Posted on Monday 3 December 2007 2732 , 1
A single manuscript page from a love story written by Napoleon Bonaparte sold for €23,000 (£17,000) at Osenat auction
house in France yesterday.
It was the first page of the final draft of Napoleon's 1795 short novel Clisson and Eugenie, only 22 pages in its original handwritten form. The story, loosely based on the author’s brief romance with the sister of his brother’s wife, Desiree Clary, was not published in Napoleon’s lifetime.
Mr Hicks, who helped issue the most complete version of the text in September, said: “It is the last piece of creative writing Napoleon produced before turning his literary attention to political matters.”
He said the general was very literary and influenced by the Enlightenment thinker Rousseau, and Rousseau ideas of the solitary poet and reverence for nature feature in the novel.
The manuscript has been part of a French family collection since the 1950s. Before then, it belonged to the financier Andre de Coppet.



This is encredible! I learn more fascinatig details from you about Napoleon each day, and now I learn about the man’s literary career! I’m not surprised at the sale amount of this one page.
I’ve got a 45 minute commute up a winding mountain road each day, and your Napoleon podcast is with me there and back. I discovered it about three months ago and have made my way quickly up to the present episodes. Thanks for the thoroughness!