Book review: Imperium by Robert Harris

The twentieth book I read in 2016 was Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome by Robert Harris.  This is the first in a historical fiction trilogy based on the career of Cicero.  As such, it's set during the same time period as Steven Saylor's Gordianus the Finder series, and it's interesting seeing the same historical personages interpreted in some very different ways.  Rufus is much more of a party boy in Harris's novel, and Cicero's family barely rates a mention in Saylor's books, though both authors can agree in their dislike for Crassus.

The scopes of the series, of course, are entirely different.  Saylor presents Cicero as an occasional employer/nemesis in a series of gritty urban detective novels, while Harris focuses on Cicero as the main character in a political thriller.  The first half of Imperium is a gripping courtroom drama, as Cicero takes on the wealthy and the well-connected in a trial which will either make or break his career; the second half shifts into a political story of favors, negotiations, and schemes as Cicero tries to win election to the office of consul in the face of opposition he stirred up in the trial which brought him fame.

Harris's Cicero flirts with being a hero but inevitably enters into compromises that undermine his appeal to the reader.  Even when he is doing the noble thing, one must constantly remind himself that he's doing it for his own political advancement.  He begins the book by prosecuting a corrupt governor who looted and oppressed the people of his province and becomes a hero to the Roman people, but later he defends a governor little less corrupt to advance his career.  It is not surprising that Saylor's Gordianus finds his Cicero self-serving and without principles, though Harris is more sympathetic toward the difficulties Cicero faced and the deals he had to strike to climb the ladder of power as a "new man" with no pre-existing connection to the powerful and jealous Roman aristocracy.