Book description
In 44 bc, Julius Caesar was murdered on the Ides of March. His
mistress, Cleopatra of Egypt, fled back to Alexandria with their
little son. Mark Antony, Caesar's friend and henchman, who, according
to some accounts, was already besotted by the beautiful Cleopatra,
took up her son's case before the Senate. But they refused to
recognize him as one of Caesar's heirs.
Civil war broke out, and after the defeat of Caesar's murderers,
Antony took control over the East. Summoned to his headquarters in
present-day Turkey, Cleopatra made her entry at dusk on a scented,
candlelit barge: and so began one of the greatest love stories of all
time - an eleven-year love affair that created the ancient world's
most famous celebrity couple. The affair became all-consuming and
fired the lovers with the ambition to create a new order. Had they
succeeded, our world today might have been very different.
Filled with murder, intrigue, civil war and great battles, the
tragedy of Cleopatra and Antony has fascinated the world for two
millennia, and has been depicted by everyone from Chaucer and
Shakespeare to Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor in the iconic 1960s film.
Now Diana Preston has gone back to the original sources and delved
into the real history behind the propaganda and the myth, to breathe
new life into this epic love story.
Diana Preston
is an Oxford-trained historian, writer, and broadcaster who lives in
London. Her most recent books are
Wilful Murder: The Sinking of the Lusitania
(now a major BBC1 film),
A Pirate of Exquisite Mind,
Before the Fall-Out
(chosen for the Samuel Johnson Prize longlist) and
A Teardrop on the
Cheek of Time
. She writes with her husband
Michael Preston
, an historian and traveller.
