Napoleon's Haemorrhoids, By Phil Mason
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The history of Europe might have turned out very differently had Napoleon not had an attack of haemorrhoids that intervened with his usual battlefield surveillance. How such seemingly tiny events can have large consequences is the subject matter of Phil Mason's entertaining book. Tiny paragraphs are organised under categories including history, politics, war, science, art, sport, crime and business.
One of the best chapters is "Artistic Strokes (of Luck)", in which we learn about Agatha Christie's chance path to writing: born to a mother who believed no child should look at a book before the age of eight, it was working in a chemist's dispensary in her mid-twenties that fuelled so many of Christie's poison-filled plots. Meanwhile, Evelyn Waugh would not have lived to write Decline and Fall had his suicide attempt by drowning, aged 21, been successful (he was deterred by a shoal of jellyfish).
Some of Mason's examples stray beyond the bounds of his own theory. But the more apposite are well worth reading.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments