A fascinating, witty and detailed biography
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Joyce Tyldesley's 'Cleopatra' is a remarkable book; highly readable, clever and humorous, the biography offers a wealth of information and detail on Cleopatra and her world.
The book is structured in a reassuringly chronological manner. Tyldesley begins with Cleopatra's turbulent accession to the throne, moves through her careful negotiation of famine, drought and opposition, and ends with her death and legacy. Her much-discussed liaisons with Caesar, Pompey and Marc Antony also merit significant attention.
Throughout the course of the biography, Tyldesley sustains the interest by examining all the most famous myths about Cleopatra, and then systematically authenticating or debunking them. We discover how far we can trust the accounts of Cleopatra rolling herself theatrically from carpets, or dissolving priceless pearls in wine. We find out how likely it was that the queen was actually hook-nosed and prominent-chinned, and that far from being careless and flippant, she was shrewd and politically astute.
The most fascinating part of the story for me, having studied Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, was the chapter that dealt with their famous relationship. Anyone who knows the play at all would find the explanation of Antony's scandalous past, for example, extremely enlightening. It is also interesting to see how far Shakespeare adapted and manipulated the legend for the stage. I would therefore recommend this book to anyone studying Shakespeare's play - or any play about Cleopatra, for that matter - as an excellent study companion.
Really, though, this biography might appeal to anyone, simply because Cleopatra is such an intriguing and mysterious figure in history. In spite of its somewhat scholarly tone in places, one does not have to be an egyptologist to find 'Cleopatra' interesting and surprising.
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