MobileRead July 2015 Discussion: Waterloo (spoilers)

[din155]

Originally Posted by CRussel

I'm enjoying this book, but it's not compelling me. I'm listening to the Audible version, which is well read, and I sometimes wish I had a map in front of me. OTOH, I don't actually _care_ about the details of who was on which road. What is more interesting, and well covered, is the logistical and tactical considerations that led to Wellington's victory. And the ways in which it could all have gone horribly wrong. (For example, why did Marshall Ney delay his attack on Quatre Bras.)

I enjoyed the audiobook. I felt the same about not seeing a map to visualize the positions but the story made up for it. Overall a good selection and I am glad to have read it.

P.S. Of late my attitude with history books has been to read them as semi-fiction stories unless there is something which interests me enough to research further.

[sun surfer]

Finished! And only a bit late to the ball.

This book reminded me of reading War and Peace so long ago, because it also deals with a Napoleonic battle and its deadly aftermath.

I enjoyed this book because of my almost utter lack of knowledge about battle specifics. From this book alone I think I've now gained a rudimentary knowledge of how battles then were fought and that alone was worth the price of admission. I've always wondered vaguely how armies can keep things in order and keep everyone on the same page in the intensity of the clash, and also not accidentally kill their own (especially from cannons firing on the enemy when their army is already attacking it). I knew disorder and friendly fire happened in some few instances, but thought it rare enough and that they must have ways I don't understand of preventing this. Now I see that my vague thoughts were more correct than I'd realised - that it is very hard in a large battle for things not to get confused all around and that they must all just do the best they can. I also learned about the differences between squares (never knew there was such a thing!), columns and lines, how different types of soldiers from skirmishers to cavalry are used, etc., etc. It was all very eye-opening for me and he painted a vivid picture of the battle.

I didn't, however, care for the repetitiveness at points, as has been mentioned by others. If anyone disagrees with me, we can certainly play a game of paper, scissors and stone to settle the matter.

Also as others have said here, I felt there was a bias against Napoleon. From the way he painted the picture it just almost didn't seem plausible that Napoleon and his side could've really been that incompetent, you know? I understand that as close as the battle was, Napoleon and his top tier did make many mistakes that cost them the win, but I feel like something was left out of the book, something to better explain these mistakes. They were explained in the book and in single contexts they make sense but overall I just felt the writing was slightly too biased. For instance, I understand that Cornwell himself may not understand why Napoleon didn't send more of the reserve, and send it quicker, to help Ney near the end when he was having his success after La Haie Sainte, but Cornwell is content to leave it there making Napoleon looking like an idiot for not doing so.

Similarly, Cornwell seems to go out of his way to defend Wellington throughout. These criticisms of his writing aren't absolute - there are times, even many, when he writes understandingly about Napoleon and a few times even critically about Wellington (such as Wellington not giving the Prussians enough credit later in life) - but overall I think he let his own opinions in just enough to tarnish the book.

Here are two examples:

The Duke of Wellington, meanwhile, was never off his horse, Copenhagen. For much of the battle he stayed beside the elm tree at the crossroads, but at moments of great danger he was always with the threatened troops.

If the Emperor had really thought that sacrificing his cavalry would mean the destruction of Wellington's infantry then he had been proved horribly wrong by a 'hail of death' and a 'fire of unbelievable violence'.

Both of those may be true but they both also seem overstated with bias.

Overall though, I do feel that he probably was trying to be even-handed and just couldn't help himself or didn't realise his bias, and the book was a fairly simple to read, engaging and enlightening breakdown of a very complex few days.