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cartoonmicah 's review for:
I was looking for a copy of Thackeray’s Vanity Fair and accidentally stumbled on a book on the history and constantly reinvention of the artistic rendering of the Roman emperors. Twelve Caesars is a fascinating read, though it often feels like an anecdotal appendix to a subject matter too widely ranging for a single text.
Though there were others after them, the first twelve dictators in Roman history are the ones who committed the most heinous crimes and attracted the most memorable rumors. Throughout modern history, these twelve have variously been lauded, condemned, and used for all sorts of propaganda purposes, both as a collective group and as individuals. But with thousands of coins and all sorts of other sculptures repudiated to be from their own lifetimes, what true information do we have about their appearances? Twelve Caesars is a case by case study of what artists and historians have gotten right and, more famously, wrong in their assertions about the historic significance on art works and texts concerning these men. Monarchs and dictators tend to love them while rebels and republicans revile everything they stood for. Christians have often identified them as both persecutors and noble characters.
This book was full on interesting stories, but I personally would have appreciated something a little more beginner in contextualization the emperors and something with a little more of a fluid through line. Audio was definitely not ideal for this one, but in paper I think it would feel more like a reference material than a read through text. Even so, all of it was fascinating.
Though there were others after them, the first twelve dictators in Roman history are the ones who committed the most heinous crimes and attracted the most memorable rumors. Throughout modern history, these twelve have variously been lauded, condemned, and used for all sorts of propaganda purposes, both as a collective group and as individuals. But with thousands of coins and all sorts of other sculptures repudiated to be from their own lifetimes, what true information do we have about their appearances? Twelve Caesars is a case by case study of what artists and historians have gotten right and, more famously, wrong in their assertions about the historic significance on art works and texts concerning these men. Monarchs and dictators tend to love them while rebels and republicans revile everything they stood for. Christians have often identified them as both persecutors and noble characters.
This book was full on interesting stories, but I personally would have appreciated something a little more beginner in contextualization the emperors and something with a little more of a fluid through line. Audio was definitely not ideal for this one, but in paper I think it would feel more like a reference material than a read through text. Even so, all of it was fascinating.