Last week, we had a look at City of Libertines, a novel by W.G. Hardy about the infamous Clodia Metelli. This week, we'll be continuing the Clodia-love with its companion novel, Turn Back the River, where our favorite Medea of the Palatine is involved with delinquint upstart Lucius Sergius Catalina. Personal theory: they're only making out to give Cicero an aneurysm. And with the length of the average Ciceronian sentence, who can really blame them?
(Cicero dear, I kid. I really do appreciate all the wonderful primary source material you've left us on life in the Late Republic. I promise! Though, would it have killed you to shut up once in a while?)
Of course, I had to go with Joanne's word that this was a book about Clodia and Cataline, because, well, I'll let the cover speak for me.
(As always, click the cover to enlarge it.)So is it just me, or does Cataline look almost exactly like Catullus on the cover of the other W.G. Hardy book? Either Clodia reeeeeeally has a type, or Rome has been invaded by an army of Robert Taylors created in some freak cloning accident on the set of Quo Vadis. I'm going with the latter, as Hollywood's insidious power to influence our views of antiquity runs deep. Now that I've said this, the henchmen of movie execs will probably show up at my apartment and arrange for my disappearance. Don't fight over my posessions too much.
But back to the cover. Cataline looks entirely too calm, like he's getting ready to slice up some zuchinni for kabobs, and not like he's stabbing the heck out of the senatorial classes. I'm not sure why he's got his cape wrapped around his arm like an extra sleeve, but it looks pretty dorky. Nothing quite compares to Clodia's little number, however, which looks like it's been awkwardly Frankensteined together out of dresses that never looked good on anyone. I mean, for one thing, it's fitted, which is ridiculously unRoman, and... is that a sailor collar? Seriously? It's a good thing "Sailor Clodia" doesn't scan to the name of a certain Japanese superheroine, or I'd be making up a song that reveals entirely too much about the cartoons I watched in my tween years.
Clodia and Cataline aside, I find myself endlessly cracked up by the guys crawling away from them. They don't look like they're moving particularly fast, so you'd think Cataline would have been able to off them by now. Also--look at Yellow, in the background. Is he armless? Is he wearing a sleeve and a loincloth, instead of a perfectly acceptable tunic? Is he using Blue's leg as his arm in some bizarre limb-sharing program? You decide!
As a final note, those white marble temples need some paint, statim. Actually, this is one of my big Classicist pet peeves, and I would like artists, historical fiction writers, and set designers to take note: PAINT YOUR DAMN TEMPLES AND STATUES. IT'S ACCURATE.
Thank you.
Next, not to invoke a dreadful double meaning or anything, but oh hey, a back!
Yes, that is Clodia in a halter dress entertaining Robert Taylor Clone #46. At least someone wised up to the fact that the Romans wore color and decided to make it a blue halter dress. I still can't figure out why Cataline would want to hang around the house in armor, but maybe he finds it appropriate for sulking.
I've got to admit--as old-school book blurbs go, this one isn't bad. At least they avoid using the word "lust." I appreciate the fact that Clodia gets to be intelligent, though I'm also noting that it's "passionate" and "patrician" that get repeated. I suppose my biggest quibble is the implication that Rome "drifted" towards the dictatorship of Julius Caesar. I think "drifting" is only the correct word there if what we mean is drifting away on an ice flow which is slowly melting as it heads south, completely trapped, with a dozen other people who used to be your best friends, but they're now all pissed off because they think you seduced their wives/daughters/sons and you're all in debt and there's not enough food to go around.
Oh. And they have all have daggers.
Kai su, mon teknon?
