Napoleon 'tried to learn English'

 

Napoleon wanted to be read the London papers

Napoleon Bonaparte was keen to learn English while in exile, documents shown in Britain for the first time reveal.

The deposed French emperor apparently wanted to learn the language of his foes so he could read what the London papers were writing about him.

Scraps of paper from his English lessons in captivity on the island of St Helena go on show at London's National Maritime Museum on Thursday.

They include lines of French haltingly translated by Napoleon into English.

Count Emmanuel de las Cases, who accompanied the emperor into exile after he surrendered to the English at the Battle of Waterloo, wrote about his desire to learn the language in his memoirs.

According to him, Napoleon had his first lesson on 17 January 1816, when he asked las Cases to dictate to him some sentences in French, which he then translated, using a table of auxiliary verbs and a dictionary.

According to historian Dr Peter Hicks, las Cases describes how Napoleon hated being sat down to work like a schoolboy but steeled himself for the task.

Dr Hicks said: "He was not necessarily anti-English. He had to fight because it was the enemy of France."

He added: "In France people are amazed to find that he was learning English. But he didn't do it for pleasure. He wondered how much money he could have saved in translation if he could have learnt English."

The documents are to feature in the Greenwich museum's Nelson and Napoleon exhibition, being held to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Nelson' death at the Battle of Trafalgar.

They are among a wide range of letters, paintings, personal items and objects lent by galleries and museums across Europe.

The English lesson papers, described by Dr Hicks as "quite remarkable", are on loan from the Fondation Napoleon in Paris.

最近在英国展出的历史文献首次披露，拿破仑·波拿巴在流放期间曾热衷于学习英语。

很显然，这位当时已遭到罢黜的法国皇帝想要学习敌人的语言，这样就可以阅读伦敦报纸上有关他的报道。

拿破仑在被囚禁于圣赫勒拿岛期间学习英语的几张碎纸片将于周四在伦敦国立海事博物馆展出。

上面还有几行从法语译过来的磕磕绊绊的英文。

伊曼纽尔·卡斯伯爵在回忆录中写道，拿破仑非常想学习语言。滑铁卢战役惨败后，卡斯伯爵和拿破仑一同被流放到圣赫勒拿岛，。

据卡斯伯爵说，拿破仑于1816年1月17日开始了他的第一节英语课，当时拿破仑要求卡斯用法语口述几个句子，然后他借助一本词典和一个助动词表将其翻译成英语。

历史学家彼得·希克斯博士指出，卡斯在回忆录中描述了拿破仑当时十分痛恨像学生一样坐下来学习，但又强迫自己去学习英语。

希克斯博士称：“他并不抵制英语，他同英国打仗，仅仅因为英国是法国的敌人。” liuxuepaper.com