“I have borne the musket of a soldier, the traveller’s cane, and the pilgrim’s staff: as a sailor my fate has been as inconstant as the wind: a kingfisher, I have made my nest among the waves.” The first unabridged translation of Chateaubriand’s autobiography to be published in more than a century. It narrates not just the author’s own life but also the ‘parallel life’ of Napoleon. This is the first of two volumes.