A review by spiritualkungfu
Augustus by John Williams

5.0

John Williams Augustus could be called historical fiction, he creates written accounts for his characters and regardless of how well they represents a truth it adds characteristics that don't properly reflect the figures as they actually were, he adds historical quotes throughout his fictional letters/journals/memoirs ect, it would probably be easier to recognise them with a physical book rather than the audio I listened too, they add to the impression of accuracy but ultimately it can't avoid the fictional element, the positive of this approach is that he can make the history come alive in a way that only first hand accounts or fiction can, rather than dry academy we get a poetic retelling of what was true life for these people, in this way it's a Tolstoyan history, a living moment with depth of feeling and thoughts, I find it interesting the way William uses primary sources to create his tale, in this the fictional accounts are the sources for our primary sources creating an interesting circle that allows Williams to add bias as they exist in what survived while making them personally correspondences he can shine some light on the truth, I thought this was terrifically done.