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The perception that the classics are in decline is nothing new. What was the Renaissance but “a desperate last-ditch attempt to save the fleeting and fragile traces . . . from oblivion”? The upside of this sense of imminent loss, Beard believes, is that it gives them “the energy and edginess” they still have. By updating reviews and essays that have appeared elsewhere, Beard takes a chronological approach to ancient Greece and Rome and confronts a number of issues, some obvious, some less so. One obvious one is to ask how great Alexander was. (Not very, it seems.) A less obvious is to ask what made the Greeks laugh? (The things we laugh at haven’t changed much in two millenniums.) Some insights into ancient Rome are the “spinning” around Caesar’s murder by proponents and opponents alike, the fact that Augustus was an emperor who could take – and make – a joke, and the fact that most of what we think we know about Cleopatra is a myth thanks to Augustus’s demonising scribes. A fascinating, enjoyable read even if you’re not a classics buff.
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