What I've been reading...

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Robert Harris, Dictator (Hutchinson, 2015)

Just finished reading the above book and I loved it. It is the third in a trilogy of novels centred on the life of Cicero, as narrated by his slave/secretary Tiro during turbulent times in Rome’s history (weren’t they all turbulent?) when Julius Caesar has become part of the triumvirate with Pompey and Crassus. It concludes with Cicero’s rather brutal death and his realisation that he has miscalculated in his support of the young Octavian, later to become Augustus.

None of this is not a plot spoiler: Harris’s research of the period is extensive – his bibliography is impressive – and he keeps very close to the written sources. In fact, one reviewer said you might as well read the sources rather than Harris’s fictionalized account as he keeps so close to them. Harris’s writing style is clear. His characters are well drawn and you really care about the fate of Cicero, his daughter Tullia and his slave/secretary Tiro, as well as a host of other characters in the book. He maintains the tension throughout the book even if some of us are aware of how it must end. Harris was a political journalist in his other life and it shows. He enjoys recounting the political machinations of the Roman senators.

I love this kind of fiction based on fact. I can enjoy a good story in the hands of a master craftsman, but also feel I am learning a bit of history. There are, however, some weaknesses. Occasionally Harris slips into slightly jarring modern vernacular; for example Pompey and Crassus are said to stand for election “on a joint ticket”. But overall this is compulsively readable and succeeds in re-creating the social and political world of late republican Rome – I’m a great fan of Robert Harris as a writer. And the book makes me want to read the sources, all in the Loeb Classical Library. If you feel that modern government today is far from ideal in its corruption and greed, perhaps reading this novel might help put it into perspective. But then perhaps we should have learnt a stronger lesson from our Roman forebears.

Christine L. Corton

What I've been reading...

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Harper Lee, Go Set a Watchman (London: William Heinemann, 2015)

Oh dear! The only positive thing I have to say about this book is that it encouraged me to reread Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), which I think is a truly wonderful book, filled with warmth and, while making its point about the unfairness of life (especially black Americans), it also shows a society that tries to be fair especially through the portrayal of Atticus Finch, a true Gentleman in every sense of the word. This latest novel, on the other hand, has no warmth and it even shows Atticus Finch adopting some quite racist attitudes. Written before To Kill a Mockingbird, it was submitted to the editor, Tay Hohoff, who saw its potential and encouraged Lee to rewrite, and from that came the later book.

I did not like the style of Watchman, which indulged in a lot of calling people ‘honey’ and ‘sweetheart’. The plot bored me and I did not feel any empathy for Atticus or Scout (in this book largely called Jean Louise and a twenty-six-year-old returning to Maycomb after living in New York). It explores the tensions over race between the more liberal North and the still racist South which wants to keep the black Americans well and truly underfoot. Scout is shocked to discover that Atticus is allowing people in an official council meeting to openly demand that the black Americans are kept in their place – a view Atticus supports since he believes that black Americans are not educated enough to vote and would, through their sheer voting numbers, put black men in governing positions. In the end Scout comes to agree with her father’s stance – something which I might have found disappointing if I had at all cared about her as a character.

The reviews of this book warn the reader not to read this as a sequel to To Kill a Mockingbird. [SPOILER ALERT<] And it is hard to discover in this novel that Jem has dropped down dead from a heart attack and Dill is tramping around Europe after the trauma of the Second World War [>/SPOILER ALERT] but, if I just look at this book on its own, as I am encouraged to do, I would suggest that it is not good enough, and it should not have been published, doing great damage to Lee as a writer. Am I right in believing that there was a hint that Truman Capote helped Lee with To Kill a Mockingbird? If so, then perhaps this later novel had more to do with Capote than Lee. My mark would be 1 out of 10. I really could not see any reason to publish it or to read it. 

Christine L Corton