Nelson

''Fascinating . . . Shot through with fresh insights . . . No previous biography has attempted anything so comprehensive.'' Observer

Nelson is a thrilling new appraisal of Horatio Nelson, the greatest practitioner of naval command the world has ever seen. It explores the professional, personal, intellectual and practical origins of one man''s genius, to understand how the greatest warrior that Britain has ever produced transformed the art of conflict, and enabled his country to survive the challenge of total war and international isolation.

In Nelson, Andrew Lambert - described by David Cannadine as ''the outstanding British naval historian of his generation'' - is able to offer new insights into the individual quality which led Byron rightly to celebrate Nelson''s genius as ''Britannia''s God of War''. He demonstrates how Admiral Nelson elevated the business of naval warfare to the level of the sublime. Nelson''s unique gift was to take that whi