Napoleon Bonaparte's character and achievements have always divided critics and historians. In this compelling biography, Frank McLynn draws on the most recent scholarship and throws a brilliant light on this most paradoxical of men -- as military leader, emperor, and lover. Tracing Napoleon's extraordinary career, the author examines the Promethean legend from his Corsican roots, through the years of the French Revolution and his military triumphs, to his coronation in 1804 and ultimate defeat and imprisonment. McLynn brilliantly reveals the extent to which Napoleon was both existential hero and plaything of Fate; mathematician and mystic; intellectual giant and moral pygmy; great man and deeply flawed human being. In this work McLynn offers a vivid and valuable canvas of, and new dimension to, eighteenth-century European history. He also brings the reader, as never before, closer to understanding the much mythologized Napoleon. - Back cover.