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4.11 AVERAGE
4.11 AVERAGE
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for 2013 along with a multiple other accolades well deserved. It's apparently clear that Tom Reiss did a deep dive into researching his subject and the biography was thorough from his youth until his untimely death at the age of 43. There is plenty of history in this work and some of it quite shocking to tell the truth. Napoleon was a tyrant and no better than the monarchs he replaced as history shows him and following Alex Dumas around in all the battles he was involved in it's clear that Dumas was a willing participant. So I came away with the feeling of not being very fond of the subject of this work but admittingly aware that this novel is honest and deserves a five star to the author for writing the Count's story.
One of my favourite novels is The Count of Monte Cristo and I found this absolutely fascinating! How a man who was the son of a slave became one of the best generals in the French army, married a white woman he genuinely loved, and how is son, the infamous author, was inspired by the life of his father in his writing.
Reasons I Recommend:
1) 18th c France, an aristocrat brings his teenage son home and gives him an education parallel to other French nobles
2) Dumas changes his name at his father’s behest when he joins the French army as a common soldier, quickly rises through the ranks on merit alone and
3) How one soldier who did so much for the French revolution was denied his final glory, died penniless, left his family in poverty bc of Napoleon.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Quote 1: To remember a person is the most important thing in the novels of Alexandre Dumas. The worst sin anyone can commit is to forget. The villains of The Coune of Monte Cristo do not murder the hero, Edmond Dantès they have him thrown into a dungeon where he is forgotten by the world. The heroes of Dumas never forget anything or anyone: Dantès has a perfect memory for the details of every field of human knowledge, for the history of the world and for everyone he has encountered in his life.
Quote 2: Possible, when the French slave empire was at its height, for the sons of slaves, men of color, to be living as gentlemen in Paris-the capital of France, of Europe itself?
Quote 3: Among the Muslims, men from every class who were able to catch sight of General Bonaparte were struck by how short and how skinny he was. ... The one, among our generals, whose appearance struck them even more... was the General-in-Chief of the cavalry, Dumas. Man of color, and by his figure looking like a centaur, when they saw him ride his horse over the trenches, going to ransom the prisoners, all of them believed that he was the leader of the Expedition.
#briereads #brierecommends #2024goodreadsreadingchallenge #reviewedongoodreads #reviewedoninstagram #bookworm #lovetoread #idratherbereading #historicalbiography #truestory #alexandredumas #generalalexdumas #theblackcount #tomreiss #book22of250goal
Reasons I Recommend:
1) 18th c France, an aristocrat brings his teenage son home and gives him an education parallel to other French nobles
2) Dumas changes his name at his father’s behest when he joins the French army as a common soldier, quickly rises through the ranks on merit alone and
3) How one soldier who did so much for the French revolution was denied his final glory, died penniless, left his family in poverty bc of Napoleon.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Quote 1: To remember a person is the most important thing in the novels of Alexandre Dumas. The worst sin anyone can commit is to forget. The villains of The Coune of Monte Cristo do not murder the hero, Edmond Dantès they have him thrown into a dungeon where he is forgotten by the world. The heroes of Dumas never forget anything or anyone: Dantès has a perfect memory for the details of every field of human knowledge, for the history of the world and for everyone he has encountered in his life.
Quote 2: Possible, when the French slave empire was at its height, for the sons of slaves, men of color, to be living as gentlemen in Paris-the capital of France, of Europe itself?
Quote 3: Among the Muslims, men from every class who were able to catch sight of General Bonaparte were struck by how short and how skinny he was. ... The one, among our generals, whose appearance struck them even more... was the General-in-Chief of the cavalry, Dumas. Man of color, and by his figure looking like a centaur, when they saw him ride his horse over the trenches, going to ransom the prisoners, all of them believed that he was the leader of the Expedition.
#briereads #brierecommends #2024goodreadsreadingchallenge #reviewedongoodreads #reviewedoninstagram #bookworm #lovetoread #idratherbereading #historicalbiography #truestory #alexandredumas #generalalexdumas #theblackcount #tomreiss #book22of250goal
What a swashbuckling story! The the father of the Alexandre Dumas we all know and love (coincidentally also known as Alexandre Dumas, and grandfather of a third Alexandre Dumas who was a famous playwright) had a life history to rival that of d’Artagnan or Edmund Dantes. Born to a white French father and a black Haitian enslaved mother, Alex Dumas was briefly sold into slavery by his own father before joining him as a free man in Paris in the late 18th century. His life is inextricably linked with the French Revolution, and the incredible experimentations with liberté, égalité, fraternité that allowed Dumas to rise through the ranks of the military, rubbing elbows with Napoleon Bonaparte and carrying out daring feats of bravery. He joined Napoleon’s failed conquest of Egypt and then spent years in a Neapolitan prison, returning to his family an utterly broken man. The rise and fall of his fortunes was so dramatic, it’s no wonder his son wrote the best revenge fantasy of all time modeled after his father’s imprisonment. I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in French history, Black history, or even just a fan of the younger Dumas’s novels. Though he was just four years old when his father died, it’s impossible to think of his stories without imagining Alex Dumas now.
informative
medium-paced
emotional
informative
reflective
medium-paced
I thought this would be more storytelling than biographical. But really enjoyed
adventurous
informative
medium-paced
Continuing on with the "French Revolution seen through the perspective of Americans" I started with The Greater Journy: Americans in Paris and Dr. Mutter's Marvels, the Black Count took me into the realm of the greater military conflicts outside Paris as well as international race politics.
