Julius Caesar and Rome

Men and Their Times

by J.P.V.D. Balsdon

Julius Caesar and Rome.

Genres: Italy, History

191 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1971

About the author

John Percy Vyvian Dacre Balsdon (per Library of Congress)

Reviews

[Elliot Wyatt · Rating 2 out of 5]

This work benefits from being short and sweet, as the writing style is not particularly engaging. It assumes the reader has a pretty substantial prior knowledge of the late republic, and is difficult to follow for the average reader.

Whilst I can appreciate that Balsdon favours the cold hard fact approach to history here, rarely getting lost in rumour or jumping to half-baked conclusions, I was pretty disappointed by his tendancy to make the epic seem bland. The book almost manages to make Julius Caesar uninteresting, which is quite an achievement. Pivotal moments such as the crossing of the Rubicon and his assassination are not given the gravity they deserve.

We're all familiar with the age old debate of narrative vs accuracy in history. I think this book could be used as a pretty good case study for why narrative is important.

[Victor Sonkin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Balsdon is my hero; his "Life and Leisure in Ancient Rome" is by far the best book on the subject, and his "Oxford Life" is a wonderfully idiosyncratic rambling about, well, Oxford life. So I have to make it clear that in my opinion three stars means "quite good", and that I do not give this book a better mark only because its content veers away from the intention of the series — to give a general reader an insight into the innards of an era through the biography of a famous historical figure. This, however, is a very learned brief (but very dense) description of Julius Caesar's life; anyone without solid background knowledge will be immediately lost. Balsdon is at his best when he relaxes a bit and expresses his own views and preferences. As a short introduction to Julius Caesar, it's excellent; as a short introduction to Roman civilization, it is quite unsuitable.