A deeply considered look at women and power in the late Roman age.
Wife of one emperor, mother of another, Empress Livia proves a powerful tool with which to amplify on the “dog days” of the Roman Empire.
British journalist Dennison (The Last Princess: The Devoted Life of Queen Victoria’s Youngest Daughter, 2008, etc.) deftly sifts the historical record for a portrait of a woman in the right place at the right time. Livia was the daughter of Marcus Livius Drusus Claudianus, who belonged to Rome’s most distinguished senatorial families but backed the wrong side after Julius Caesar’s assassination and was eliminated during the Second Triumvirate’s Proscription. Nonetheless, Livia had been married off at age 15 to “turncoat” Tiberius Claudius Nero, had two sons quickly by him, living often in exile, before her affair with Octavian, the youngest of the Triumvirate, precipitated a hasty divorce and remarriage. Thus Livia allied herself with Rome’s first citizen, and their marriage lasted more than 50 years. Although she had clear ambitions for her two sons, Tiberius and Drusus, Livia herself was not allowed to share power as Octavian’s star rose over the next half-century—although “access…was arguably Livia’s true patrimony.” The first order of business was the necessity of defeating Mark Antony, who had broken off and allied himself with Cleopatra. After Actium, Octavian assumed the name “Augustus,” revered one, and gradually Livia also became an archetype by imperial propaganda, becoming sacrosanct, as depicted in public statues—faithful, steadfast and chaste, as opposed to Cleopatra’s exotic, promiscuous, beguiling depictions. Her childlessness with Octavian might have been troubling, had Octavian not truly loved Livia. He finally adopted Tiberius as his son, and Livia ultimately secured Tiberius’s inheritance of power upon Octavian’s death in 14 CE. Dennison does a nice job of defending this fascinating character from “demonization” through the centuries, and knowledgeably considers many facets of Roman history, including religion, the place of women and children, family life and iconography.
A deeply considered look at women and power in the late Roman age.Pub Date: Jan. 4, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-312-65864-9
Page Count: 336
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2010
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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