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mrsmarch's review against another edition
2.0
This is a really interesting book. The author makes connections and comes to good conclusions based in a sound appraisal of the existing sources and an understanding of then-current Roman outlook with no benefit of historical hindsight. This book could have been up there with Anthony Barrett's biography of Livia.
Yes, I said "could have."
I don't know why, but this book seems to have suffered from the lack of a good copyeditor. The author frequently chooses large or impressive words when a sharper one would have served, making the prose, in places, bulky and distracting. Maybe there was a copyeditor, but I can see so many places where further attention could have been paid to polish the outstanding raw material at hand.
I still highly recommend this book to serious readers of Roman history or women's history, but leave the caveat that the prose is rough through most of the book, particularly the second half, and may make for ornery reading.
Yes, I said "could have."
I don't know why, but this book seems to have suffered from the lack of a good copyeditor. The author frequently chooses large or impressive words when a sharper one would have served, making the prose, in places, bulky and distracting. Maybe there was a copyeditor, but I can see so many places where further attention could have been paid to polish the outstanding raw material at hand.
I still highly recommend this book to serious readers of Roman history or women's history, but leave the caveat that the prose is rough through most of the book, particularly the second half, and may make for ornery reading.
difficultwomanreads's review
3.0
Livia's always held a certain fascination for me. She's a fairly obscure figure among non-history-buffs. (Versus Cleopatra. Everyone knows about Cleopatra.) Yet during her era, no other woman held the sort of precedence that she did. Praised for her beauty--praised, at the time, for her matronly virtues--she would go down in history as a wicked stepmother sort of figure, a scheming matriarch who makes men's penises shrivel up at the sound of her name. (No, seriously. Is it any surprise that "I, Claudius", the work that would make Livia infamous, was written by a man?) So imagine my happiness and surprise at finding a whole biography just about Livia. How did it turn out? Eh. Results were mixed.
The Good
Matthew Dennison very clearly appreciates his subject. He places great care in small but helpful details, like the color of Livia's wedding veil and certain omens that she put great store in. There's a slight, but not overpowering, feminist edge to his work. Personally, I believe that when attempting to rehabilitate a defamed woman's image, it's always helpful to approach the subject with a feminist eye. Dennison doesn't attempt to modernize Livia in any way, but attempts to understand her motivations from the perspective of a woman in her day and age. I particularly commend a male historian for being able to do this effectively, as I tend to find them a little lacking in that department.
At the same time, Dennison is careful to keep from projecting his ideas and viewpoints onto Livia. He keeps strictly to the facts. Very rarely does he do the thing that many biographers are criticized for: assume. He only draws conclusions when he absolutely must.
Dennison also manages to give us an effective look at Augustus, who I found myself liking a lot more than I expected. (I'm an Antony and Cleopatra fan. We tend to look at Augustus with a bit of disdain. Man didn't know how to party.) He's remarkably human in Dennison's hands, perhaps moreso than his wife.
The Bad
Unfortunately, there's a reason why Livia biographies are so hard to find. Ancient sources are very difficult to uncover--particularly accurate ancient sources. Dennison, again, never wants to draw his own conclusions--not even when they're reasonable. That accounts for the book's slim pagecount.
There just isn't that much Livia in a book about Livia. I can understand a lot of material on Augustus and Tiberius, as they were huge parts of her life. But sometimes I felt like I was reading a biography on the vs. Livia, particularly in the case of Tiberius. Extremely noticeable in this regard were entire pages going on about people who weren't even that important to Livia.
Often Dennison was forced to go on tangents about women who would have been Livia's contemporaries. He would have to draw his conclusions about how Livia "may" have had similar experiences. I couldn't help but feel that this issue could have been handled more deftly--in a way that more directly related to the subject.
The Ugly
Livia is a remarkably fascinating woman. So I must credit the book's tendency to stray from its focus with why it sometimes ventured into boring territory.
The Verdict
Nothing overly amazing or groundbreaking here. However, "Empress of Rome" is interesting and helpful. If you want to learn more about Livia and are going into it knowing little to nothing, I recommend it. If you're an expert or a history buff, you might want to skim it and otherwise look elsewhere.
