List Price: $29.95 Details

Save: $2.90 (10%)

& FREE Returns

FREE delivery: Saturday, Aug 28 Details

Fastest delivery: Tuesday, Aug 24
Order within 22 hrs and 12 mins Details

In Stock.

$$27.05 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Ships from	Amazon.com
Sold by	Amazon.com

Details

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Return policy: Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

$4.95 delivery: Aug 31 - Sep 8

Fastest delivery: Aug 26 - 31

Used: Acceptable | Details

Sold by onceuponatimebooks

Share

Other Sellers on Amazon

$15.22
+ $6.97 shipping

Sold by: Duba Studios

$25.54
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: Ambis Enterprises

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See all 2 images

Follow the Author

Jean Lacouture

DeGaulle: The Rebel 1890-1944 (Norton Paperback) Paperback – May 17, 1993

by Jean Lacouture (Author), Alan Sheridan (Translator)

15 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Hardcover

"Please retry"

$19.27

$3.51

Paperback

"Please retry"

$27.05

$15.22

$0.96

“In this magnificent biography . . . Jean Lacouture marches majestically through de Gaulle’s first 54 years. . . . A feast, robust, subtle, joyful, complex, a celebration to be savored.” ―New York Times Book Review

Savior of his nation in war; bold man of letters; patriot; a statesman who achieved reality for his political vision by the overwhelming force of his will: the personality that emerges in Jean Lacouture’s magnificent biography of Charles de Gaulle seems larger than life, a presence of mythic proportions. The story begins with de Gaulle’s childhood in Lille and follows him through his heroic experiences in World War I and his swift rise to prominence in the French army, to that great moment of triumph, the liberation of Paris in August 1944. Perceptions of the private de Gaulle―the schoolboy, the father―are woven into this politically astute account of a career grounded in controversy.

Print length

640 pages
Language

English
Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date

May 17, 1993
Dimensions

6.2 x 1.7 x 9.3 inches
ISBN-10

0393309991
ISBN-13

978-0393309997
See all details

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

Jean Lacouture
6
Hardcover
47 offers from $3.51
Jean Lacouture
4
Paperback
37 offers from $4.00

What other items do customers buy after viewing this item?

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

Jean Lacouture
6
Hardcover
47 offers from $3.51
Jean Lacouture
4
Paperback
37 offers from $4.00

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Jean Lacouture is a French journalist and historian.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (May 17, 1993)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 640 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0393309991
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393309997
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.2 x 1.7 x 9.3 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,460,404 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,216 in Historical France Biographies
- #3,771 in US Presidents
- #3,899 in French History (Books)

Customer Reviews:
15 ratings

Customer reviews

5 star		94%
4 star		6%
3 star 0% (0%)		0%
2 star 0% (0%)		0%
1 star 0% (0%)		0%

How are ratings calculated?

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

mill worker

Vive la France

Reviewed in the United States on August 20, 2018

Verified Purchase

Great work about De Gaulle. The author is sometimes harsh in his assessment and does not overlook De Gaulle's faults, but the reader is introduced to a complex man who was arrogant, often wrong, yet also a brilliant and inspirational leader. Highly recommend for anyone wanting to lean more about the individual man and French history.

Reviewed in the United States on October 6, 2018

Verified Purchase

Describes the man behind the militar and political leader.

Helpful

Amazons Greatest Customer

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on May 6, 2018

Verified Purchase

Answered a lot of my questions

Reviewed in the United States on July 24, 2017

Verified Purchase

fantastic!

Reviewed in the United States on January 16, 2017

Verified Purchase

A+

Reviewed in the United States on February 24, 2015

Verified Purchase

excellent a great biography

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Goldman

Both Vols. Best biography in English so far

Reviewed in the United States on March 29, 2009

It's probably too early to write a good scholarly biography of De Gaulle. "The test of time" might require centuries; and the truth about highly questionable individuals -- Alexander Hamilton, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Dishonest Abe Lincoln, Henry VIII Tutor, and William III of Orange and then men of 1688 -- is flatly denied centuries later by would-be hagiographers, ideological propagandists, and molders of plaster saints. It might be too early because De Gaulle, like Eisenhower, so carefully guarded his private life -- who was always an actor on a stage, playing the self-created role of "General de Gaulle" -- that we're likely not to get the "inside view" of the man anytime soon. Perhaps just as well, he himself quoting, in _Le Fil de l'Épée_ that "no man is a hero to his valet". It might be too early also for the simple reason that the French State doesn't open their files to historians for 50 years.

The author of this two volume study is a journalist, not a historian; yet given a time when the university is swamped with the plague of Cultural Marxists and Sixty-Eighters, maybe it takes a journalist to do the job. That said, the two volumes of this work are probably the best biography that we have so far, at least in English. A pity that it could not have been published as the French edition in 3 vols. One would have wish a bit more about the first 50 years of his life, and more about his views on strategy and command of the military. How close was he to Petain in the 20s? To Charles Maurras? Did he really wish the restoration of the Monarchy? The 2nd vol begins to run thin with the events of 68, as one ought expect for a work published when it was.

