by Duane W. Roller / The end of the Roman Republic has inspired a lot of good recent biographies, but did we really need another scholarly life of Cleopatra after Joyce Tyldesley's Cleopatra: Last Queen of Egypt (2008)? Surprisingly, the answer is yes. While Tyldesley probed deeply into Ptolemy family history and iconography, classicist Roller (Greek & Latin, emeritus, Ohio St. Univ.) focuses on Cleopatra (69-30 B.C.E.) as a ruthless and learned queen in a time when female rulers were practically unknown. The first of the Ptolemys to speak Egyptian (the family was Greek in origin), Cleopatra used her many languages to help her achieve her goals of holding on to her throne and restoring to Egypt territory lost by her ancestors. Her shrewd liaisons and childbearing with Julius Caesar and Marcus Antonius supported her on her throne for 20 years as Roman dominance of the Mediterranean world grew. But there were limits to what a proud queen would do to survive. "I will not be led in triumph," she told her conqueror Augustus Caesar. Then she killed herself. VERDICT Cleopatra reclaims her stature as a significant monarch of her era in this unsentimental corrective to the romantic legend. Recommended for all who study her era. --Library Journal.
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