She did a great job, and was the first reader ever in my experience not to mispronounce “err.You think 21st century culture is celebrity-obsessed? Try Mediterranean society at the dawn of the first millennium, when politics were entirely personal, and rulers’ romantic entanglements could be as important as the battles they won.

I listened to the audio production, which was read by Robin Miles.

This was a time period full of personalities who made huge impacts not only in their own time, but even down to the present. (Oddly, I couldn’t detect even a hint of chemistry between Taylor and Burton.) I thought the story in the film was really remarkably close to the one told by Schiff.Įvaluation: The story of Cleopatra – and indeed, all the Roman “celebrities” in the generation before the birth of Jesus – is exceedingly fascinating, even if much of it is conjecture. The film is infamous for nearly bankrupting 20th Century Fox, and for the affair between Taylor and Richard Burton that began during filming. Her legend lives on however, “in one of the busiest afterlives in history,” which has only obscured the real person even more.Īfter finishing this book, I rented the movie version with Elizabeth Taylor. Ĭornered by Octavian, Cleopatra killed herself in 39 BC, most probably by using poison rather by an asp as popularly assumed. In Schiff’s telling, Octavian, is a villain, but this view of him is contestable other historians consider him to have been Rome’s greatest emperor. The only way they had to explain it was sex. Her reputation as a wanton temptress came from Roman writers who were dismayed and alienated by that influence. Having had affairs with both Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, and having affected Octavian in many ways, there is no doubt she also influenced the course of Roman politics for many years. Schiff clearly admires Cleopatra, who ruled Egypt capably for 21 years, spoke a number of languages, and was renowned for her intellect, charisma, and speaking ability as well as her political acumen.

Cleopatra schiff review