That said, it is too heavy on the scandal, too light on the politics, and McCullough weights the scale in favor of the scandal by making her Caesar an impossible man to beat or block. Caesar was an incredibly brilliant man, a political animal who achieved great military feats--but McCullough makes light of his faults by portraying his enemies as buffoons or fools, or worse. Cato the Younger was a bad politician, a drunkard, and a bigot; yet he was also one of the late Republic's great Stoics. Likewise, Cicero, albeit timid and insecure, was a great orator and a master of legal rhetorical technique; McCullough makes him a figure of ridicule all through the book. No matter what the challenge, Caesar comes through looking like a hero (or at least with the last word). And the scene with Lucullus is cringe-inducing--even though it was probably the reaction McCullough was hoping for in readers, it left me feeling as if I'd seen a bad bit of overacting.
Still . . . the book is titled "Caesar's Women," and the women are something to enjoy. Although McCullough likes to remind her audience of the patriarchal nature of Roman society (as if it could be forgotten!), still one fact remains: a Roman woman was not someone to be ignored. Be she widow, crone, Vestal, whore or lawful wife, her society and her culture acknowledged her existence, no matter how bounded it was by custom and morality. And although the surviving histories focus on the men, Roman women had great influence on their families, particularly their sons and daughters, and that influence contributed to the ideals of the Republic.
A grand example is Servilia, the wife of Decius Junius Silanus, mother of the young Brutus--a cruel, hateful, beautiful woman who falls utterly under Caesar's thumb. Of course the attraction is instant, but to call this a romance would be a misnomer. Servilia is in love; Caesar is simply in lust, and too perceptive of Servilia's true character to lose his heart to her. The relationship is so well portrayed, it makes up for the casting of Caesar as the Superman of the Republic.
At this stage of her life, Servilia is wed to a man she cordially despises, and is the mother of daughters she ignores and a son she browbeats into submission. Poor Brutus is so dominated by his mother that the few forms of rebellion he commits usually come back to bite him--avoiding an active lifestyle, for one, including his military training. Yet Servilia is also a force to be reckoned with, something Caesar keeps in mind as he avoids her attempts to strengthen their sexual intimacy into something more.
Caesar's favorite activity of cuckolding his political enemies is continued here. The victims are many, with the grandest display of outrage belonging to Cato. And McCullough does weaken his image as a flawless charmer in depicting his marriage to Pompeia Sulla. A "beautiful idiot," Pompeia is described as silly, dull, materialistic, tasteless--in short, almost every shortcoming ever ascribed to a woman except physical ugliness. Caesar's contempt is almost instant; his treatment of her, completely restricting her comings and goings, is tyrannical--but who enforces it all? His mother, Aurelia.
Perhaps the best female character McCullough has created is Aurelia, Caesar's mother, and she is phenomenal. Whenever Aurelia enters the scene, she captures attention. Her actions at the Bona Dea feast, with Clodius Pulcher, will make your hair stand on end. But McCullough aged her "portrait," just as she did Sulla's in "Fortune's Favorites"--and I doubt anyone could detest it as much as I do.
A close runner-up for best female character is Fulvia, Pulcher's wife. A screaming, uninhibited force of nature, Fulvia doesn't do much in "Caesar's Women," but when she's around it's impossible to ignore her. As for the most charming, that would be Julia, Caesar's daughter. A wise, sweet child, hardly precious or overweening (anyone remember the author's portrayal of young Cicero?), Julia is a heart-stealer from the first moment she appears. But for mousiest female, Calpurnia (Caesar's third wife) would take the prize. And for most unpleasant . . . Servilia would win the laurels. The poster child for the havoc a loveless childhood can wreak, Servilia darkens the scene whenever she appears--but it's impossible not to snicker and enjoy the mayhem that ensues when she does.
I've avoided going into detail about the book to keep from spoiling it for other readers. I will recommend it--it's a fine portrayal of the end of the Roman Republic, and it does a beautiful job of portraying Roman women in all their power, strength, and personality.
