Winterson
tells the story of Heracles: his godly father Zeus, his mortal mother
Alcmene, the wrath of Zeus’s wife Hera, the divinely provoked insanity
that causes Hercules to kill his wife and children, and the twelve
impossible tasks he must do in order to atone for the murder of his
family.
As the eleventh
of his impossible tasks, Heracles must travel to the end of the world
to steal the Apples of the Hesperides from a fruit tree belonging to
his enemy Hera. He arrives to find that the apples are guarded by
Ladon, a hundred-headed snake, and he enlists the help of Atlas, a
Titan, who has been commissioned with the task of shouldering the
world.
Though the story
is a timeless one, Winterson gives it a modern and psychological
bent. In their quest for the Apples of the Hesperides, Heracles
and Atlas come to reconsider paths that their lives have taken:
“Why are we doing this, mate?”
“Doing what?”
“You’re holding up
the Kosmos and I’m spending twelve years clobbering snakes and thieving
fruit. The only good time was chasing Hippolyte, Queen of the
Amazons, and she didn’t want anything to do with me when I caught
her…”
“What happened to Hippolyte?”
“I killed her of course”
“I knew her once”
“Sorry mate.”
There was a
pause. Atlas was silent. Heracles drank another skinful of
wine. He didn’t want to think. Thinking was like a
hornet. It was outside his head buzzing at him.
“What I mean to say, Atlas, is why?”
“There is no why,” said Atlas.
“That’s just the trouble,” said Heracles.
“There is a why, here, or here, or here,” and he started hitting the
side of his head, trying to squash the droning thought.
Atlas said –
“Bent under the world like this, I hear all the
business of men, and the more I hear them questioning their lot, the
more I know how futile it is. I hear them plan for tomorrow and
die during the night. I hear a woman groaning in labor and her
child is stilborn. I hear the terror of the captured man, and
suddenly he is set free. I hear a merchant traveling home fromt
he coast with his goods, and robbers set upon him and take all he
has. There is no why. There is only the will of the gods and a man’s fate.
“I’m the strongest man in the world,” said Heracles.
“Except for me,” said Atlas.
“And I’m not free….”
“There is no such thing as freedom,” said Atlas. “Freedom is a country that does not exist.”
“It’s home,” said Heracles. “If home is where you want to be.”
Winterson’s
version of the Atlas and Heracles story is chock-full of such witty and
probing passages. Her mythological superheroes find ways to
liberate both mind and body from the tasks that life has presented
them. In this way, the story becomes a modern one, full of
questions about why we do the things we do.
Italian food has
never been so sophisticated and so simple as it is when presented by
Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers, owners of London’s esteemed River
Cafe. This is the fifth “River Cafe” cookbook - the series
has a cult-like following - and if you haven’t used these cookbooks
yet, once you do you’ll probably want to own them all.
Italian Easy is gloriously
illustrated and beautifully designed. Just paging through the book will
leave your mouth watering. Gray and Rogers have made an industry
of cooking fresh ingredients in uncomplicated ways that bring out their
finest, richest tastes. If you live in a place where you can get
high quality, seasonal, fresh fruits and vegetables as well as fresh
fish and good meat, then the River Cafe recipes will help you make
those things taste even better than they already do.
Other cookbooks in the River Cafe series have recipes that are a bit more complicated than those in Italian Easy.
But the simple preparations leave out nothing in flavor, and they mean
that you’ll have more time to to sit around the table with family and
friends because you’ll spend less time in the kitchen.
Buy River Cafe Easy From Powell’s
by centuries of grime and soot, Michelangelo’s paintings in the Sistine
Chapel were cleaned in a painstaking process that began in the 1979 and
lasted thirteen years - three times longer than it took Michelangleo to
paint the ceiling.
This
50-minute video documents the laborious cleaning process that brought
Michelangelo’s frescoes back to their original glory. If you’ve
ever been curious about the process of restoration - its complications
and complexities - than Return to Glory is for you. It
provides a close-up look at the processes that were used by art
conservators as they sponge-bathed each and every massive figure on the
Sistine Ceiling. And it documents exciting discoveries made in
the process. Splendidly colored figures formerly hidden by layers
of dirt and grime emerge before your eyes.