Still, the best most complete study so far, to be put alongside Daniel J. Mahoney's study of De Gaulle's political philosophy, _De Gaulle: Statesmanship, Grandeur, and Modern Democracy_, to say nothing of De Gaulle's war memoirs and _Mémoires d'Espoir_. André Malraux's _Les Chênes qu'on abat_ is worth a look.

At the risk of being a hagiographer myself, my own rationale why one can't read enough about this man follows:

The Greatest Man of the 20th Century, who saved his country not once but four times from disaster and shame: 1940, 1958, Algeria 1962, and 1968. A man who gave his country its first workable constitution since 1789. They say the cemeteries are full of people who thought they were indispensable; the cemetery at Colombey-les-Deux-Églises holds one. And when the French rejected him in 1946, he left power to prove to them that they indeed couldn't get along without him; by 1969 his constitution was strong enough to survive without him, and has done well for 50 years.

So yes, an arrogant man, but with much to be arrogant about. He had a respect for two other arrogant yet right men: Churchill and MacArthur. He was said to have thought of himself as St. Joan of Arc; if so, he wasn't far off the mark. And he ruled without trampling on human rights or democracy (1958: "68 years old is too old to begin a career as a dictator").

One who had an uncanny prophetic ability -- foreseeing the French military defeat on 1940. The French High Command ignored his _Le Fil de l'Épée_, _Vers l'Armée de Métier_, and _La France et son Armée_. The GERMAN General Staff did read these books, and so in 1940 France was defeated from a playbook written by a Frenchman. The real father of Blitzkrieg, he was as important for military history and theoretical strategy as for politics.

He foresaw that the 4th Republic wouldn't work, that the 5th would, that Viet-Nam would be a disaster, that it was time to quit Algeria. He knew fully well that Wilsonianism was facade for American hegemony, and so opposed it. He knew also quite well that when push came to shove, the US and the USSR weren't going to risk the nuclear destruction of their cities, and they would use instead Europe for their battlefield; hence his wise opposition to NATO and his pushing a "Third Force". He foresaw that Communism in general and the Soviet Union in particular would collapse from within, and one need only wait them out. He saw clearly the danger also of Anglo-Saxon _cultural_ hegemony -- that continental Europe has a better tradition. He noted clearly one of Huntington's fault lines, the one Huntington omitted, the one that runs along the English Channel: The Brits and Irish don't belong in Europe. Nor Quebec in Canada.

And his greatest achievement: the reconciliation with Germany, overcoming the fault line between Mitteleuropa and Atlantic Europe, as old as the Treaty of Verdun, AD 843. This reconciliation is the cornerstone of European unity -- though he would have wanted a confederation of the countries rather than the current bureaucratic leviathan in Brussels. Of course it took the 2nd Greatest Man of the 20th Century, Adenauer, to bring this reconciliation about. "Unfortunate the country that needs a hero"? -- the view of Brecht, a hopeless utopian. We're always unfortunate.

Read about him.

9 people found this helpful

Helpful

Francis McInerney

A Harsh Portrait

Reviewed in the United States on December 23, 2006

An excellent work, it paints a harsh portrait of de Gaulle. A brave man with physical courage to go, he was possibly one of the greatest military thinkers in history. But he was vain, socially and politically unskilled, and an extremely poor judge of those on whom he depended to fulfill his ambitions: Churchill and, especially, Roosevelt.

Unable to gauge these two, or to assess their intentions from their side of the table, he stumbled from miscalculation to miscalculation. Only the greater mistakes of others like Giraud and the fact that most of France was sidelined by occupation and collaboration gave him the opportunities he used and these none too successfully.

Worse for de Gaulle, he could not see, as Roosevelt did so clearly, that post war France would have no greater status than a large U.S. state. Roosevelt toyed with de Gaulle as he would have toyed with any the state governor hopeful seeking his attention. De Gaulle neither understood this nor forgave it. Neither has France.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

J. S. Yorke

De Gaulle by Lacouture

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 16, 2009

Verified Purchase

A large,detailed book about De Gaulle, France, and Europe. Very well,and interestingly written. Diifficult to know when, and where leave off reading when one has other things that should get done!

3 people found this helpful

Michael Bilton

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 26, 2015

Verified Purchase

Brilliant

See all reviews

Pages with related products. See and discover other items: charles de gaulle

Buy new: $27.05 FREE delivery: Saturday, Aug 28 Ships from: Amazon.com Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used: $0.96

Other Sellers on Amazon

Follow the Author

Similar authors to follow

DeGaulle: The Rebel 1890-1944 (Norton Paperback) Paperback – May 17, 1993

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

What other items do customers buy after viewing this item?

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Product details

Customer reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Buy new:

$27.05

FREE delivery: Saturday, Aug 28

Ships from: Amazon.com

Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used:

$0.96