Napoleon tried to conquer world, not inner demons

BRAINTREE, MASS. Pintsized French general and dictator Napoleon Bonaparte, the scourge of Europe 200 years ago, exhibited key symptoms of the psychiatric ailment known as borderline personality disorder, or BPD for short. Napoleon had four of the nine BPD symptoms described in psychiatry's diagnostic bible, according to Kristofer Cathexis of the New England Society for Reconstructive Diagnostics.

Cathexis' findings, gleaned from Napoleon's diaries, several historical novels, and at least one vintage Bugs Bunny cartoon, appear in a research paper, "Napoleon's Mental Waterloo," published in the most recent DYSFUNCTIONAL QUARTERLY.

"Napoleon had relationship issues," Cathexis says. "He reminds me of Glenn Close in the movie Fatal Attraction, except Nap had access to a lot more weapons."

Cathexis cites the following behaviors -- heretofore considered unremarkable by psychiatrists -- as evidence of Napoleon's borderline personality disorder: his frequent screaming fits when his wife Josephine refused to spoon-feed him at state dinners; his reckless impulsiveness, evidenced by reports that the diminutive commander snuck up behind his lieutenants with a tiding crop and a croissant and delivered what he called "les tromps de la guerre;" his fear of being abandoned and unloved, which predictably enough caused lifelong bedwetting and an urge to control everybody, everywhere, all the time; and his periodic delusions of grandeur, during which he repeatedly claimed to be a 6'8" Nubian goat herder sent to France on a secret mission for the Sun God.

These Napoleonic revelations follow another researcher's recent announcement that the Biblical hero Samson had antisocial personality disorder. However, Samson's psychological problems were puny compared with Napoleon's, Cathexis says.

"Samson parlayed an impressive physique into a life of petty crime and then blew it by letting his girlfriend cut off his hair," notes Cathexis. "Napoleon was a short, pudgy guy with a bad comb-over who leveraged impressive neuroses into neardomination of the world and an extended island vacation. For heaven's sake, Napoleon has a brandy and a pastry named after him, and all Samson has is a line of luggage."

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