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ellietahm 's review for:
SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome
by Mary Beard
**Listened to the audiobook narrated by Phyllida Nash**
TL;DR - terrific, comprehensive history with interesting anecdotes. May be helpful to have a baseline familiarity with Roman origin myths, social structure and general notable figures.
The Writing: 5 stars. Mary Beard’s SPQR was fascinating and covered a vast landscape, from conflicting origin myths to military campaigns and social life. I wouldn’t say I am a subject matter expert on Rome by any means, but I feel I had a decent baseline familiarity having studied Rome in school and visited. Having that was helpful, as SPQR is not a Roman 101. Beard helpfully connects anecdotes and color to various characters as she threads the narrative needle, which was particularly helpful once we moved into the era of “everyone is named Caesar.” Having listened to SPQR, I now feel I have not only a foundation but, to continue the analogy, a first floor for Roman history, which is useful should I decide to pursue additional texts on the various topics she covered in her comprehensive work.
In particular, I thought her inclusion of social and family structure was quite interesting, both to understand the use and limitations of slavery within Roman culture, and the role of women. It is rare to get a look into historic reproductive health care, let alone of antiquity, so the inclusion was, to me, notable. These “behind the scenes” individuals are often overlooked in history texts in favor of powerful men, but in my opinion, it is useful to understand the culture through the lens of the populace, rather than solely through that of the rulers.
The Narration: 5 stars. Phyllida Nash gave a wonderful performance of SPQR. She is a talented narrator who (as far as I am aware) nailed the commonly accepted pronunciations of Latin terms and names. I’m thrilled to know she has a number of other audiobooks available.
The Production: 4 stars. I am happy to report there were no glaring production issues. I think there was at times some soft background music between chapters or sections of the book. It was fine, but I kept thinking I was accidentally playing music on another device instead of it being part of the audiobook.
TL;DR - terrific, comprehensive history with interesting anecdotes. May be helpful to have a baseline familiarity with Roman origin myths, social structure and general notable figures.
The Writing: 5 stars. Mary Beard’s SPQR was fascinating and covered a vast landscape, from conflicting origin myths to military campaigns and social life. I wouldn’t say I am a subject matter expert on Rome by any means, but I feel I had a decent baseline familiarity having studied Rome in school and visited. Having that was helpful, as SPQR is not a Roman 101. Beard helpfully connects anecdotes and color to various characters as she threads the narrative needle, which was particularly helpful once we moved into the era of “everyone is named Caesar.” Having listened to SPQR, I now feel I have not only a foundation but, to continue the analogy, a first floor for Roman history, which is useful should I decide to pursue additional texts on the various topics she covered in her comprehensive work.
In particular, I thought her inclusion of social and family structure was quite interesting, both to understand the use and limitations of slavery within Roman culture, and the role of women. It is rare to get a look into historic reproductive health care, let alone of antiquity, so the inclusion was, to me, notable. These “behind the scenes” individuals are often overlooked in history texts in favor of powerful men, but in my opinion, it is useful to understand the culture through the lens of the populace, rather than solely through that of the rulers.
The Narration: 5 stars. Phyllida Nash gave a wonderful performance of SPQR. She is a talented narrator who (as far as I am aware) nailed the commonly accepted pronunciations of Latin terms and names. I’m thrilled to know she has a number of other audiobooks available.
The Production: 4 stars. I am happy to report there were no glaring production issues. I think there was at times some soft background music between chapters or sections of the book. It was fine, but I kept thinking I was accidentally playing music on another device instead of it being part of the audiobook.