Has no chronological narrative. It looks at the rulers of Rome through the prism of 10 separate themes, from “power dining” to imperial travel, as Ms. Beard returns to subjects she has treated throughout her career (imperial portraiture, Roman triumphs, deification). Each of the themes offers a vivid way to re-examine what we know, and don’t, about life at the top ... For all its detail and diverse interests, the book’s unifying argument might be that it is very hard to grasp the truth of what the emperors were actually like ... Beard punctuates her erudite but easy prose with striking turns of phrase and arresting observations ... A masterly group portrait.
An erudite and entertaining new book by the redoubtable classics scholar and feminist Mary Beard ... Beard, a consummate storyteller, finds 'ancient gossip' understandably hard to resist. Such stories also free her up to pursue her subject thematically instead chronologically, pointing not just to differences among the emperors but also similarities ... As a writer, Beard is so appealing and approachable that even the recalcitrant reader who previously gave not a single thought to the Roman Empire will warm to her subject.
It is clear that Beard...is herself deeply intrigued by the Roman emperor ... Beard treads this ground carefully, drawing on a rich plethora of literary and material evidence from both the center and the edges of the Roman world ... Beard’s writing is, as always, deeply engaging and informed by what seems to be an encyclopedic knowledge of the ancient world. Due to the sheer amount of evidence from which she draws, and the vast ground she covers, she inevitably has to condense her sources ... A book with as ambitious a scope as this one cannot, of course scrutinize all sources equally. And Beard offers ample resources, labeled 'Further Reading,' for curious readers who want to discover more for themselves. What ultimately emerges in these rigorously researched pages is an account that gives life to an often shadowy yet captivating figure.
