What were they Thinking (and Drinking)
English classical scholar Mary Beard has written another history of ancient Rome, but with a new spin. SPQR isn't the book to get if you are interested in detailed military history, a minute time-line of the fall of the Roman Republic, or play by play descriptions of the crimes of the twelve Caesars. Beard is after something a bit different, a social history, what the man on the street must how felt and thought when Sulla, Augustus, and Hadrian were calling the shots. She does outline the growth of Rome and the Empire from its legendary beginnings through the second century AD, but many of the details are about the lives of the middle class, the laborers, and the slaves who provided the luxuries to the rich and famous. Her protagonists are more often men of letters like Cicero and Pliny the Younger than conquerors like Pompey and Julius Caesar or monsters like Nero. Even though I am a details person, I found SPQR a refreshing change from most ancient history. I do wish Beard had devoted more time to the rise of Christianity and why it eventually pushed paganism aside, but this is a book I can truthfully say made me smarter. A four to four and a half star read.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Comprehensive yet Easily Digestible
This book spans Ancient Rome's complete 1000-year history. It shows political, cultural, imperial, and day-to-day life. Mary Beard offers some surprising perspectives of historical events and figures and endeavors to separate myth from fact. Her writing style is elegant but very engaging and accessible.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Wonderful entry to ancient Rome
It is impossible to be interested in learning of ancient Rome and not have come across books by Mary Beard. This is the first I've read by her, but not the first I own, and I recently bought another, “Confronting the Classics”. I started reading this as a companion to Livy's “Early History of Rome”, last reviewed, to help separate myth/guesswork from fact. That being said, SPQR is a wonderful first book for readers to delve into ancient Rome. Beard sets the book up in chapters that tend to go in chronological order, from the myths surrounding Rome's founding by the brothers Romulus and Remus, to a thousand years later when Christianity was just beginning to gain a foothold in its culture. For the most part, she sticks to this order, although there are inevitably some times where she meanders on a particular person or time period to better flesh out the details, and these are where we get the deepest dives of the book. Beard delves into after-death political assassinations, where rulers would spread sick rumors about the man they'd replaced, as if that would help to legitimize the current rule. As a woman who happens to be a history fanatic, I also adored Beard's attention to topics such as ancient birth control, war crimes against women, and the use of women (and divorce) in these times. For more reading on this topic, I own “Birthing Romans” by Anna Bonnell Freidin. Historians don't often touch upon what it was like living as a civilian, much less a woman, during different times of history, and any attention paid to the dominant sex is much appreciated. SPQR offers fascinating pieces of Roman history to you in spades. There were times I laughed out loud due to the open pettiness of affluent Romans, or gasped at the horrific treatment of others (young boys and women being the biggest targets). I enjoyed Beard's addition of archaeological evidence to support or debunk various myths, and the book is chock-full of photos (even outside of the photographic insert) to aid in the journey. SPQR is one of those history books that serves as a summary introduction to a subject you will read further into, and it does a wonderful job of doing just that, touching upon all kinds of events and personalities that have their own reading materials. Beard also includes a “Further Reading” section at the end that comes in handy for this purpose. Overall, I highly recommend adding this one to your collection if you're looking to learn more of Rome. It makes for a great entry into the topic.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com