The Twelve Caesars

By: Suetonius

Narrated by: Clive Chafer

As private secretary to the Emperor Hadrian, the scholar Suetonius had access to the imperial archives and used them (along with eyewitness accounts) to produce one of the most colorful biographical works in history. The Twelve Caesars chronicles the public careers and private lives of the men who wielded absolute power over Rome, from the foundation of the empire under Julius Caesar and Augustus, to the decline into depravity and civil war under Nero and the recovery that came with his successors. A masterpiece of observation, anecdote, and detailed physical description, The Twelve Caesars presents us with a gallery of vividly drawn---and all too human---individuals. This version of The Twelve Caesars is the translation by Alexander Thomson, M.D.

Public Domain (P)2011 Tantor

Rome's First Family was colorful

've wanted to read this book for a very long time. I even had a Loeb Classic Library edition in English and Latin. However, I was a poor Latin student and I waited far too long to get started, and I wasn't going to cheat and just read the translation. Well, I gave all that up and read a translation. I recall a bit from old Western Civ classes, and some from my Latin classes, of the history of this period. I'm most familiar from the Robert Graves books, I, Claudius and Claudius the God. This covers a lot of the same ground and I was amazed to see that Graves didn't need to stray too far to make his stories interesting and dramatic. I recall reading Caesar's Gallic Wars, in Latin, and I missed the back story on the divine Julius. Certainly a more interesting character than I remember. I read this as an audiobook and there were plenty of insertions of additional material which weren't clearly distinguished from the original material, so I can't always tell what was Suetonius and what was more modern. Overall, quote interesting.

A Good listen, but colorful language is censored

If you are already interested in the period of the early Principate then this book is perfect for you. Be warned, however that Suetonius enjoys a good yarn and many time periods are expressed through a series of rumors and anecdotes. The focus on courtly life can be a bit draining after some time, so listening in multiple sittings is a must. These stories help color the personalities of those who would call themselves ‘Imperator’ and humanizes history in a way that a textbook cannot. This is also a good listen for those who appreciate the Liberal Arts as an overview of each period’s greatest writers, poets and orators follows each Caesar’s death. My biggest complaint is the censorship of the more in appropriate translations. In a book that discusses some of the most horrible crimes of those in power, it’s a bizarre choice to inundate sentences with pauses to indicate a cus word. Historiography should not shy away from discussing the bluntness of prior ages.

Heavily modified and softly translated

The History of the Twelve Caesars by Suetonius is one of the most important historical texts of the classical period, and is unique fun in a good translation. Unfortunately, the translator has added long passages of historical context and analysis between the original entry. These passages are overly long and poorly conceived, and are not clearly separated from the translation of the original text. Worse, they contain long passages presented in both Latin and English which destroy any narrative flow in the work.

Finally, apparently for moral reasons, passages describing sexual habits are not translated directly, but paraphrased euphemistically. This is simply not acceptable in a translation of a key historical text.

Dry, Dry, Dry

This book wasn???t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

You have to be a hard-core historian to really enjoy this book.

What three words best describe Clive Chafer???s performance?

Cultured, dry, emotionless

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from The Twelve Caesars?

Some of the really long passages in Latin.

Any additional comments?

I was doing OK with this book even though it's pretty dry material. I expected it to be a bit on the scholastic side. I know enough about Roman history that I was getting by and enjoying some of the bits and pieces. You have to have a pretty good knowledge of that history to even have a chance at understanding what is going on and recognizing the names. There are so many names to keep track of.

And then, I ran into an extraordinarily long passage in Latin that just about put me to sleep before the narrator finished it. Maybe if I understood Latin, I wouldn't have found this so irritating but it would have been better done by translation to English. I can't imagine that there are many who have a full enough knowledge of Latin to understand the passage.

good technical book...but

good data, but reads like a textbook. I recently finished a book on Augustus Octavia which was highly fascinating. But, I moved on from this one after about Chapter 5.