Likewise,
if it’s Michelangelo’s amazing capacity to render the human body that
interests you, than this is a documentary film that you won’t want to
miss. You can’t get this close to the Sistine Ceiling in a visit
to the Vatican Museums, and you can’t begin to see the details that
this video highlights - including a figure that bears Michelangelo’s
hand print!
Return to Glory is
currently out of print, but you’ll find copies in many public and
university libraries. And, with a careful search, you’ll discover
that there are some used copies floating around the internet.
Nippon Television Network Corporation, 1996. Distributed by CCC of America, Inc.
Here’s a brand new book
that aims to give us the inside view on Michelangelo and his quest for
artistic perfection - but this is not a book about the Sistine Chapel
ceiling or the Pieta. Rather this book details Michelangelo’s
quests for perfect blocks of marble in the quarries of Carrara in
Northern Italy. Author Eric Scigliano presents a vivid picture of
Michelangelo’s escapades and ordeals in the quarries that produced the
marble from which the artist carved every single statue that he ever
created.
Michelangelo’s repeated
trips to Cararra - some lasting as long as eight months - gave him
intimate knowledge of its mountain of marble. He spent his time
there choosing the perfect blocks of statuario - marble fit for carving statuary - and supervising their quarrying and their transport to distant locales like Florence and Rome.
In writing this book,
Scigliano shows his reader just how difficult and complex the task of
quarrying marble was in the Renaissance, and he also demonstrates
the extraordinary effort needed to produce the perfect block of
marble.
Fortunately this book
is not just about the quarries. It also covers the subject of
Michelangelo’s scultpural work, with chapters discussing some of the
artist’s greatest hits, like the David and the Pieta. Equally
spellbinding are Scigliano’s descriptions of the enormous social
and political challenges Michelangelo faced throughout his career, and
his often troubled relationships with popes, princes, and poets.
Order Michelangelo’s Mountain from Powell’s
Free Press, 2005. ISBN 0743254775
If you are trying to
find a book that will grab the imagination of your 8, 9, 10 or 11 year
old, then the Roman Mystery Series is your answer.
The Thieves of Ostia,
by Caroline Lawrence, is the first book her still-growing series, Roman
Mysteries. The story takes place in Ostia, ancient Rome’s port
(and a place you can still visit today), where Flavia Gemina, daughter
of a sea captain; her neighbor, Jonathan; Lupus, a young beggar; and
Nubia, an African slave solve the mystery of a slain dog.
The book is fast-paced
with lots of action and adventure: Flavia and her companions are
chased by a pack of wild dogs, they narrowly escape malicious slave
traders, and they discover that their chief suspect has committed
suicide by jumping from a lighthouse. It’s enough to keep any
young reader turning the pages.
But the book also gives
a great overview of daily life in an ancient Roman city with its
descriptions of architecture, politics, religion, slave trading, and
economics. And, it’s the perfect book to give a young traveler
headed to Rome or one who’s already been to the Eterna.
Even better, if you’re travelling to Rome with grade-school age
children in tow, read them the book and then plan a trip to Ostia
Antica - it’s easy to get to by public transportation - so they can see
just where Flavia Gemina and her friends lived.
Order The Thieves of Ostia from Powell’s
Though at
first glance this book seems as if it would provide history and
analysis of Rome’s great emperor, Hadrian, that’s not the case at
all. Rather, Danny Danzinger and Nicholas Purcell have teamed up
to produce a book that provides a broad overview of the Roman Empire in
the second century AD, under the rule of Hadrian.
Though Hadrian himself does receive a significant amount of attention in the book, the authors of Hadrian’s Empire
most often use aspects of Hadrian’s life as stepping-off points for the
exploration of broader themes. Thus, there are chapters that
cover topics such as the workings of the Roman city, the administration
of the Roman Empire, the military, politics, religion, social life,
attitudes towards sex, people’s lodgings, food, clothing, class
differences, women’s roles in society.
If you’re
the kind of person who spends your time in the Roman Forum wishing you
knew more about how Romans lived, worked, and played, then this
book will satisfy some of your longings for it will leave you
with a much-expanded idea of what life was like in the ancient
Roman world.
