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ianallen's review
3.0
lol never mind I thought I could use the last couple of hours of this to sleep on the train today but ended up finishing. Good book! Sounds dry! Kind of is! But also a good vehicle to discuss some quirks of history!
kennnedyexe's review
4.0
enjoyable! an often-witty and overall quite thoughtful deep dive into an art historical niche. an inspection of a particular motif (roman emperors) throughout art history. a caveat- it IS a niche. although beard does a wonderful job of attempting a clarifying "who's who" at the beginning of the book, and thoughtfully reiterates defining features to help the reader keep the caesars in line, a familiarity with classical history and/or renaissance art history (where a lot of the motifs pop up- rather unsurprisingly) does make the reading flow easier. nothing that a slow, deliberate reading process (as is often needed for these sorts of academic romps anyhow) isn't capable of ameliorating.
the reviews on this particular book are a wonderful reminder of why i put almost no weight to goodreads reviews of books lol, it seems a great many of the negative reviews accuse beard of "neglecting historical narrative" as if that was ever the intention of the book. she does have a quite lovely *classical history* book, however this one is quite explicitly stated to be a study of artistic motifs, quite literally derived from a fine arts lecture. it's not false advertising if you simply fail to bother to read the subtitle, much less the context of the book, which is quite clear as to its content and purpose.
it was fun! i love a good microscopic art historical gander. i love a good niche.
the reviews on this particular book are a wonderful reminder of why i put almost no weight to goodreads reviews of books lol, it seems a great many of the negative reviews accuse beard of "neglecting historical narrative" as if that was ever the intention of the book. she does have a quite lovely *classical history* book, however this one is quite explicitly stated to be a study of artistic motifs, quite literally derived from a fine arts lecture. it's not false advertising if you simply fail to bother to read the subtitle, much less the context of the book, which is quite clear as to its content and purpose.
it was fun! i love a good microscopic art historical gander. i love a good niche.