Episode 15 - Who Mourns for Napoleon?

1/6/2014

The lovely voice you heard at the beginning of the episode was Rob Monaco, from the Podcast History of Our World - be sure to check him out!

We’re going to look at Napoleon’s legacy in three broad steps. First, what were Napoleon’s reforms, economic, political, and social, and what did they accomplish. Second, who benefitted from his rule? Who was going to miss him when he was gone, and perhaps form the nucleus of an opposition to those who came after him. Finally, what did all of this mean for the idea of Italy? Did the people in Italy feel more or less Italian after Napoleon left than they had before he arrived? Download Episode 15

2 Comments

Rob

1/26/2014 11:00:15 am

Hi guys,
Just noticed there weren't a lot of comments recently and I simply wanted to thank you for your incredible preparation, effort and overall production.

I'm heading to Italy for a few weeks vacation in the Summer and stumbled upon your work several weeks ago. It is great stuff and I've been forwarding it onto several friends with a knowledge/love of Italy.

To be honest, I'm also interested in why/how you both ce to love the subject so deeply. Maybe I missed that somewhere.

I'm any case, thank you so very much and I hope you are enjoying the content production asuch as I'm enjoying the content consumption.

Best wishes, Rob

Benjamin

1/28/2014 08:06:41 am

Hi Rob,

We certainly enjoy researching and writing for the podcast, but messages like yours are undoubtedly the best part of the whole thing. Thank you for your kind words, and for sharing the podcast with fellow Italy enthusiasts!

As for why we like the topic so much, I’ll actually talk more about that in an interview with Zack Twamley in a few weeks, but I’ll give you the short version here. What we’ve learned by doing this podcast is that just about EVERY topic in history is interesting, you just need to find the right angle. We’re not Italian (though my fiancee’s family is). We picked this topic because it wasn’t well known in English, had a significant but not overwhelming number of books in English, and had a clear beginning and end. It wasn’t until we started working on it that we discovered how fascinating the topic is.

It’s all about finding the right perspective. This isn’t just the story of border changes and international disputes, it’s about nationalism and Italian identity. Fundamentally, the story is about what it means to be Italian. So, the more we read about it, the more we’re interested in discovering more.

Thanks again for your very kind message, we really appreciate it!

Benjamin

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