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Tuskegee in Philadelphia: Rising to the Challenge (American Heritage Ser.)
by Robert J KodoskyThe uplifting story of the African American Philadelphians who joined the prestigious WWII unit to serve as fighter pilots, nurses, mechanics, and more. At the outbreak of World War II, Philadelphians heeded the call, including the valiant airmen and women of Tuskegee. Although trained in Alabama, the prestigious unit comprised dozens of Philadelphia-area natives, second only to Chicago in the country. They served as fighter pilots, bombers, nurses, and mechanics, as well as in many other support roles. The African American service members had to overcome racism and sexism on the home front in order to serve with great distinction. Their battle for equality didn&’t end at the war&’s conclusion. Tuskegee alumni continued to serve their nation by working to secure civil rights and serve their community back home in Philadelphia. In this book, historian Robert Kodosky presents the trials and triumphs of Philadelphia&’s Tuskegee airmen and women. Includes photographs
The Tuskegee Strangler: The Nicest Serial Killer They Ever Met
by Linda Lou LongEvery serial killer is a “nice guy”—until he’s found out. The shocking, true account of a Southern charmer who left a trail of victims in his wake.Jerry Marcus fooled them all. He was “a nice guy,” always helped at home, did well in school, an athlete, and always employed. When things went wrong, he was the first to help clean up the mess. He was the last person anyone suspected of being a serial killer.After Marcus was caught and sentenced to life in prison in the late ’70s, author Linda Lou Long spent years corresponding with him. The Tuskegee Strangler gives an inside look into the workings of a man who is not your typical serial killer.
Tutankhamen: The Life and Death of the Boy-King
by Christine El MahdyWhen Tutankhamen's tomb was discovered in 1922, even the most experienced archaeologists joined the international community in marveling at the incredible wealth--and seemingly bizarre rituals--of ancient Egypt. What kind of society could produce such spectacular treasures only to bury them forever?Lost in a frenzy of speculation--anthropological, scientific, and commercial--was Tutankhamen himself. Thirty-five hundred years ago, the mightiest empire on Earth crowned a boy as its king, then worshipped him as a god. Nine years later, he was dead. Despite the young monarch's almost universal recognition in death, Egyptologists know very little about his life. Traditional histories, founded on incomplete investigation and academic dogma, shed almost no light on the details of a life as complicated and as fascinating as it was short.In Tutankhamen: The Life and Death of the Boy-King, Christine El Mahdy finally delivers a coherent portrait of King Tut's life and its historical significance. Based on stunning tomb records, lost since their discovery, this revolutionary biography begins to answer one of the twentieth century's most compelling archaeological mysteries: Who was Tutankhamen?
Tutankhamen: The Search for an Egyptian King
by Joyce TyldesleyThe discovery of King Tutankhamen's tomb in 1922 was perhaps the world's most important archaeological find. The only near-intact royal tomb to be preserved in the Valley of the Kings, it has supplied an astonishing wealth of artifacts, spurred a global fascination with ancient Egypt, and inspired folklore that continues to evolve today. Despite the tomb's prominence, however, precious little has been revealed about Tutankhamen himself. In Tutankhamen, acclaimed Egyptologist Joyce Tyldesley unshrouds the enigmatic king. She explores his life and legacy as never before, and offers a compelling new window onto the world in which he lived. Tutankhamen ascended to the throne at approximately eight years of age and ruled for only ten years. Although his reign was brief and many of his accomplishments are now lost to us, it is clear that he was an important and influential king ruling in challenging times. His greatest achievement was to reverse a slew of radical and unpopular theological reforms instituted by his father and return Egypt to the traditional pantheon of gods. A meticulous examination of the evidence preserved both within his tomb and outside it allows Tyldesley to investigate Tutankhamen's family history and to explore the origins of the pervasive legends surrounding Tutankhamen's tomb. These legends include Tutankhamen's "curse"--an enduring myth that reaffirms the appeal of ancient magic in our modern world A remarkably vivid portrait of this fascinating and often misunderstood ruler, Tutankhamen sheds new light on the young king and the astonishing archeological discovery that earned him an eternal place in popular imagination.
Tutankhamón y su tumba
by José Miguel ParraJosé Miguel Parra redescubre en este texto el misterio de la arqueología más importante hasta la fecha: la tumba de Tutankhamón. Hace 100 años, el arqueólogo Howard Carter descubría en el Valle de los Reyes la tumba KV62, perteneciente a Tutankhamón. Era un hallazgo insólito, pues había permanecido totalmente intacta durante más de tres milenios. Si ahora escuchamos el nombre de Tutankhamón, lo más probable es que nuestra mente lo asocie de forma inmediata a las pirámides de Egipto y a los faraones. Incluso quizás alguien lo asocie con Indiana Jones. Pero, más allá del mito, ¿hasta qué punto conocemos su historia? José Miguel Parra, eminente historiador especializado en el Reino Antiguo, presenta en este texto todas las claves para comprender la figura de uno de los faraones más importantes de todos los siglos. En él podremos conocer las luchas internas de las dinastías por la sucesión al trono, la representación artística de los líderes del antiguo Egipto o la drástica evolución del culto religioso. Y, por supuesto, una de las partes más emocionantes de este texto: el misterio (aún sin resolver) que engloba la prematura muerte del faraón. Tutankhamón y su tumba es un texto ágil e iniciático que invita a disipar todas las dudas alrededor del descubrimiento arqueológico más importante de la historia.