The Good
Matthew Dennison very clearly appreciates his subject. He places great care in small but helpful details, like the color of Livia's wedding veil and certain omens that she put great store in. There's a slight, but not overpowering, feminist edge to his work. Personally, I believe that when attempting to rehabilitate a defamed woman's image, it's always helpful to approach the subject with a feminist eye. Dennison doesn't attempt to modernize Livia in any way, but attempts to understand her motivations from the perspective of a woman in her day and age. I particularly commend a male historian for being able to do this effectively, as I tend to find them a little lacking in that department.
At the same time, Dennison is careful to keep from projecting his ideas and viewpoints onto Livia. He keeps strictly to the facts. Very rarely does he do the thing that many biographers are criticized for: assume. He only draws conclusions when he absolutely must.
Dennison also manages to give us an effective look at Augustus, who I found myself liking a lot more than I expected. (I'm an Antony and Cleopatra fan. We tend to look at Augustus with a bit of disdain. Man didn't know how to party.) He's remarkably human in Dennison's hands, perhaps moreso than his wife.
The Bad
Unfortunately, there's a reason why Livia biographies are so hard to find. Ancient sources are very difficult to uncover--particularly accurate ancient sources. Dennison, again, never wants to draw his own conclusions--not even when they're reasonable. That accounts for the book's slim pagecount.
There just isn't that much Livia in a book about Livia. I can understand a lot of material on Augustus and Tiberius, as they were huge parts of her life. But sometimes I felt like I was reading a biography on the vs. Livia, particularly in the case of Tiberius. Extremely noticeable in this regard were entire pages going on about people who weren't even that important to Livia.
Often Dennison was forced to go on tangents about women who would have been Livia's contemporaries. He would have to draw his conclusions about how Livia "may" have had similar experiences. I couldn't help but feel that this issue could have been handled more deftly--in a way that more directly related to the subject.
The Ugly
Livia is a remarkably fascinating woman. So I must credit the book's tendency to stray from its focus with why it sometimes ventured into boring territory.
The Verdict
Nothing overly amazing or groundbreaking here. However, "Empress of Rome" is interesting and helpful. If you want to learn more about Livia and are going into it knowing little to nothing, I recommend it. If you're an expert or a history buff, you might want to skim it and otherwise look elsewhere.
julis's review
informative
slow-paced
4.0
Good points: Dennison either knows his shit or is cribbing from someone else’s very good notes, because in addition to the ancient historians, he brings in a lot of archaeology, which is incredibly important when we’re dealing with someone with very few contemporary references and a short list of biased references from 2 centuries later. He pulls these all together into a largely cohesive narrative and balances Tacitus’s sexism with...well, literally anything else. His writing is engaging and he generally avoids reductive analyses of the main cast (Caligula once again gets bashed, perhaps predictably).
Bad points: Could he not have done it in chronological order?? Or at least given a timeline? The family tree at the beginning is also missing several branches (and entirely male-centric) making some relations hard to follow.
sam_rosenfeld's review
3.0
Dennison might be a great researcher, but he's no story teller. He took a fascinating figure from history and wrote a very boring book about her.
mommachristy2's review against another edition
3.0
There is so much we do not know, can only speculate, about such an impressive eoman of history. As grand as she was, Livia's history is greatly unknown for certain, including her feels about how much she managed to achieve in life. Still, a powerful woman who cultivated her image around the prominent men in her life, Livia was a woman who stood out and led a nation. I enjoyed Dennison's view into her life and career as "Mother of Rome". A very interesting read.
kake's review
DNF: the Kindle sample got me partway through Chapter 2, by which point it was very clear that I wasn’t going to get on with the author’s writing style — just far too many literary flourishes getting in the way of clarity.
kellswitch's review
3.0
A well written, approachable and enjoyable book it doesn't really reveal anything overwhelmingly new about Livia but then there doesn't seem to be much out there at all. What I did enjoy was how he used what little there is known to create at least a feeling of what her life may have been like and to point out the inconsistencies and biases in the recorded histories that paint her as a villainess without trying to claim that none of them were true.
Not an earth shattering book but enjoyable, I came away with at least some feeling for what the life of a high level Roman woman may have been like.
Not an earth shattering book but enjoyable, I came away with at least some feeling for what the life of a high level Roman woman may have been like.
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