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Has anyone read this book? I picked it up last week and just started to read it.
I have to say that so far I am highly disapointed. The book is not factual at all. The author tries to tell us things that we do not know and makes references to modern events very poorly.
Any opinions? Is this a book of history or merely a taudry historical novel?
Timothy Hanna
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I´m just reading it, and I must say I am very impressed.
Christian K.
No reconstruendum => No reconstruction.
Ut desint vires, tamen est laudanda voluntas.
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Impressed by what? His writing style or the liberties he takes with historical figures?
Timothy Hanna
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Quote:Impressed by what? His writing style or the liberties he takes with historical figures?
I hope that it is better than Persian Fire; my review is here. As Dorothy Parker once said: "This is not a book to be tossed aside lightly, it should be thrown at great force."
Jona Lendering
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Excellent review Jona.
I believe I commented on it once before in an earlier thread about Holland's book Persian Fire.
Have you read Rubicon?
I would be most interested in your review of that work.
:wink:
Narukami
David Reinke
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I read Rubicon too some years ago. It has this same cheap "sensationalist" taste as the tv-series Rome. I can`t explain it further but the book was a disappointment....
Virilis / Jyrki Halme
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I think it is a good book if you remember what it is. I believe Holland is a novelist who decided to try his hand at non-fiction, so you can expect novelesque style. We aren't talking about Momigliano here.
Take a look at some of the blurbs on the cover:
Quote:stunning... chariot-race speed... bloodstained collapse... thrill ride
Holland isn't trying to compete with professional historians, and they aren't advertising it as such. :wink:
I thought it was a fun little book that had its aim of entertainment, not education. As long as you keep that in mind you can have fun with it.
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I think M. Foucault would have liked this book. I am impressed, because it is very well written, and because the author had the guts to write such a book. There´s not a lot of narrative ancient history books out there which take narrative to such a level.
It is quite able to interest people into the subject of ancient history, and, let´s face it, it seems to sell very well. In all these aspects, it is a very good book, IMO.
Christian K.
No reconstruendum => No reconstruction.
Ut desint vires, tamen est laudanda voluntas.
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Quote:I think M. Foucault would have liked this book. I am impressed, because it is very well written, and because the author had the guts to write such a book. There´s not a lot of narrative ancient history books out there which take narrative to such a level.
It is quite able to interest people into the subject of ancient history, and, let´s face it, it seems to sell very well. In all these aspects, it is a very good book, IMO.
You mean Michel Foucault, "punish & observe"? Oh, I miss my university days :wink: ...
Virilis / Jyrki Halme
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Yup, the very same. 
Christian K.
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Quote:Yup, the very same.
Sigh. Deep sigh.
Jona Lendering
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Why? Because he´s dead?
Quote:I would like my books to be a kind of tool-box which others can rummage through to find a tool which they can use however they wish in their own area… I would like the little volume that I want to write on disciplinary systems to be useful to an educator, a warden, a magistrate, a conscientious objector. I don't write for an audience, I write for users, not readers.
– Michel Foucault (1974), 'Prisons et asiles dans le mécanisme du pouvoir' in Dits et Ecrits, t. II. Paris: Gallimard, 1994, pp. 523–4).
Christian K.
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Quote:Why? Because he´s dead?
No, I just miss my university days. Life was so much more exciting, with new disoveries every day, and intellectuals who really had something to say.
Jona Lendering
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The book is like a tasty snack: easily consumed...
It's readable but there are much better books on the subject.
Also known as: Jeroen Leeuwensteyn  hock: <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_eek.gif" alt=" hock:" title="Shocked" /> hock:
"You see, in this world there\'s two kinds of people, my friend. Those armed with pila, and those who dig. You dig."
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Quote:caiustarquitius:11r6jhp9 Wrote:Why? Because he´s dead?
No, I just miss my university days. Life was so much more exciting, with new disoveries every day, and intellectuals who really had something to say.
Indeed! So true. I had a great time in grad school -- a lot of fun 
Narukami
David Reinke
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