Search the Products Store
Search the Book Store
clog dancing Book Store Index
Privacy Policy
Copyright Notice
Home
|
|
Dancing into Battle: A Social History of the Battle of Waterloo |
Author: Nick Foulkes
Published: 2008-04-28 |
List price: $16.95
Our price: $13.22
|
Usually ships in 24 hours
As of: December 01st, 2008 07:25:32 PM
|
|
|
Customer comments on this selection.
 Dancing with Foulkes
Well, this is a waste.
The author fails the reader in every possible way:
Poorly researched, biased, randomly selected statements uncritically collected to fabricate a book.
It seems that the issue at hand is too tempting to some, so they write, even if they have nothing to say.
Mr. Foulkes, even if you are a fashion reporter usually occupied with 'dandy-ism' and claiming that this book wasn't meant for crack-historians, its immoral to mislead the public and to grossly omit the results and disputes of 200 years of controversial history. Stick to issues of dandy-ism and do not take people's money for nothing.
It was Plini the elder who said: Even in the most horrendous book one might find a valuable sentence. I was looking for that, I couldn't find it.
 Highly entertaining story of Waterloo
If you are interested in the story of Waterloo, and the famous personalities that are attached to this historically important battle, then you will certainly enjoy this book. It's not a work of military history - indeed the battle scenes are short and sharp and not at all strategically outlined - instead this is a work of social history - readable, entertaining and not densely academic.
The book revolves around the small but interesting coterie of British ex-pats who moved to Brussels after Napoleon was finally defeated at Toulouse and then incarcerated on Elba. They moved for various reasons, most particularly to economise. We meet aristocrats like the weak Duke of Richmond and his socially ambitious wife, a branch of the Capel family - impoverished and looking to rusticate for a while on the continent, the curious gossipy MP Thomas Creevey to name but a few. Wellington, of course, is the main mover and shaker as he arrives from Vienna to take control of a disparate and mainly unready Army with a view of finally getting rid of the resurgent Napoleon.
The Duchess of Richmond's famous ball on the night of 15 June is the focal point of the book - and it's a story familiar to readers of fact and fiction. The news of the fighting at Charleroi started coming in as the aristocratic British officers are dancing at the ball. The ball broke up in a hurry as the officers made haste to return to their regiments. It really is one of the most romantic stories (the officers who died in their dancing shoes, having not had time to change) but there is an undercurrent of incipient tragedy as the night unfolded.
Foulkes also tells us about ordinary soldiers who fought and died on 18 June, giving us background on their lives before that infamous day. He uses Sgt John Shaw - a famous pugilist and drunkard as a metaphor for the confusion about the battle - was he a hero or was he simply out of his mind with drink when he left his unit to take on 10 French cuirassiers? Foulkes contrasts him with the metaphor of Wellington during the days before and after the battle - a hardened soldier, brilliant strategist, womaniser, self-contained but weeping in the aftermath of Waterloo though fully aware of his achievement. A man who became a national hero, not displaced until Churchill, but nevertheless a man who left an Army that did not change thus setting up the debacle of the Crimean War.
The author draws on diaries and other sources well known to students of the era and the battle and he has entertained me with a cracking good read. He gives a very good picture of what it was like to be in Brussels and hear the booming of the cannons in the distance, seeing the injured return in agony and tatters days after the that picnics, balls and reviews were the focus of attention. We learn about the hangers-on, the women left behind and the battlefield scavengers. Uxbridge (and the famous amputation of his leg) and Raglan (of Crimean fame) and the various other young and aristocratic ADCs who formed Wellington's "family" come to life for us.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in the period - either from a military or social point of view. It's highly entertaining and well illustrated.
|
|
Our clog dancing book picks:
|
|
Search the clog dancing Products Store
LCS Amazon Store 2.5 © 2008
|