Two short reviews: The Song of Simon de Montfort and Being Napoleon

I haven't done a huge amount of book finishing recently, but the most recent non-fiction book I've got all the way through was this one, The Song of Simon de Montfort, by Sophie Therese Ambler. It is a biography focused on two main points: how de Montfort conceived of his role in opposing and controlling the king, and how he appeared through the eyes of those that followed him.

The book begins with the end: Simon preparing to die on the field at Evesham, and everything that follows then leads us back to this moment. It's a neat trick to engage the reader, and it works. 

On the whole I found the book informative - to my shame I didn't know a great deal about de Montfort before reading this - but it is also something of a hagiography, as inevitably it must be given its stated aims. Simon is shown as a great revolutionary driven by his cause, standing up for the common people, wronged by his king, and in the end by his confederates. That his own arrogance, selective morality, manipulative tactics and dubious methods of obtaining funds contributed to his demise is largely overlooked. 

The book is engagingly written, nicely weighted and well paced, but if a man's qualities are to be as lauded as much they are here, for his faults to be glossed over so consistently eventually generates a kind of low level rumble of resentment in the reader. When the book was done, it was that sense of discontent that stayed with me.

I'd give it 3.5 out of 5. It's a good read-on-the-plane kind of book, and has motivated me to look more into gaming the period, as well.

The second short review I have is for a 2018 documentary on Netflix called Being Napoleon. The Netflix blurb is for a quirky, offbeat piece, and I can't really improve on that as a description. It follows the fortunes of various oddball characters as they build up to a reenactment on the 200th anniversary of Waterloo. There is the occasional lurch towards mockumentary, but it always manages to remain on the right side of that line.

It ended up an affecting watch, with the emotional heart of the film turning out to be not quite where you would have expected it to be.

4.5 out of 5 for me. If you have Netflix and haven't seen it already, I would suggest giving it a look.

Recent reading (short reviews)

The Kindle has been getting an ancients workout recently and as some of the books may be of interest to wargamers I thought I'd post a few brief thoughts.

Julius Caesar: the Colossus of Rome. Richard A. Billows (2009)

This was an enjoyable read on Gaius Julius and the disintegration of the Republic. Billows is a Caesar apologist, and he places a large part of the blame for the Republic's demise on the unwillingness of the senatorial class to initiate necessary reforms, on their inability to compromise, and on their refusal to make accommodation for Caesar and his talents. Wherever you stand on that, it is a magnificently tragic story, and it is well told here.

There is a good analysis in the Bryn Mawr Classical Review which I would refer readers to, and will quote the conclusion:

"Light" reading for lovers of ancient history, Billows's biography of Caesar is appropriate to a general audience wanting detail but lacking a basic knowledge of the subject. It may even prove of use to those desperately seeking to put lecture-notes into order at the last minute. Stylistically a pleasure to read and crammed full of details, it has something to offer these categories of readers. However, it was never intended nor should be misconstrued as a serious contribution to scholarship on the subject. The work of Gelzer endures.

I mostly agree with the reviewer, but do think it's better than just 'light' reading. I found the book not only accessible but also informative and satisfyingly complete in the treatment of the theme. It covered a lot of ground and approached the subject from an interesting angle. I would recommend it.

Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic. Tom Holland (2003)

This was a nice contrast to the Billows book. Holland is far less sympathetic to Caesar, and reading one book after the other reinforced the complexity of the issues and provided a first-class example of how the same evidence can be used to support quite different conclusions.

A review by Richard Miles can be found here in the Guardian, and, as before, I will quote the conclusion:

Holland, a non-specialist, has produced a broad-ranging, accessible synthesis of the period. The fact that Holland is not an academic is a positive strength: it has allowed him to look at his subject with a fresh and engaging eye.

Though it is not a work of amazing original research, Rubicon passes the crucial "so what?" test. Next time someone asks me why they should study Roman history, Rubicon will be one of the first books that I shall direct them to.

There's something about Holland that keeps me wary as a reader. I'm not quite sure what it is. A hint of smugness? An overly smooth surety in his interpretations? I can't put my finger on it exactly, but a sixth sense was in operation throughout  and I felt myself not fully trusting his use of evidence or his conclusions. Worth reading, but I wouldn't be cajoled into thinking it's definitive.

Dynasty: the Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar. Tom Holland (2015)

Dynasty follows on from Rubicon to look at the Julio-Claudian emperors, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. He offers considered, in-depth portraits, and while the well-known flaws are discussed, he examines the circumstances of each ruler's life, times and mode of accession in an effort to put these flaws into context.

