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Folk-Tales of Napoleon The Napoleon of the People; Napoleonder By: Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) |
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NAPOLEONDER
From the Russian THE NAPOLEON OF THE PEOPLE
From the French of Honoré de Balzac
Translated With Introduction By
GEORGE KENNAN
1902
CONTENTS NAPOLEONDER
THE NAPOLEON OF THE PEOPLE
INTRODUCTION Most of the literature that has its origin in the life and career of a
great man may be grouped and classified under two heads: history and
biography. The part that relates to the man's actions, and to the
influence that such actions have had in shaping the destinies of peoples
and states, belongs in the one class; while the part that derives its
interest mainly from the man's personality, and deals chiefly with the
mental and moral characteristics of which his actions were the outcome,
goes properly into the other. The value of the literature included in
these two classes depends almost wholly upon truth; that is, upon the
precise correspondence of the statements made with the real facts of the
man's life and career. History is worse than useless if it does not
accurately chronicle and describe events; and biography is valueless and
misleading if it does not truly set forth individual character. There is, however, a kind of great man literature in which truth is
comparatively unimportant, and that is the literature of popular legend
and tradition. Whether it purports to be historical or biographical, or
both, it derives its interest and value from the light that it throws
upon the temperament and character of the people who originate it,
rather than from the amount of truth contained in the statements that
it makes about the man. The folk tales of Napoleon Bonaparte herewith presented, if judged from
the viewpoint of the historian or the biographer, are absurdly and
grotesquely untrue; but to the anthropologist and the student of human
nature they are extremely valuable as self revelations of national
character; and even to the historian and the biographer they have some
interest as evidences of the profoundly deep impression made by
Napoleon's personality upon two great peoples the Russians and the
French. The first story, which is entitled "Napoleonder," is of Russian origin,
and was put into literary form, or edited, by Alexander Amphiteatrof of
St. Petersburg. It originally appeared as a feuilleton in the St.
Petersburg "Gazette" of December 13, 1901. As a characteristic specimen
of Russian peasant folk lore, it seems to me to have more than ordinary
interest and value. The treatment of the supernatural may seem, to
Occidental readers, rather daring and irreverent, but it is perfectly in
harmony with the Russian peasant's anthropomorphic conception of Deity,
and should be taken with due allowance for the educational limitations
of the story teller and his auditors. The Russian muzhik often brings
God and the angels into his folk tales, and does so without the least
idea of treating them disrespectfully. He makes them talk in his own
language because he has no other language; and if the talk seems a
little grotesque and irreverent, it is due to the low level of the
narrator's literary culture, and not to any intention, on his part, of
treating God and the angels with levity. The whole aim of the story is a
moral and religious one. The narrator is trying to show that sympathy
and mercy are better than selfish ambition, and that war is not only
immoral but irrational. The conversation between God, the angels, and
the Devil is a mere prologue, intended to bring Napoleon and Ivan angel
on the stage and lay the foundation of the plot. The story teller's keen
sense of fun and humor is shown in many little touches, but he never
means to be irreverent. The whole legend is set forth in the racy,
idiomatic, highly elliptical language of the common Russian muzhik, and
is therefore extremely difficult of translation; but I have tried to
preserve, as far as possible, the spirit and flavor of the original. The French story was first reduced to writing or at least put into
literary form by Honoré de Balzac, and appeared under the title of "The
Napoleon of the People" in the third chapter of Balzac's "Country
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