Eugenie and Napoleon III

This is another of those relatively harmless books dedicated to transforming history into sentimental, soft-core porn. David Duff (author of Victoria and Albert among other works) promises at the outset not to be diverted by political and military matters, and he keeps his word. Readers of more serious works, among them Harold Kurtz's The Empress Eugenie (1964), are acquainted with the sexual problems that existed between Napoleon III and his wife, a woman so beautiful that, as Duff puts it, ""even her dentist, accustomed to a more prosaic view, was bowled over"" when he saw her as the Emperor's bride. But were they aware of all the affairs and misalliances of this unhappy pair? Did they know the extent to which Victoria and Albert came under the spell of the oversexed monarch and his frigid wife? According to the author, Albert was ""as near in love"" with Eugenie as with any woman not his wife, and Victoria was completely charmed by Napoleon's ardors--and if such paragons of virtue were so affected, imagine the sexual ferment on the continent. With history left out, what remains would certainly have delighted the gossip columnists of the mid-1800s. Today it is at best moderately entertaining, and, at worst, very dull.