#Charles-Frédéric Reinhard

[empirearchives]

Description of Napoleon and Josephine from Mme Reinhard

Context: This is a letter from Mme Reinhard to her mother after a reception held in 1799, 3 days before 18 Brumaire.

—

“The meeting was lively and brilliant, and Bonaparte’s unexpected arrival made it interesting; I knew he was indisposed and I wasn’t counting on him. This meeting with the general was good fortune for everyone; many of the distinguished foreigners and diplomats’ wives gathered at my home had never seen him, and I’m convinced that everyone went home with the feeling of a wish fulfilled. I found Bonaparte as I had imagined him, modest like a dominator, simple like someone who can claim anything; he seems disdainful of drawing attention to himself and wants to lose himself in the crowd, with the certainty that he will always impose himself and that he cannot go unnoticed. The expression on his face is noble, his gaze piercing: he doesn’t try to be friendly, and rightly so, for friendliness in him would be seen as condescension… Mme Bonaparte is not a worthy counterpart to her husband, and it’s painful to see two such dissimilar beings riveted to each other. Although her attire and the refinement of her manners allow her to rise above the multitudes, one senses the effort, and all that we know of her morals speaks in favor of neither her mind nor her heart.”

Source: Une femme de diplomate: Lettres de Madame Reinhard à sa mère, 1798-1815. Published by A. Picard et fils (1901), p. 92-93.

[porlockstompf]

READING DE NACHT READING 2017

                                                            my favourite books of the year

my overall favourite book of the year:

     david keenan “this is memorial device” [faber & faber] (2017)

POST-CYBERPUNKSTOMPF:

01 nick harkaway "gnomon" (2017) 02 kim stanley robinson "new york 2140" (2017) 03 m john harrison "you should come with me" (2017) 04 gardner dozois (ed) "the year's best science fiction: thirty-fourth annual collection" (2017) 05 james morrow "the asylum of dr. caligari" (2017)

06 annalee newitz "autonomous" (2017) 07 cory doctorow "walkaway" (2017) 08 dave hutchinson "acadia" (2017)   + dave hutchinson "slow companions" (2017) 09 ed finn (ed) visions, ventures, escape velocities: a collection of space futures" (2017) 10 bryan thomas schmidt (ed) "infinite stars" (2017)

11 allan kaster "the year's top hard science fiction stories" (2017) 12 nina allen "the rift" (2017) 13 charles stross "the delirium brief" (2017) 14 simon morden "at the speed of light" (2017) 15 ada palmer "seven surrenders" (2017) & "the will to battle" (2017)

16 yoon ha lee "raven stratagem" (2017) 17 john joseph adams (ed) "cosmic powers" (2017) 18 mur lafferty "six wakes" (2017) 19 taiyo fujii "orbital cloud" (2017) 20 andrew bannister "creation machine" (2016)     + andrew bannister "iron gods" (2017)

21 gareth l powell "entropic angel & other stories" (2017) 22 ann leckie "provenance" (2017) 23 monica louzon (ed) "catalysts, explorers & secret keepers: women of sf" 24 ian mconald "wolf moon" (2017) 25 neal stephenson & nicole galland "the rise & fall of d.o.d.o." (2017)

26 adam roberts "the real-town murders" (2017) 27 tim pratt "the wrong stars" (2017) 28 jim c. hines "terminal alliance" (2017) 29 charles stross "the empire games" (2017) 30 james s.a. corey "persepolis rising" (2017)     + james s.a. corey "strange dogs" (2017)

31 allen steele "avengers of the moon (captain future)" (2017) 32 neal asher "infinity engine [transformation III]" (2017) 33 jason m. hough "injection burn" (2017)   + jason m. hough "escape velocity" (2017) 34 donna scott (ed) "best of british science fiction 2016"/una mccormack "star of the sea" (2016) 35 david marusek "upon this rock"/john scalzi "collapsing empire" (2017)

& a couple of re-readings: richard k. morgan "takeshi kovacs trilogy" in view of the coming netflix series and colin harvey "damage time" (2010) ... no further reason needed!