Order Hadrian’s Empire from Powell’s
Hodder & Stoughton Ltd , 2005. ISBN 0340833602
By now, Ross King’s blockbuster book, Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling,
is well known to many lovers of art and Rome-antics. But,
just in case you’ve missed it, we want to remind you that it’s out
there and that it’s well worth your time. It provides an
excellent and enjoyable overview of the immense task undertaken by
Michelangelo when he was commissioned to paint the Sistine Chapel
ceiling by Pope Julius II.
It wasn’t
Michelangelo’s first encounter with the formidable pontiff.
Julius II had already asked Michelangelo to create a colossal tomb for
him, then cancelled the project, an act that angered Michelangelo and
made him swear never again to work for Julius. It was a promise
that couldn’t be kept, however, for in 1508 Julius summoned
Michelangelo to Rome and set him on the task of painting the Sistine
Ceiling.
As King
points out, Michelangelo was perhaps not the most logical choice for
this project. His experience as a painter was limited, yet he was
to produce a masterpiece that still attracts enormous
crowds almost 500 years after its completion. The process by
which the ceiling came into being is the subject of King’s book, but
it’s hardly a straight forward art history.
Rather, Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling
should be considered to be a history of the Papal Court and its
artists, for King aims to give his reader a complete picture of
the social context in which Michelangelo worked. As a
result, we learn much about the relationship between Michelangelo and
the Pope; about the interactions between Michelangelo and the other
superstar artists, like Raphael, working for Julius II; about the
techniques and processes used by Michelangelo to paint the ceiling; and
about the complex relationship that Michelangelo maintained with his
family in Florence.
Order Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling from Powell’s
Penguin, 2003. ISBN 0142003697
In the year 1999, the movie Gladiator
reminded millions of people just how spectacular a place Rome’s
Colosseum is. It had been decades since the last swords and
sandals flick, but Russell Crowe, in the role of a fictional
gladiator, Maximus, dramatically won our hearts.
Yet, one
wonders. Did it really happen that way? Did the movie
provide an accurate portrayal of the gladiatorial games? And was
its computer-generated rendition of the Colosseum worth the time (and
money) it took to produce it? Now you can judge for
yourself.
Classical
scholars Keith Hopkins and Mary Beard have just published a
pocket-sized history of the Colosseum and the spectacles it
hosted. This is a book that shouldn’t be missed by anyone who has
found themselves standing in the Colosseum and trying to imagine what
it was like to attend the gladiatorial games. Nor should the
book be overlooked by those who have shivered with horror when thinking
of the carnage and violence that took place in the largest amphitheater
in the Roman world.
Beard and
Hopkins write for a general audience and their book addresses many
aspects of the gladiatorial games and the Colosseum itself. They
have chapters that examine the staging of the games, the building of
the Colosseum, the careers of gladiators, the social rituals of which
the gladiatorial games were a part, and the uncanny attraction that
generations of travelers have had to this monument.
Far from
dry, this book is an enjoyable and quick read - the perfect length for
the plane ride to Rome. “We who are about to die, salute this
lovely little book!”
Order The Colosseum from Powell’s
Harvard University Press, 2005. ISBN 0674018958
Enjoying HBO’s new Rome series? Then you’ll want to read Steven Saylor’s books too.
Many of
us find it easier to get a handle on complex historical eras by
approaching them first through fiction and later tackling the labyrinth
of historical facts. If that’s your preferred approach, then
Steven Saylor’s Rome Sub Rosa series is made to order.
Saylor’s
mystery novels are set in the 1C BC and they star Gordianus the Finder
as a Roman “detective” with a nose for truth and an uncanny ability to
find himself in unusual predicaments. Roman Blood, the
first of the ten books in the series, throws Gordianus into cahoots
with the young Cicero and takes the reader deep into the political,
legal and family arenas of ancient Rome. Rome’s hottest new
lawyer, Cicero, is faced with defending a wealthy farmer accused of
killing his father. Cicero hires Gordianus to discover what
really happened and Saylor gives a lively rendition of Sextus’s trial
including Cicero’s defense speech.
Gordianus’s
work on the case will win him acclaim and through the course of
Saylor’s next nine books, his status in life will rise as he moves from
a middle class house on the Esquiline Hill to a noble abode on the
Palatine. His adventures will become ever-more exciting too - in
subsequent books Gordianus interacts with Rome’s major movers and
shakers, including Pompey the Great and Caesar.
