"You engage, & then you wait & see"-so Napoleon characterized his art of war. The greatest general of his day was a scrambler who never had a plan, strategic or tactical, that did not break down or change of necessity in the field. He was the master of the broken play, so confident of his ability to improvise, cover his own mistakes, & capitalize on those of the enemies that he repeatedly plunged his armies into uncertain, seemingly desperate situations, only to emerge victorious, "blundering" to glory. In this absorbing book, historian Owen Connelly explores for the first time this aspect of Napoleon's battlefield genius. At the same time, he offers a complete account of the Napoleonic campaigns-at once the most concise & most accurate history in print. Owen Connelly is professor of history at the University of South Carolina. A past president of the Society for French Historical Studies he was a member of the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton University.