creative dialogue, with each succeeding writer addressing himself and responding to his predecessor and predecessors.

A major new history of the Russian conflict immortalized by Tolstoy in War and Peace Russia's expulsion of Napoleon's Grande Armée in 1812 is considered one of the most dramatic events in European history. However, Tolstoyan myth and an imbalance of British and French interpretations have clouded most Westerners' understanding of Russia's role in the defeat of Napoleon. Based on a fresh examination of Russian military archives, Russia Against Napoleon provides the first-ever history of the period told from the Russian perspective. In Dominic Lieven's account, Russia's victory in 1812 was just the beginning of what would be the longest military campaign in European history, marked by Russia's epic efforts to feed and supply half a million troops as they crossed an entire continent. Moving from the 1807 treaty signed by Napoleon and Tsar Alexander I through the Russian army's improbable entry into Paris in 1814, Lieven provides suspenseful accounts of events, such as the burning of Moscow and the great battles of Leipzig and Borodino, as well as astute analyses of the great military strategists of the time. The result is a magisterial work sure to be eagerly anticipated by military and history buffs alike.

Napoleon’s invasion of Russia remains the benchmark for military disaster, even some two hundred year after he and his 600,000 men crossed the Niemen into the interior of Russia. The story of these men and their stolid, valiant opponents, the Russians, is recounted in admirable detail by the Author: from the killing fields of Smolensk and Borodino to the great fire of Moscow and the retreat through the snows of the Russian winter. Illustrated with 8 plans, the action of the great struggle is brought into full life, even through the passage of so much time. Author — George, Hereford B. 1838-1910. Text taken, whole and complete, from the edition published in London, T.F. Unwin, 1899. Original Page Count – xv, 451 p. Illustrations — 8 maps and plans.

Reproduction of the original. The publishing house Megali specialises in reproducing historical works in large print to make reading easier for people with impaired vision.

Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) is one of the most illustrated political and military figures of the last two millennia. He has remained in the memory of the world as a legend that the passage of the years has failed to blur. On the contrary, Napoleon Bonaparte widely continues to be considered the personification of human genius. In this memoir, which was first published in this English translation in 1937, author and historian Evgeny Tarle vividly presents in detail Napoleon’s life and official activity. “THE man, with whose life and personality this book deals, presents one of the most extraordinary phenomena in world history. It is not surprising that he has been, still is, and will continue to be, the subject of many biographies. “As recently as 1914, a section of the militant German press sang fervent praises of Napoleon as the creator of the Continental Blockade and as the author of the idea of uniting the European continent against England; after the World War, the victorious Allies, inspired by his example, inserted the more ruthless clauses into the Versailles Treaty; and the Fascist dictatorship in Italy made the study of Napoleon’s personality a compulsory course of history instruction in the schools. And before and after the World War the figure of Napoleon loomed constantly before the minds of the ruling classes, frightened by approaching revolution and yearning for the strong man and deliverer. “The grandiose Napoleonic epic has had almost as strong a hold on political philosophers and theoreticians as on historians, publicists and poets. Beginning with the Hegelians and ending with the revolutionary Marxist writers, there has been no single noticeable current of social and philosophic thought which, in one fashion or another, has not been influenced by Napoleon.”—E. V. Tarle, Introduction

Originally published in 1962, J. Christopher Herold's Bonaparte in Egypt is the best modern account of this extraordinary campaign. In a detailed study, elegantly written, Herold covers all aspects of Bonaparte's expedition: military, political, and cultural. It was a bold adventure, full of drama, topped and tailed by the extremes of total triumph and utter defeat. Although Bonaparte was victorious at the Battle of the Pyramids and occupied Cairo, his fleet was completely destroyed by Nelson at Abukir Bay and his ambition to conquer the Holy Land was frustrated at Acre. Despite these reverses, Bonaparte returned to France where he was greeted as a hero and seized political power in 1799. His attempt to take permanent control of Egypt and Syria for France was a critical stage on his road to power, and it is one of the most revealing episodes in his spectacular career.

The book brings together the philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard with that of another prominent proto-existentialist thinker, Fyodor Dostoevsky. Asking the question: "What constitutes an authentic Christian life?", the book explores the answer given by both authors, which is that one should rid oneself of selfish inclinations and strive for a life of faith that revolves around the virtues of humility and non-preferential love. However, as we learn from Dostoevsky and Kierkegaard, becoming an authentic individual is no easy task, and the book goes on to examine the obstacles that lie in the path of individual existential self-development. The book then examines the ways in which the various characters and pseudonymous authors who populate Dostoevsky's and Kierkegaard's books struggle in their attempts to become authentic ethical and religious individuals. The examination of this struggle, termed existential entrapment and defined as the inability to progress on the path of one's existential self-development, forms the core of the book and helps to map out the ethical-religious landscape of Dostoevsky’s and Kierkegaard’s thought.