Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) is arguably the greatest figure in modern history. In more than a few ways, he changed the world. In The Symbolic Napoleon: Perspectives on Gros's 'Bonaparte Visiting the Plague-Stricken of Jaffa', Bhaso Ndzendze contemplates his legacy through a painting of him produced by Antoine-Jean Gros in 1804, the year of his coronation as Emperor of the French. Why was the painting produced at the time that it was? Why does it...