A review by 23149014345613
I, Claudius: From the Autobiography of Tiberius Claudius, Born 10 B.C., Murdered and Deified A.D. 54 by Robert Graves
4.0
Pairs nicely with the Schiff account of Cleopatra's life that I finished a few months back. This book removes the distance from the writer and the subject, though, purporting to be the autobiography of Tiberius Claudius. The cover art and the confusion about who was really writing sort of psyched me up for something more farcical and subversive (a la Tristam Shandy), so I spent the first hundred pages or so sort of confused by the tone and not sure how truthful were the facts being relayed. I also neglected to look up when Graves lived or when the book was written, so I wasn't sure how modern the book was (again, based on the cover art, it seems blisteringly so). This is not the text's fault, just a case of a reader not doing basic research before starting, and a warning about adding things to your to-read list and then forgetting why 2 years later.
This is ultimately, as far as I can tell, a factual account of Claudius's life, with meat added to the bones to create something coherent, accessible, sympathetic, and loaded with juicy palace gossip. I assume it is accurate because the names and places often get dull and confusing, the way Roman stuff always does. But I skimmed through any sections that seemed bogged down in minutiae, knowing I'm not going to be tested on this material, and ultimately found many stories of classical wit, intrigue, idealism and treachery that felt very true to the times and very interesting still to modern readers. I won't be continuing the story of Claudius, but I'm glad I picked this one up. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to read a history of Rome without having to wade into source texts and learn ancient Greek. The autobiography trick, while another layer obscuring the history laid down in the work, makes it an easy entry point for readers more accustomed to novels than dry textbooks.
This is ultimately, as far as I can tell, a factual account of Claudius's life, with meat added to the bones to create something coherent, accessible, sympathetic, and loaded with juicy palace gossip. I assume it is accurate because the names and places often get dull and confusing, the way Roman stuff always does. But I skimmed through any sections that seemed bogged down in minutiae, knowing I'm not going to be tested on this material, and ultimately found many stories of classical wit, intrigue, idealism and treachery that felt very true to the times and very interesting still to modern readers. I won't be continuing the story of Claudius, but I'm glad I picked this one up. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to read a history of Rome without having to wade into source texts and learn ancient Greek. The autobiography trick, while another layer obscuring the history laid down in the work, makes it an easy entry point for readers more accustomed to novels than dry textbooks.