Well, the Olympics are over, the Texans have gone home (boo!), the theme-parking is done, and I finally finished I, Claudius (Graves). I really enjoyed this book! I started reading it at the beginning of the Olympics and read leisurely since I also spent alot of time watching the Olympics and visiting with my sister and niece from Texas for 10 days. I loved reading the account of the Roman Empire for this time period from the fictional auto-biographical voice of Claudius. Claudius began his story with the death of Julius Caesar and the rise of his great-uncle Augustus as the emperor. Roman history can be so confusing, that this telling of the story made it much more interesting and easier to follow. I can't wait to dig into each of the historical characters now and read about them and match them to the story! Was Livia, the wife of Augustus and grandmother of Claudius, really responsible for killing her own husband, among other people? I loved Claudius, the crippled, stuttering youngster that no one paid any attention too, and how he kept his wits about him and rose to become the emperor at the end of the book. And, I really loved his older brother Germanicus who was the only person who was ever truly kind to Claudius and loved him. He was a noble general and should have been the successor to Augustus, but he maintained his loyalty to his uncle and adoptive father, Tiberius (who succeeded Augustus instead) throughout his life, even when Tiberius wrongly suspected Germanicus of trying to usurp his position. I figured out right away who killed Germanicus and it was quite chilling to have that confirmed towards the end of the book. The characters of Caligula, Livia and Tiberius were downright evil! I know Caligula is a famous name, but I really have not invested any time in Roman history, so I didn't know of all his atrocities. And, duh, I totally kept waiting for him to be killed by his horse!! I didn't get the meaning of that prophecy until it was literally hitting me over the head at the same time if was hitting HIM over the head in the last few pages. Anyway, like I said...I'm going to read some history to compare the two accounts. Loved the book! I might just have to read the sequel which is about the time period that Claudius actually was emperor of Rome.

Here are a couple of snippets from the book. The first one is at the beginning when Claudius is explaining why he's writing the account:

This is a confidential history. But who, it may be asked, are my confidants? My answer is: it is addressed to posterity. I do not mean my great-grandchildren, or my great-great-grandchildren: I mean an extremely remote posterity. Yet my hope is that you, my eventual readers of a hundred generations ahead, or more, will feel yourselves directly spoken to, as if by a contemporary: as often Herodotus and Thucydides, long dead, seem to speak to me.

And, of course, the well-known or well-imitated first line of the book:

I. Tiberius Claudius Drusus Nero Germanicus This-that-and-the-other (for I shall not trouble you yet with all my titles) who was once, and not so long ago either, known to my friends and relatives and associates as "Claudius the Idiot", or "That Claudius", or "Claudius the Stammerer", or "Clau-Clau-Claudius" or at best as "Poor Uncle Claudius", am now about to write this strange history of my life; starting from my earliest childhood and continuing year by year until I reach the fateful point of change where, some eight years ago, at the age of fifty-one, I suddenly found myself caught in what I may call the "golden predicament" from which I have never since become entangled.

When Claudius, the boy, is being asked his opinion about two rival historians' methods of writing history, they are surprised that he is very knowledgeable on the subject, and has his own thoughts on the matter. Pollio thinks perhaps Claudius has become disillusioned that his tutor Livy's way of writing history is only one way of looking at things:

"It's not disillusion, sir. I see now, though I hadn't considered the matter before, that there are two different ways of writing history: one is to persuade men to virtue and the other is to compel men to truth. The first is Livy's way and the other is yours: and perhaps they are not irreconcilable."

I really love that quote and the entire time I was reading I, Claudius I kept wondering if my dad had ever read this book. He would have loved it! Wish I could ask him.