I ended up liking this book way more than I thought I would. It was a biography of a fascinating subject and it was told in a stylized way that was extremely engaging. Cooper knew how to write to entertain. He also has an excellent view of history that he shares with readers in short, pithy quotes. For example: "In feudal times the king had had to reckon with a free and powerful nobility, living upon their own land, and relying upon the support of their own adherents. The struggle between king and landed aristocracy had resulted in France in the defeat of the aristocracy, just as in England it had resulted in the defeat of the king." But he's also got a lot of personality as a writer, like when he casually insults people from history: "a tender father of a family and a faithful husband of an ugly wife." Why did he feel the need to say that? And he has a clear sense of morality, like when he writes that, "A dictator cannot blame others for what is done in his name unless he punishes them." He also writes that, "Extremists, to whatever camp they belong, are the disease germs in the body politic. They can never create, but when the general health of the body is weak, they can bring destruction. They are reckless as to the means they employ, and because their passion-blinded eyes can discern no difference between the most moderate and the most violent of those who differ from them, they are ready to combine with the latter in order to defeat the former."
Talleyrand is an important historical figure because he served in nearly all French governments from the time of the Revolution, when he was elected to the first Estates-General in 1789, during the Directory, under the First Empire, and under both the Restoration governments of Louis XVIII and Louis-Philippe. He is especially interesting because he was Bishop who didn't believe in God and spent most of his life feuding with the church, for which he was excommunicated. His worst act against the church was his earliest: in 1789 he brought forward the motion for the State to seize all church property. He was then excommunicated for ordaining prelates in direct disobedience to the Pope. Talleyrand joined the church against his will, forced into it so that the inheritance of his father's estate could go to his younger brother. Talleyrand was disfavored because of a birth deformity that caused him to limp. And he wasn't fit for the church because he was a rationalist: he supported measures for the emancipation of the Jews, stabilization of weights and measures, and a system of public education (among others). In 1790, he was elected the President of the National Assembly.
Talleyrand was also corrupt, as we would understand it today. But Cooper is clear on telling us that Talleyrand would not have considered his solicitation of bribes to be corruption, but rather the proper remuneration for his services. For example, he always favored the re-creation of Poland after it was partitioned by Prussia, Russia, and Austria in 1795. So he didn't see anything wrong with taking money from Polish elites to advocate that same cause to his superiors, and in fact Talleyrand returned the money when he failed to achieve it. But Talleyrand became famous for bribery because, Cooper writes, "he took millions where [others] took thousands." As a person, it seems like people generally all had the same impression. First, they regard him as repulsive, and like a snake. But then, they get to know him and really love him and his cleverness.
Talleyrand was clearly a master diplomat. He understood the lesson that was lost at Versailles in 1919, that a state should be hard and vicious in war but friendly and merciful in peace. Talleyrand's advice would have preserved the French Empire had it been heeded. He advocated to Napoleon to offer Austria a good peace that would grant it territories away from France, so that it might focus elsewhere. But instead, Napoleon forced Emperor Francis to pay 1/6 of his revenue and an indemnity of fort million francs while losing nearly three million subjects. Cooper writes of this that Napoleon's fatal error was to never decide his war aims before going to war. The result was that war was fought for the sake of war with unconditional surrender by the enemy being the only thing that could end it. And so when Napoleon fought Prussia, the Prussian King Frederick William accepted Napoleon's peace proposal from October, but since matters had gone better for Napoleon in the meantime, Napoleon demanded more by November. Prussia lost half its territory and lost over five million subjects in population. These peace treaties in fact engendered even more hatred on the part of the conquered, and meant that they would be back to fight Napoleon again. And then this bit Napoleon in the back when he rejected borders that would have given him the natural borders of France: the Rhine, the Alps, and the Pyrenees. Because he felt such a strong offer was due to his strong position, he rejected it. Then he regretted that rejection two weeks later, when he was losing and it was too late. Then, he was given terms that would have given him France's 1791 borders. But since he'd just won two successes he refused. And from that point the Allies were determined to eliminate him once and for all since they couldn't rely on negotiations with him.
A theme that keeps coming up in my readings is nationalism. It emerges in this book again when Napoleon has managed to trick the King of Spain into losing his throne, which Napoleon handed to his brother, Joseph. Cooper points out that this trick could not work against the nobility of Europe, because they saw it as him breaking the rules, but that it also couldn't work against the normal people, because they had developed a national identity. By the 19th century, Spaniards would not consent to being ruled by the French. On the basis of war against Portugal, Napoleon got the permission of the Spanish royals to bring an army through Spain. But once he was there, he struck against them. It was that treachery that caused Europe to turn against him completely and irrevocable. Cooper writes that, "No dynasty could feel secure after the manner in which the Spanish Bourbons had been treated; no nation could despair of liberty when they saw how the Spanish people were refusing to accept an alien domination."
I'll just finish by saying I really liked this book and especially this author. I am going to try to find some more of his books.
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