This is a small Jewel of a history, lively style and tight narrative. It greatly benefits from covering a short period in a small area. Horne has amassed a interesting set of illustrations, and the endpaper maps are adequate. The research is presented cleverly, but he's no fan of the Commune of Paris. ( )

Muy bueno un paneo no cansador sobre la historia del sitio de los prusianos y la posterior Comuna, escrito con gracia, ironía se lee como una novela y es bastante profundo ( )

English historian Alistair Horne (A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-1962 (New York Review Books Classics)) tells the story - really two stories - of the Franco-Prussian War's impact on Paris. First came the siege of Paris, a valiant struggle in its own right. A then after the downfall of Paris and the Prussian (partial) withdrawal came the Commune.

Horne does an excellent job telling these fascinating stories. I was surprised to learn that prior to this war the Prussians were somewhat lightly regarded as a military force - seen almost as a caricature of itself. The French under Louis-Napoleon (Napoleon III) expected to win the war and instead lost Alsace-Lorraine. As Horne emphasizes, this annexation planted the seeds for continued warfare between France and Germany. Bismarck opposed the annexation on those grounds, but lost the argument to the generals. The war culminated with the unification of Prussia and Germany into the new German Empire. In a scene foreshadowing Hitler's 1940 visit to Paris, the unification ceremony and elevation of King Wilhelm of Prussia to Emperor Wilhelm of the German Empire took place at the Versailles.

Louis-Napoleon and his Second Empire were given the boot in September 1870 even before the final surrender and the Third Republic was born. The Prussians kept coming and put Paris under a siege that lasted some 120 days. About two months later the Commune came into being as the first workers' republic (albeit small and short-lived). The establishment of the Commune led to a Parisian civil war.

Horne makes good use of the available source to bring the despair, hunger, terrors, thrills, and heroics to life. My only quibble is Horne's clear antipathy to the leftists; he assigns more derogatory terms to the Communards than the forces of reaction despite the fact that those forces certainly executed far more Parisians than the Communards. Still, his bias don't seem to interfere with his objectivity and his writing made the book a joy to read. ( )

850 The Fall of Paris: The Siege and the Commune 1870-71, by Alistair Horne (read 12 May 1966) This is a detailed account of Paris from the beginning of the Franco-Prussian War (France declared war for no discernible reason on July 15, 1870) to the end of the fighting against the Commune on May 29, 1871. The first half of the book concerns the siege by the Germans from Sept 20, 1870, to Jan 30, 1871. The Paris Commune took over on March 19, 1871, and the second half of the book concerns that time. The rats, the balloon flights, the drama of the Siege, become less momentous when he gets to the drama of the Commune: the model for the Red revolutionaries of 1917, and thus of tremendous significance in today's world. Kaiser Wilhelm I was crowned at Versailles on Jan 18, 1871. Archbishop Darboy was executed by the Commune on May 24, 1871. While the book drags at times, it certainly is worth reading, since I never realized fully what a fantastic year 1870-1871 was--and how it changed the world, since it laid the seeds of World War I and the results thereof more than any other single year. ( )

This book is in two parts, about the two sieges of Paris. The first was by the Germans and the second by the French government. Ironically the second siege and its aftermath was much more costly in French lives than the first. Each started a train of events that resulted in millions of live being lost.

The war started by Bismarck, the 'Iron Chancellor', was for the purpose of uniting Germany and making Wilhelm I the emperor of Germany. As with most of his plans, this one worked perfectly. The Prussian army dealt France a humiliating defeat. This in turn set the scene for the rise of the Paris Commune.

Horne seems to have a very British attitude toward the French, considering them an excitable latin race. He appears to think this affects their judgement adversely. He continually compares the happenings in France to happenings in Great Britain to the detriment of France.

Alistair Horne's career as a journalist shows in his easy prose and clear descriptions. He has researched the events he writes about very well. If you want a clear portrayal of this period of history then this is a good book for it.