The RetreatThe Retreat
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Book, 2004
Current format, Book, 2004, 1st American ed, Available .Book, 2004
Current format, Book, 2004, 1st American ed, Available . Offered in 0 more formatsFollows the demoralized, exhausted, and much diminished French army in September 1812 at the gates of Moscow as Napoleon and his forces confront their most brutal challenge amid the cold and starvation of the Russian winter.
The sequel to The Battle, winner of the Priz Goncourt, continues the story of the Napoleonic Wars with the demoralized, exhausted, and much diminished French army in September 1812 at the gates of Moscow as Napoleon and his forces confront their most brutal challenge amid the cold and starvation of the Russian winter.
In midsummer 1812, Napoleon crossed over the river Niemen into Russia with the largest army hitherto assembled in European history. In September, the Grand Army, exhausted, famished, and reduced to a third of its initial size, finally reached Moscow, but the famed holy city was empty. Fires were burning and only inmates loosed from prisons and asylums roamed the streets. Citizens had already evacuated in great convoys, taking with them all the provisions and as many belongings as they could transport, including the fire engines.
For the next five weeks, the occupying forces found themselves in a strange, suspended state, conquerors of a ruined city. A semblance of normalcy prevailed - Napoleon's staff jockeyed for position; a stranded French theatrical troupe performed in the Kremlin; Stendhal, a foot soldier in the Army, recalled Nero's fire in Rome, and as winter drew near Napoleon waited for Tsar Alexander to return and sue for peace.
Filled with horrific human suffering and almost indescribably scenes of carnage, The Retreat is a vivid and memorable depiction of the Russian campaign, and an unblinking look at the capacity of those in extreme adversity, and of what men, when called upon, can survive.
The sequel to The Battle, winner of the Priz Goncourt, continues the story of the Napoleonic Wars with the demoralized, exhausted, and much diminished French army in September 1812 at the gates of Moscow as Napoleon and his forces confront their most brutal challenge amid the cold and starvation of the Russian winter.
In midsummer 1812, Napoleon crossed over the river Niemen into Russia with the largest army hitherto assembled in European history. In September, the Grand Army, exhausted, famished, and reduced to a third of its initial size, finally reached Moscow, but the famed holy city was empty. Fires were burning and only inmates loosed from prisons and asylums roamed the streets. Citizens had already evacuated in great convoys, taking with them all the provisions and as many belongings as they could transport, including the fire engines.
For the next five weeks, the occupying forces found themselves in a strange, suspended state, conquerors of a ruined city. A semblance of normalcy prevailed - Napoleon's staff jockeyed for position; a stranded French theatrical troupe performed in the Kremlin; Stendhal, a foot soldier in the Army, recalled Nero's fire in Rome, and as winter drew near Napoleon waited for Tsar Alexander to return and sue for peace.
Filled with horrific human suffering and almost indescribably scenes of carnage, The Retreat is a vivid and memorable depiction of the Russian campaign, and an unblinking look at the capacity of those in extreme adversity, and of what men, when called upon, can survive.
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- New York : Atlantic Monthly Press, 2004.
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