Public-domain ebook
Talleyrand: A Biographical Study
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In: Biographies·French Literature·History - European
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #46660.
About this book
Joseph McCabe’s work is a scholarly biography that seeks to untangle the notoriously opaque life of Charles‑Maurice de Talleyrand‑Périgord. The opening pages set the tone by citing the doubts of Sainte‑Beuve, Carlyle and Madame de Staël, then explain how recent memoirs and a wealth of contemporary documents have finally allowed the author to construct a “consistent and intelligible personality.” McCabe outlines his method, drawing on Talleyrand’s own memoirs, official correspondence, and the writings of his many contemporaries, while also critiquing earlier biographers. The narrative begins with a vivid anecdote, the boy’s childhood injury that doomed him to a limp, and proceeds to trace his aristocratic origins, his early education, and the familial neglect that shaped his future diplomatic career. The detailed table of contents and extensive bibliography attest to a rigorously researched study that moves from his formative years through the tumult of the Revolution, Napoleon, and the Restoration.
The book reads in the measured, erudite prose of early‑20th‑century scholarship, reflecting the period’s confidence in exhaustive source work and a narrative voice that balances admiration with critical distance. McCabe’s style is dense but accessible, interweaving quotation, analysis, and occasional anecdote without resorting to melodrama. Readers who enjoy meticulous historical biographies, particularly those interested in French diplomacy, the Revolutionary era, or the complex personalities behind great political events, will find this study rewarding. It also appeals to scholars and serious amateurs who appreciate a work that situates a singular figure within the broader currents of his time while still delivering a compelling portrait of the man behind the legend.
Who appears in Talleyrand
- Charles‑Maurice de Talleyrand‑PérigordTall, gaunt French aristocrat, pale skin, thin hair, slight limp, 18th‑century diplomatic attire, powdered wig, crisp coat
- Sainte‑BeuveMiddle‑aged French literary critic, beard and mustache, spectacles, dark coat, 19th‑century gentleman hat, thoughtful expression
- Madame de StaëlElegant salonnière, graceful posture, auburn hair styled in early 1800s fashion, silk gown, delicate jewelry, intelligent eyes
The opening · free to read
Sainte-Beuve, after an attempt that one cannot describe as successful, declared that “it is hardly possible to write the life of M. de Talleyrand.” Frédéric Masson noticed the figure of the great diplomatist as he passed with a disdainful “ce Sphinx.” Carlyle forgot his dogmatism for a moment, and pronounced Talleyrand “one of the strangest things ever seen or like to be seen, an enigma for future ages.” Even a woman of penetration, Mme. de Staël, who had known him well, assures us that he was “the most impenetrable and most inexplicable of men.”
There were a few who thought that the long-sealed “Memoirs” of the Prince, which were published only a few years ago, would reveal every secret. They forgot that these were the work of the man who held (improving on Voltaire) that “speech was given to man to disguise his thoughts”—the man who conducted his exit from the world with all the art he had used at the Congress of Vienna. Yet, if the “Memoirs” have thrown no light, or only a deceptive light, on some of the obscurer passages in Talleyrand’s career, they have at least filled in our picture of his personality, so that the tradition of its inscrutability must be surrendered. There has been a prolonged and microscopic research into the age or ages of Talleyrand,—the Old Regime, the Revolution, the Consulate, the Restoration, and the second Revolution. The memoirs of nearly all his contemporaries have seen the light, and official records everywhere have been examined. I have made a careful use of all this research up to date, and find it possible to present a consistent and intelligible personality.
Lady Blennerhassett included the material of the “Memoirs” in the biography of Talleyrand that she wrote ten years ago. But a good deal of light has since been thrown on the earlier part of his career, and in this regard I gratefully avail myself of the investigations of M. de Lacombe. Moreover, Lady Blennerhassett is chiefly occupied with the Prince’s diplomatic action. His personality does not stand out very clearly from her very crowded canvas. That is an inherent disadvantage in writing the life of a great diplomatist. However, in spite of the alluring character of the stretch of history across which the thread of Talleyrand’s life passes, I have tried to keep it in its place as a background, and to bring out into the fullest light the elusive figure of the man who made and unmade a dozen oaths of loyalty.
J. M.
LONDON, June, 1906.
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