The First Man in Rome

Was Ancient Rome a cancerous state built on oppression? Can a ‘good' state exist if it requires slavery and colonialist expansion to function? Are the patrician nobility of Rome good people, even if they are to a man slave owners? Did women within Ancient Rome's patrician class feel empowered by their wealth or held back by contemporary sexism?

Colleen McCullough confidently answers: Uh, iunno.

Look, I didn't love Robert Harris' Cicero trilogy either, but it at least played with a few of these questions. It cared about the historiography of Rome. It was told from the perspective of a slave who loved his master and had no particular opinions about being an enslaved person, but it was at least in conversation with I, Claudius and, like, scholarship. It engages with the legacy of Rome. That's really all I'm asking for, here. What are we talking about when we talk about Rome?

The First Man in Rome functions as a romance– not a romantic romance, but the original meaning of a romance, an adventuresome story about heroes, told in a vernacular style. (I can't say McCullough's prose is ever particularly sparkling.) I don't really understand why these books are as popular as they are, but I don't generally understand why generational stories that have extremely simplistic morality are popular (Sorry, Mr Follett).

This is a story about heroes fighting a justified battle against savage barbarians (who are given no characterization) for the glory of their country (the nature of its glory is not considered); the generals of this war are brave and enterprising men (who own slaves) with wives who love them (even though they're sometimes selfish bitches) and deserve good things. It has the morality of a pulp story by Edgar Rice Burroughs, but it was published in 1990.

Read it the first time when I was just out of college, and it blew my mind. Twenty years later I grabbed it for my trip to Naples/Pompeii, and it absolutely came alive for me once again. It's a fascinating and absorbing story, and filled with thousands of historically accurate details that make my understanding of human history all the richer. I was completely enthralled. Highly, highly recommend.

Great read!