STOMPF KLASSIK:

01 matthew mcintosh "the mystery.doc" (2017)

02 sébastien roger "les désordres du monde. walter benjamin à port-bou" (2017) 03 laurent binet "hhhh" (2012) 04 + laurent binet "the 7th function of language" (2017) 05 jean echenoz "special envoy" (2017)

06 paul stanbridge "forbidden line" (2016) 07 ryu murakami "tokyo decadence (2016) 08 aifric campbell "the semantics of murder" (2008) 09 mark vernon "darker with the day" (2017) 10 magnus mills "the forensic records society" (2017)

GEDÄCHTNISSTOMPF:

01 mckenzie wark "general intellects: 25 thinkers for the 21st century" (2017) 02 claude lefort "wat is politiek?" (2016) 03 ger groot & sam ijsseling "dankbaar en aandachtig" (2013) 04 martin heidegger "beiträge zur philosophie (vom ereignis)" (2003) 05 hannah arendt "totalitarisme" (2014)

06 daniel birnbaum & kim west "life on sirius: the situationist international & the exhibition of art" (2016) 07 ger groot "de geest is uit de fles" (2017) 08 sean gaston "the impossible mourning of jacques derrida" (2006) 09 bas heijne "onbehagen: nieuw licht op de beschaafde mens" (2016) 10 giorgio colli "ecrits sur nietzsche" (2017)

11 frédéric neyrat "échapper à l'horreur" (2017) 12 slavoj zizek "against the double blackmail, refugees, terror & other troubles with the neighbours" (2017) 13 henning mankell "quicksand" (2016) 14 jacques rancière "en quel temps vivons-nous? conversations avec eric hazan" (2017) 15 alain badiou "je vous sais si nombreux... " (2017)

16 alain badou & jean-luc nancy "la tradition allemande dans la philosophie" (2017) 17 tom mccarthy "typewriters bombs jellyfish [essays]" (2017) 18 valeria luiselli "tell me how it ends: an essay in 40 questions" (2017) 19 fredric jameson "raymond chandler: the detections of totality" (2016) 20 umberto eco "chronicles of a liquid society" (2017)

POLARSTOMPF:

01 chris petit "pale horse riding" (2017)   + chris petit "the butchers of berlin" (2016)   + chris petit "the human pool" (2002)   + chris petit "the psalm killer" (1996)

02 john le carré "a legacy of spies" (2017) 03 david hewson "sleep baby sleep" (2017) 04 mick herron "slow horses" (2010)   + mick herron "dead lions" (2013)   + mick herron "the list" (2015)   + mick herron "real tigers" (2016)   + mick herron "spook street" (2017) 05 jussi adler-olsen "the scarred woman" (2017)

06 jo nesbo "the thirst" (2017) 07 ben fergusson "the spring of kasper meier" (2014) 08 e.o. chirovici "the book of mirrors" (2017) 09 toni coppers "de zaak magritte" (2017) 10 james r. tuck "mama tried (crime fiction inspired by outlaw country music)" (2016)

YOUNGADULTSTOMPF:

01 philip pullman "la belle sauvage" (2017)

PLATTERSTOMPF:

01 cosey fanni tutti "art sex music" (2017) 02 david keenan "this is memorial device" (2017) 03 joanne demers "drone and apocalypse" (2015) 04 + joanne demers "listening through the noise" (2010) 05 robert barry "the music of the future" (2017)

06 richard cabut & andrew gallix (eds) "punk is dead: modernity killed every night" (2017) 07 butt gavin, kodwo eshun, & mark fisher (eds) "post punk then and now" (2016)" 08 sandra garrido "why are we attracted to sad music" (2016) 09 tomas serrien "klank: een filsofie van de muzikale ervaring" (2017) 10 marlies de munck "waarom chopin de regen niet wilde horen" (2017)

11 daniel warner "live wires" (2017) 12 will carruthers "playing the bass with three left hands" (2016) 13 steve hanley "the big midweek-life inside the fall (2016) 14 tex perkins "tex" (2017) 15 mark lanegan "i am the wolf" (2017)

17 simon reynolds "shock & awe" (2016) 18 andrew o'neill "a history of heavy metal" (2017) 19 bryan ray turcotte "the fucked up reader" (2007) 10 bob batchelor (ed) "literary cash" (2017) 20 simon webb "a 1970s teenager. from bell-bottoms to disco dancing" (2013)

         both bell-bottoms and disco dancing can be had @ muntpunt !