The New York Times review concentrates on it being an engaging yarn:

Mr. Holland may not write with Mr. Hughes’s [Robert Hughes, art critic and author of Rome: A Cultural, Visual, and Personal History - Prufrock] breadth of cultural references or literary flair, but he does a compelling job of conjuring ancient Rome and its often monstrous rulers, and providing us with an understanding of its complicated class dynamics and animating mythology. He leaves us with insights into the reach and sweep of its empire and an appreciation of how precarious life was for slaves and freemen and soldiers. And for the ruling class, too, caught up in “the great game of dynastic advancement” that was played out with conspiracies, secret alliances and mortality dispensed in an infinitude of ways — by poison, exile, starvation, false accusations and arranged accidents.

The Guardian's take was rather less favourable and in places a little unfair, allowing current politics to intrude and devolving into a somewhat uncharitable [mis]reading of the author's approach.

The original Dynasty was a show for the era of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, which fed into a tangle of emotions about 1980s capitalism: viewers were required to feel a mixture of envy, horror, fascination and admiration for beautiful Joan Collins, her wicked ways and her much-emulated fashions. Holland’s book, likewise, invites us to put ourselves into the sandals of Nero and Caligula, and assumes that, if we let ourselves off the hook with a dash of sarcasm, we will want to do so – as if signing up to be their apprentices. Depressingly enough, this is ancient Rome for the age of Donald Trump.

Holland does not in fact invite us to identify with the characters, but does attempt to consider why they were portrayed as they were and the factors that may have led to monstrous behaviour. Again, worth reading, but my reservations about Holland apply here, too.

Augustus: the Life of Rome's First Emperor. Anthony Everitt (2006)

This book I read first, so although I am a little hazier in my recall of it than I am with the others, I found it to be a sound, thoughtfully put together account of the life and career of Caesar Augustus. Augustus is of course a complex, contradictory, almost unknowable character, but undeniably great. Everitt leads us to see this greatness without skipping over the contradictions, and does a fine job of telling the story(ies) of Augustus's rise to power and how he went about consolidating it.

It's a strong book, but best read with an understanding of what had gone before (the Gracchi, Marius, Sulla, Pompey, Caesar, especially) still fresh in the mind, so that the genius of Augustus's approach - and considerations of its necessity or otherwise - can be fully appreciated.

There is a trashy review in the Independent:

After finally defeating Mark Antony at Actium, Augustus ruled the Roman world for the next 40-odd years. Everitt tells his story well by telling it carefully, with due regard for sources and resisting the unlicensed speculation that has characterised screen representations from I, Claudius onwards. The same caution, however, inhibits a sense of perspective. Had Everitt looked ahead, he would have seen how quickly Rome unravelled post-Augustus. It was the Flavian emperors, from Trajan to Marcus Aurelius, who did more for a still embryonic Europe, never mind the West.

And a better one in the Guardian:

In everything from his moral reforms to his manipulative patronage, the father of the empire proved himself a master of psychology. It is the mark of this exemplary biography that Everitt does likewise, and does so with increasing confidence as political control begins to slip from the ageing Augustus and his vulnerabilities are revealed.

In my view Everitt's book was probably the pick of the bunch, but in saying that, as these were read on the Kindle, I didn't have the luxury of flicking back to review earlier events, to check consistency of approach, or any of the other little things that make reading a paper non-fiction book a more in-depth reading experience.

Anyway, all of these books had their good points, I would be happy to have them on my shelves in paper form, and I'll likely revisit them all at some stage.

Bad Book Reviews: 'The Last Templar'

The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury is the worst book I've read in the last five years. It is so bad that after a certain point it became a matter of honour to see it through to the end, just so I could say I'd done it.

(Image from wikipedia)

Fiercely independent, stunningly beautiful female archaeologist? Check. Brave, principled law-enforcement type who needs to learn to love again? Check. Villains who work (or used to work) for various respected institutions and will do anything to find / hide a world-changing occult secret? Check. Scenes in which the aforementioned must [briefly] put aside their differences to work together? Check. A plot line that combines The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail-esque imagi-history with soap opera sexual tension and hoping-for-Hollywood cliffhanger scenes? Check.

The book is a triumph of box ticking.

On top of this there is a subplot featuring our last Templar of the title: a 13th Century knight who has escaped the fall of Acre and been entrusted to safeguard the SECRET OF THE TEMPLARS.

Whatever could the secret be?

While Micheal of Carmaux's story (for that is his name) undoubtedly serves authorial purpose on word count alone, it also allows the author to provide background information and construct parallels between the ancient and modern action that attempt to disguise the plot's reliance on coincidence. His adventures also provide opportunities for TV-rights sword fights and allow the author to signpost the deeper conclusions which readers should be coming to for a second time, just to be sure.