Order Roman Blood from Powell’s
St Martin’s Press, 2000. ISBN 0312972962
Anthony Majanlahti’s book, The Families Who Made Rome: A History and a Guide
is simultaneously a social history of Rome’s most noble families and a
guidebook that allows you to see Rome in a whole new way. If
you’ve ever wandered from Palazzo Barberini to Piazza Colonna or from
the Villa Borghese to the Palazzo Medici and wondered who built all
these grand palaces, piazzas, and gardens, then this book is for you!
The book
begins with an introduction to the “Broken City,” the Rome created by
the long Middle Ages, when power struggles and financial woes took
their toll on the city that had once been the capital of the Roman
Empire. From there, Majanlahti sets out to show us how the
magnificent Rome we experience today came into being and he places much
of the responsibility for the rejuvination of the city in the hands of
its most noble residents - families such as the Colonna, the Della
Rovere, the Farnese, the Borghese, and the Barberini.
The book
is divided into chapters that focus on the architectural and artistic
achievements of a particular family. These chapters make great
reading for the arm-chair traveler, but also serve as an interesting
guide for visitors to Rome.
Order The Families Who Made Rome from Powell’s
Chatto and Windus, 2005. ISBN 0701176873
Jake Morrissey’s book, The Genius in the Design, reveals the intense rivalry between two maestri,
Gianlorenzo Bernini and his contemporary Francesco Borromini. The
two artists were born only a year apart and both achieved success in
the art world of seventeenth-century Rome. Though today, Bernini
is the perhaps the better-known artist, it would be safe to say that
both Bernini and Borromini should be credited with the invention and
elaboration of the Roman Baroque style.
Bernini,
the savvy courtier, curried the favor of five popes, while the
melancholy Borromini, won only the dedication and patronage of two
pontiffs. Early in their careers, Borromini and Bernini worked
together for a short period of time, however they quickly went their
separate ways and developed two entirely different means of expressing
similar Baroque ideas.
This
book - which blends a social history of Baroque Rome
with the biographies of Bernini and Borromini - explores the
circumstances that brought these artists into a head-to-head
competition that transformed Rome into one of the most beautiful cities
in Europe, but ultimately ended when Borromini took his own life.
William Morrow, 2005. ISBN 0060525339
Everyone at the IDC is talking about Caroline Murphy’s book, The Pope’s Daughter: The Extraordinary Life of Felice Della Rovere.
The book
chronicles the life of Felice, daugher of Pope Julius II who reigned
from 1503-1513. Felice began her life as the illegitimate
daughter of Pope-to-be Giuliano della Rovere and a Roman noblewoman,
Lucrezia Normanni, in 1483. When Felice was 20 years old, her
father was elected to the Papal throne and became Rome’s most powerful
Renaissance Pope and an exemplary patron of art. In his
decade-long reign, he hired Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel
Ceiling, asked Rapahel to paint his private apartments in the Vatican
Palace, and commissioned Bramante to design the new St. Peter’s
Basilica.
Julius was a formidable man, known for his terribilita, and
his daughter Felice inherited much of his political-savvy and
determination. Her Papal father married her to a Roman
noble of the Orsini family, insuring her an aristocratic standing in
Roman society, and she used her status to better her own position
in the world and that of her father. As Pope, her
father regularly called upon her to negotiate diplomatic
agreements about issues that could not properly receive
direct Papal attention. And concern with her family
legacy led Felice to build a financial empire of her own,
making her among the richest and most powerful women on the Italian
peninsula.
Not
suprisingly, Felice moved in the privileged circles of Italian
society, and her biography is a star-studded one, showcasing her
interactions with such individuals as Michelangelo, Isabella d’Este,
Lucrezia Borgia, and Catherine de Medici.
Besides
giving a fascinating account of the life of Felice della Rovere,
Murphy’s book demonstrates the extreme creativity of the period in
which she lived. Surrounded by humanistic invention of every type
- artistic, literary, philosophical, and scientific - Felice took the
task of self-fashioning to new heights, gaining levels of power
and freedom that were extraordinary for a Renaissance woman.
Order The Pope’s Daughter from Powell’s
Oxford University Press, 2005, ISBN 0195182685