The Education of Julius Caesar: a Biography, a Reconstruction

A biography of the Roman leader examines how events shaped his attitudes and character and how he influenced Roman history

Julius Caesar expressed the will of his age and brought off his grandiose plans because, writes Kahn, he saw society as a thing in motion. A man of unbending will and inexhaustible energy, he possessed wide-ranging curiosity; his eloquence and wit charmed even his enemies. Although a dictator, Caesar refused to hunt "subversives" and rejected terror as a political weapon, according to this magisterial 608-page biography. Kahn, a former classics professor, clearly admires the ruler whom he sees as "the greatest personality" of the Roman era. Twelve years in preparation, the study welds ancient and modern sources, using semifictionalized techniques to bring the past to life: "Caesar was at an age to banter with girls and grin at prostitutes ogling him from windows and doorways," the author writes at one point. Readers who can accept this technique will find Kahn's meticulously researched biography absorbing, and convincing in its re-creation of the social and political turmoil of the late Republic.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Kahn's aim is "to explore the interaction between Caesar and his times" with a "scope of imagination" that warrants the style of "fictionalized biography." Unfortunately, he falls short of these praiseworthy goals. His biography remains academic, despite the intrusion of novelistic techniques. Although his culling of the ancient sources is impressive, if not always critical, and his reliance upon direct quotation gratifying, Kahn is limited in his creation of character, scene, and drama, and in his interpretative insights, both historical and psychological. This will satisfy neither the scholar nor the historical novel reader. Robert J. Lenardon, Classics Dept., SUNY at Albany
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.