The writing itself is thick, and not only with hidden meaning. Here is an example:

The next few days drifted by in a daze. Tess would spend time with Reilly in the morning before going out for long walks, returning by lunchtime. Late in the afternoon, she would venture out again, usually up to the castle ruins from where she would watch the sun melt into the shimmering Aegean waters. She loved that part of her day the most. Sitting there in quiet reflection with the scent of sage and chamomile wafting down from the hillside, she found the idyllic setting among rocks somewhat reassuring, a bit of respite from the small bundle in her room that was preying on her mind at all times. 

If you didn't desire respite from any small bundle that was preying on your mind before, you certainly do after fifty pages of this!

Still, on the positive side, if you are looking for a book that sits proudly within the great tradition of crap books featuring Templars, you can't go wrong with this one.

Or if you are not looking, you could always read it as a penance!

Book review: Matterhorn, a Vietnam War novel

Amongst a stack of books I recently got for the Kindle was Matterhorn, by Karl Marlantes. Vietnam is not one of those wars that I tend to read about - mainly because it's still in many ways raw - but as this was a novel I thought I would give it a shot and see what it was like.

I finished the book last night, and have to say that I was impressed. Marlantes may not be a literary master, but there are moments when you might almost think he was. Some of the passages display lovely lyrical qualities, and the hard-won wisdom that underpins his descriptions and observations gives the novel authenticity, power and a relevance that can evoke unexpectedly emotional responses.

Some of the characters and scenes verge upon the stereotypical, but the sense that the author has known these people, seen these places and lived these experiences prevents any slip into terminal cliche.

Themes the book touches upon include innocence lost, the nature of friendship, race relations and the psychology of war.  The relationship I developed with the protagonist was complex, and the author immerses the reader in the blood, dirt and drink of Vietnam so thoroughly that we can begin to understand some of the damage that the ordinary man must do to himself to participate in warfare, and what things will enable him to accept the cost to self.

I have not gone into any plot details here, but if you are interested in a fictionalized account of  a young man coping with his experiences as a Marine lieutenant in Vietnam, you could do worse than read this book.

Book Review - Scipio Africanus: Greater Than Napoleon

(Image taken from Amazon.com)

Basil Liddell Hart, the somewhat controversial British military theorist, published this biography of Scipio Africanus in 1926.  In it he narrates and celebrates Scipio's many achievements and, as the subtitle "Greater than Napoleon" intimates, argues that the Roman deserves a place in the foremost rank of the great generals of history.

"Scipio's battles are richer in stratagems and ruses - many still feasible to-day - than those of any other commander in history", he writes.  Study of Scipio's campaigns, he continues, is still relevant, "because the moral objective was the aim of all his plans, whether political, strategical or tactical".

As the above quotations are taken from the preface, it can be seen that Liddell Hart states his position early, and from it he does not budge.

The book covers the whole of Scipio's career, from his heroic intervention at the Ticinus through to his retirement from public life.  The author makes frequent use of anecdotes from Livy and Polybius - often quoting long sections verbatim - to tell the story of Scipio's rise.  All of the battles and campaigns are covered in some depth, as are his motivations, so far as they are known.  His actions, exploits and stratagems are explained, interpreted, analysed - and in some cases rehabilitated - in a engaging manner.

One of the interesting things about Liddell Hart's treatment of his subject is that it is not composed in isolation. Scipio's career is portrayed not just as an example of great generalship but also as an illustration of twin themes: that heroic failure is more celebrated that unleavened success, and that successful prosecution of war requires a keen understanding of the relationship between mental, physical and moral elements.

These are themes to which he returns elsewhere.

But if we put aside our reservations about didacticism, the narrative is clear and interesting.  Aided by helpful geographical and battle maps, the wargamer is able to clearly envisage the events described, and I found it gave me a better understanding of the events, particularly those in Spain, than I received from either Lazenby or Goldsworthy.  As mentioned before, he uses a lot of direct quotation from Livy and Polybius, so a more learned (or more cynical) man than me might say "you may as well just read the original texts"; but as an interested amateur I appreciated the way in which he weaves his own commentary into the narrative, giving a good sense of the strategic significance of the events described and providing a welcome overview of the course each campaign took.

I found the book complements other sources on the era, and as long as the author's biases and didactic purpose is taken into account it provides a useful and readable account of Scipio's career.  While a lot is made of Scipio's character, there is enough focus on the military exploits to give the wargamer plenty of material to work with.

In short, if you are interested in the man and the era and can find a cheap copy I would recommend it, but I do caution against taking Liddell Hart's conclusions wholly at their face value.

Basil Liddell Hart online: 

The Strategy of Indirect Approach

Why Don't We Learn From History?