Customer Reviews

The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson

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I usually don't read history--but this man's life reads like a novel. An incredible story, and well written, too.

If you want to read the best of the new books on Lord Nelson, then without argument it is Dr Joel Hayward's outstanding and unconventional "For God and Glory: Lord Nelson and his way of war".

But if you want to add a respected classic to your collection of Nelson works, you'll need Southey. The book narrates Nelson's life in a relaxing fashion without much analysis. After all, its not a scholarly book. But the story it tells is still considered generally solid and reliable. When read alongside Oman, Mahan, and the new books by Dr Colin White and Hayward, you'll have Nelson's life down-pat.

My only gripe is that Soutyhey's work glosses over the bad times in Nelson's life; times when the seaman did foolish or wantonly violent acts. These ere so out of keeping with the great deeds done by Britain's true hero that Southey should have tried to make some sense of them.

Still, with Southey you know what you are getting: a timeless classic which did wonders, in its own time, to tell Englishmen what a debt they owed to Nelson and his fleet.