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Robert Graves' classic I, Claudius is a masterpiece of historical fiction about the stuttering, lame unlikely emperor Claudius ending just as he mounts the imperial throne (one must read Claudius the God and His Wife Messalina for the rest - high on my TBR now). It is a mesmerizing text detailing the reigns of Augustus, Tiberius and Caligula with all the accompanying betrayals, violence and sexual exploits that you would expect from a particularly gruesome early episode in the Game of Thrones. Well, the sexual exploits are mostly hinted at without gory details, but the rest is, well, rather violent to say the least.

There are moments of humor too. The debate between Livy and Pollio about their various approaches to history with Claudius in the middle was memorable. With his typically cutting wit, Claudius sums up the two approaches: "It's not disillusion, sir. I see now, though I hadn't considered it 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 irreconciliable." (p. 122). In this book, Graves follows Claudius' leaning towards Pollio's view because the morals of all the protagonists are certainly not something that would compel any sane person to truth.

This same Pollio, before passing away, gave Claudius the best advice he ever received: "Then exagerrate your limp, stammer deliberately, sham sickness frequently, let your wits wander, jerk your head and twich with your hands on all public or semi-public occasions. If you could see as much as I see, you would know that this was your only hope of safety and eventual glory." (p. 125). Fortunately for him, Claudius does take this advice to heart.

Graves seems to speak though his protagonist as he reacts to various pronouncements that occur in the book, but doubtless also during his lifetime in early 20th C Britain: "To recommend a monarchy on account of the prosperity it gives to the provinces seems to me like something that a man should have liberty to treat his children as slaves, if at the same time he treats his slaves with reasonable consideration." (p. 163).

In another example of dark humor, when Drusillus is murdered, he is found with a pear shoved down his throat in a lame attempt to excuse the assassination as an accident. "It is clear that Livia, not having been consulted about the marriage of one of her great-grandchildren, had arranged for the child to be strangled and the pear crammed down his throat afterwards. As was the custom for in such cases, the pear tree was charged with murder and sentenced to be uprooted and burned." (p. 294). This may sound particularly awful, but there are worse fates awaiting children under Caligula's reign.

As for historical fiction, this one rates for me nearly as high as Youcenar's Mémoires d'Hadrien which for me is the most beautiful evocation of a Roman emperor's inner life. In this book, it takes about 75 pages to build a head of steam and then it runs us right over the cliff over and over again with the evil characters of Livia and Caligula in particular, the manipulation of Augustus and Tiberius, and the foreshortened fates of literally dozens of family members and thousands of Roman citizens. A must read. And, if I may, the insanity of Caligula and his particular communication and governing style bears comparison to that of the orange menace at 1600 Penn Ave at the moment...