The Black Count

by REISS, TOM

• ISBN13: 9780307382467
• ISBN10: 030738246X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-09-18
• Publisher: Crown

Summary

By the author of the internationally bestselling biography The Orientalist, The Black Countbrings to life one of history's great forgotten heroes: a man almost unknown today yet with a personal story that is strikingly familiar. His swashbuckling exploits appear in The Three Musketeers, and his triumphs and ultimate tragic fate inspired The Count of Monte Cristo. His name is Alex Dumas. Father of the novelist Alexandre Dumas, Alex has become, through his son's books, themodel for a captivating modern protagonist: the wronged man in search of justice. Born to a black slave mother and a fugitive white French nobleman in Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti), Alex Dumas was briefly sold into bondage but then made his way to Paris where he was schooled as a sword-fighting member of the French aristocracy. He was only 32 when he was given command of 53,000 men, the reward for series of triumphs that many regarded as impossible, and then topped his previous feats by leading a raid up a frozen cliff face that secured the Alps for France. It was after his subsequent heroic service as Napoleon's cavalry commander that Dumas was captured and cast into a dungeon-and a harrowing ordeal commenced that inspired one of the world's classic works of fiction. The Black Countis simultaneously a riveting adventure story, a lushly textured evocation of 18th-century France, and a window into the modern world's first multi-racial society. But it is also a heartbreaking story of the enduring bonds of love between a father and son. Drawing on hitherto unknown documents, letters, battlefield reports and Dumas' handwritten prison diary, The Black Countis a groundbreaking masterpiece of narrative nonfiction. Tom Reiss is the author of the celebrated international bestseller The Orientalist. His biographical pieces have appeared The New Yorker, The New York Timesand other publications.

Table of Contents

Prologue, Part 1 February 26, 1806	p. 1
Prologue, Part 2 January 25, 2007	p. 5
The Sugar Factory	p. 23
The Black Code	p. 34
Norman Conquest	p. 47
"No One Is a Slave in France"	p. 58
Americans in Paris	p. 71
Black Count in the City of Light	p. 80
A Queen's Dragoon	p. 89
Summers of Revolution	p. 107
"Regeneration by Blood"	p. 121
"The Black Heart Also Beats for Liberty"	p. 131
"Mr. Humanity"	p. 146
The Battle for the Top of the World	p. 160
The Bottom of the Revolution	p. 175
The Siege	p. 189
The Black Devil	p. 207
Leader of the Expedition	p. 217
"The Delirium of His Republicanism"	p. 238
Dreams on Fire	p. 255
Prisoner of the Holy Faith Army	p. 264
"Citizeness Dumas … Is Worried About the Fate of Her Husband"	p. 281
The Dungeon	p. 290
Wait and Hope	p. 304
Epilogue The Forgotten Statue	p. 324
Acknowledgments	p. 331
Author's Note on Names	p. 339
Notes	p. 341
Bibliography	p. 387
Index	p. 405
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