I thought I was getting a swashbuckling adventure when I picked this up: not a historical education and eye-opening look into the French Revolution's short-lived racial utopia. And I also didn't know that my much-loved author, Alexander Dumas of Monte Cristo fame, had deep personal ties to racial issues as well as a father who lived much of Dante's betrayal.
So while I was a bit disappointed that it wasn't a novel, I soon realized it was just as good. There is swashbuckling in this, actually quite unbelievable swashbuckling by Alexander Dumas' actual father-- a mixed race General born of an aristocrat and a black slave.
So unbelievable that the only reason I believe it all is the author's careful attention to primary source materials such as letters and military historical documents.
What makes this interesting are the two strands: following the rise and fall of racial equality in the French Revolution (and then, as depicted in this book, Napoleon Bonaparte's betrayal of those ideals) as well as the impact the revolution and subsequent republic had on military campaigns in Italy and Egypt through the eyes of Dumas' father.
Reading this makes me want to go dig out that 1998 Gerard Depardieu Count of Monte Cristo mini series again somehow and watch it with my new-found knowledge :)
I thought I was getting a swashbuckling adventure when I picked this up: not a historical education and eye-opening look into the French Revolution's short-lived racial utopia. And I also didn't know that my much-loved author, Alexander Dumas of Monte Cristo fame, had deep personal ties to racial issues as well as a father who lived much of Dante's betrayal.
So while I was a bit disappointed that it wasn't a novel, I soon realized it was just as good. There is swashbuckling in this, actually quite unbelievable swashbuckling by Alexander Dumas' actual father-- a mixed race General born of an aristocrat and a black slave.
So unbelievable that the only reason I believe it all is the author's careful attention to primary source materials such as letters and military historical documents.
What makes this interesting are the two strands: following the rise and fall of racial equality in the French Revolution (and then, as depicted in this book, Napoleon Bonaparte's betrayal of those ideals) as well as the impact the revolution and subsequent republic had on military campaigns in Italy and Egypt through the eyes of Dumas' father.
Reading this makes me want to go dig out that 1998 Gerard Depardieu Count of Monte Cristo mini series again somehow and watch it with my new-found knowledge :)
The biographical sections of this novel were wonderful. They were readable and factual, the footnotes added additional context where needed, and while there were places where the historical context took the spotlight away from Alex Dumas himself, they generally didn't feel unnecessary or poorly written. There were a few places where I wish Reiss would have stayed on topic a little more, but over all I thought it was excellently written.
That said, I didn't think Reiss needed to rely as heavily on the framework he used of his discovering the personal correspondence of General Dumas in a locked safe in the French countryside. I thought it was distracting to have peppered throughout the narrative self-referential mentions of "my findings" when Dumas' story was more than enough to support the book on it's own. The context and personal interest in the prologue (and perhaps first chapter?) were fine, but when we'd passed the halfway mark and Reiss was still indicating himself occasionally, I found it extremely distracting.
I also felt that the epilogue was unnecessary, and took away from the life we'd just had recounted to us. The epilogue drew our attention back away from the General and his brave and tragic life and pointed us at modernity. Which could have been handled better, or left off, but as it was felt less like a "why don't we talk about this?" and more like a "see what we've done? We're so horrible we're racists and we're all apathetic" moral for the end of the story. It was awkward and heavy handed and I didn't appreciate the clunky ending to what had otherwise been a well written book.
That said, I didn't think Reiss needed to rely as heavily on the framework he used of his discovering the personal correspondence of General Dumas in a locked safe in the French countryside. I thought it was distracting to have peppered throughout the narrative self-referential mentions of "my findings" when Dumas' story was more than enough to support the book on it's own. The context and personal interest in the prologue (and perhaps first chapter?) were fine, but when we'd passed the halfway mark and Reiss was still indicating himself occasionally, I found it extremely distracting.
I also felt that the epilogue was unnecessary, and took away from the life we'd just had recounted to us. The epilogue drew our attention back away from the General and his brave and tragic life and pointed us at modernity. Which could have been handled better, or left off, but as it was felt less like a "why don't we talk about this?" and more like a "see what we've done? We're so horrible we're racists and we're all apathetic" moral for the end of the story. It was awkward and heavy handed and I didn't appreciate the clunky ending to what had otherwise been a well written book.