POESISSTOMPF:

01 jonty tiplady "zam bonk dip" (2010) 02 murray lachlan young "how freakin' zeitgeist are you?" (2017)

BILDERSTOMPF:

01 peter-andré bloch "sils-maria - "l'île bienheureuse" pour nietzsche" (2017)

02 willem vanhuyse "atlas van de imaginaire verklaringen: het complete handboek vor de 'patafysicus'" (2017) 03 reinhard kleist "nick cave: mercy on me" (2017) 04 william gibson "archangel (a graphic novel)" (2017) 05 a. uderzo, didier conrad & jean-yves ferri "astérix et la transitalique" (2017)

WISSENSCHAFTSTOMPF:

01 thibault damour & mathieu burniat "mysteries of the quantum universe" (2017) 02 brian cox & jeff forshaw "universal: a journey through the cosmos" (2017)

HUMOURSTOMPF:

01 james acaster "james acaster's classic scrapes" (2017)

02 chris wade “the story of derek and clive” (2017)

CYCLOSTOMPF:

01 frederik bakelandt "grinta! de bergen: 10 legendarsche wielercols" (2017)

02 lucien van impe & filip osselaer "de dag dat ik de tour verloor" (2017) 03 jonas heyerick & jelle vermeersch "bahamontes #17-#20" (2017) 04 frank strack "the hardmen: legends of the cycling gods" (2017) 05 matthias m. r. declercq "de val" (2017)

… tsundoku !

may your home be safe from tigers, leroy, x HNY!

the TBR pile grew with...

lászló krasznahorkai "the world goes on" (2017) samanta schweblin "fever dream" (2017)

peter mark, peter helman & penny snyder (eds) "the mountains in art history" (2017)

alvin lucier (ed) "eight lectures on experimental music" (2017) rhian e jones & eli davies "under my thumb: songs that hate women and the women who love them" (2017)

arne dahl "watching you" (2017) philip kerr "prussian blue" (2017) antti tuomainen "the man who died" (2017) jon michelet "the frozen women" (2017) nicolás obregón "blue light yokohama" (2017)

alex lamb "exodus" (2017) c robert cargill "sea of rust" (2017) chris brookmyre "places in the darkness" (2017) d nolan clark "forgotten worlds" & "forbidden suns" (2017) dan moren "the caledonian gambit" (2017) elizabeth moon "cold welcome" (2017) ferrett steinmetz "the uploaded" (2017) greg egan "dichronauts" (2017) ian whates "the ion raider" (2017) jaine fenn "the martian job" (2017) jamie sawyer "pariah" (2017)

jeff noon "a man of shadows" (2017) joe m mcdermott "the fortress at the end of time" (2017) joe zieja "communication failure" (2017) john kessel "the moon and the other" (2017) john meaney "destructor function" (2017) jonathan strahan (ed) "best sf &f of the year vol 11" & "infinity wars" (2017) kameron hurley "the stars are legion" (2017) kay kenyon "at the table of wolves" (2017) malka older "null states" (2017) marina j. lostetter "noumenon" (2017)

martha wells "all systems red" (2017) neil clark (ed) "galactic empires" & "more human than human" (2017) paul mcauley "austral" (2017) r.e. stearns "barbary station" (2017) robert kroese "last iota" (2017) sage walker "the man in a tree" (2017) stephen baxter "obelisk" (2017) + stephen baxter "the massacre of mankind" (2017) sulari gentill "crossing the lines" (2017) the justified ancients of mu mu “2023 a trilogy” (2017) wendy n. wagner "an oath of dogs" (2017)