The Commentaries Of Caesar

by Anthony Trollope

The Commentaries Of Caesar by Anthony Trollope. The work is an edition and critical introduction to Caesar's Commentaries on the Gallic wars and the Civil War, presented for English readers. Trollope offers a compact overview of Caesar’s life and character, discusses the structure and authorship of the Commentaries, and explains how Caesar’s narratives function as political as well as military history. The volume surveys Caesar’s campaigns across Gaul, his crossing of the Rubicon, and the civil war that followed, as well as the later campaigns in Illyria, Africa, and Spain, as recorded by Caesar or continued by later editors. Trollope comments on the strengths and limits of Caesar’s concise, sometimes brutal prose, the moral contrasts among Gauls and Germans, and the political uses of Caesar’s writings. The book aims to render Caesar accessible to modern readers while providing scholarly context about the historical significance and literary qualities of the Commentaries.

Genres: History

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1870

About the author

Anthony Trollope became one of the most successful, prolific and respected English novelists of the Victorian era. Some of Trollope's best-loved works, known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire, revolve around the imaginary county of Barsetshire; he also wrote penetrating novels on political, social, and gender issues and conflicts of his day.

Trollope has always been a popular novelist. Noted fans have included Sir Alec Guinness (who never travelled without a Trollope novel), former British Prime Ministers Harold Macmillan and Sir John Major, economist John Kenneth Galbraith, American novelists Sue Grafton and Dominick Dunne and soap opera writer Harding Lemay. Trollope's literary reputation dipped somewhat during the last years of his life, but he regained the esteem of critics by the mid-twentieth century.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_...

Reviews

[Justin Pickett · Rating 4 out of 5]

“From bloodthirstiness he slaughtered none; but neither from tenderness did he spare any.”

Trollope summarizes ten of Julius Caesar’s Commentaries (or memoirs)—the ten that are believed to have been written by Caesar himself. These describe Caesar’s various campaigns in Gaul and his fight against Pompey. The covered material ranges from Gaulish custom, to Caesar’s building of a bridge in ten days to cross a river, to Pompey’s murder and decapitation, to Caesar’s burning of most of Egypt’s royal library, to his relationship with Cleopatra:

“First, because he wanted some ready money, and secondly, because Cleopatra was pretty, Caesar nearly lost the world in Egypt.”

In is notable how Trollope distinguishes between Roman rulers, setting Caesar apart from Marius, Sulla, Octavius, and Antony, all of whom he views as greedy, power-hungry, “monsters of cruelty.” By contrast, he describes Caesar as merciful, brave, and focused on duty. Interestingly, Trollope’s overall view of Roman society during and immediately before Caesar’s time, and especially of Roman politics, is not a favorable one.

“Power had produced wealth, and wealth had produced corruption … An honest man with clean hands and a conscience, with scruples and a love of country, became unfitted for public employment.”

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a well-written overview.