The Tutor
by Andrea ChapinA bold and captivating novel about love, passion, and ambition that imagines the muse of William Shakespeare and the tumultuous year they spend together. The year is 1590, and Queen Elizabeth's Spanish Armada victory has done nothing to quell her brutal persecution of the English Catholics. Katharine de L'Isle is living at Lufanwal Hall, the manor of her uncle, Sir Edward. Taught by her cherished uncle to read when a child, Katharine is now a thirty-one-year-old widow. She has resigned herself to a life of reading and keeping company with her cousins and their children. But all that changes when the family's priest, who had been performing Catholic services in secret, is found murdered. Faced with threats of imprisonment and death, Sir Edward is forced to flee the country, leaving Katharine adrift in a household rife with turmoil. At this time of unrest, a new schoolmaster arrives from Stratford, a man named William Shakespeare. Coarse, quick-witted, and brazenly flirtatious, Shakespeare swiftly disrupts what fragile peace there is left at Lufanwal. Katharine is at first appalled by the boldness of this new tutor, but when she learns he is a poet, and one of talent, things between them begin to shift, and soon Katharine finds herself drawn into Shakespeare's verse, and his life, in ways that will change her forever. Inventive and absorbing, The Tutor is a masterful work of historical fiction, casting Shakespeare in a light we've never seen.From the Hardcover edition.
Tutti chiamano mio padre padre
by Tim 'Dr. Hope' AndersQuesto libro è basato sulla vera storia d'amore della vita dei genitori dell'autore. Sua madre era una talentuosa attrice e produttrice di Brodway e suo padre era un prete cattolico. Una storia complicata e piena di emozioni.
Tutu: Authorized
by Allister Sparks Mpho TutuCommemorating Desmond Tutu's eightieth birthday, this stirring biography commemorates the life, philosophy, faith, and achievements of one of the greatest moral heroes of our time. Written by Allister Sparks, Tutu: Authorized featuring contributions from His Holiness the Dalai Lama, President Barack Obama, and Nelson Mandela, as well as interviews given by Reverend Mpho Tutu, Desmond Tutu’s daughter, to world leaders and public figures including Hillary Clinton, Kofi Annan, Jimmy Carter, Bono, Richard Branson, and F.W. de Klerk. A stirring exploration and graphically rich presentation of one of the world’s most inspirational and altruistic figures, Tutu: Authorized overflows with illuminating revelations about Tutu’s life and resonates with insights into how we can each work to improve peace, fairness, and happiness in the world around us.
Tuxedo Park: A Wall Street Tycoon and the Secret Palace of Science That Changed the Course of World War II (Biography Ser.)
by Jennet ConantA New York Times bestseller! The untold story of the eccentric Wall Street tycoon and the circle of scientific geniuses who helped build the atomic bomb and defeat the Nazis—changing the course of history.Legendary financier, philanthropist, and society figure Alfred Lee Loomis gathered the most visionary scientific minds of the twentieth century—Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg, Niels Bohr, Enrico Fermi, and others—at his state-of-the-art laboratory in Tuxedo Park, New York, in the late 1930s. He established a top-secret defense laboratory at MIT and personally bankrolled pioneering research into new, high-powered radar detection systems that helped defeat the German Air Force and U-boats. With Ernest Lawrence, the Nobel Prize–winning physicist, he pushed Franklin Delano Roosevelt to fund research in nuclear fission, which led to the development of the atomic bomb. Jennet Conant, the granddaughter of James Bryant Conant, one of the leading scientific advisers of World War II, enjoyed unprecedented access to Loomis’ papers, as well as to people intimately involved in his life and work. She pierces through Loomis’ obsessive secrecy and illuminates his role in assuring the Allied victory.
Tuzo: The Unlikely Revolutionary of Plate Tectonics
by Nick EylesTuzo is the never-before-told story of one of Canada’s most influential scientists and the discovery of plate tectonics, a pivotal development that forever altered how we think of our planet. In 1961, a Canadian geologist named John "Jock" Tuzo Wilson (1908–1993) jettisoned decades of strongly held opposition to theories of moving continents and embraced the idea that they drift across the surface of the Earth. Tuzo tells the fascinating life story of Tuzo Wilson, from his early forays as a teenaged geological assistant working on the remote Canadian Shield in the 1920s to his experiences as a civilian-soldier in the Second World War to his ultimate role as the venerated father of plate tectonics. Illuminating how science is done, this book blends Tuzo’s life story with the development of the theory of plate tectonics, showing along the way how scientific theories are debated, rejected, and accepted. Gorgeously illustrated, Tuzo will appeal to anyone interested in the natural world around them.
The TV Showrunner's Roadmap: 21 Navigational Tips for Screenwriters to Create and Sustain a Hit TV Series
by Neil LandauIf you've ever dreamed of being in charge of your own network, cable, or web series, 'The TV Showrunner's Roadmap' provides you with the tools for creating, writing, and managing your own hit show. Combining his 20+ years as a working screenwriter and UCLA professor, Neil Landau expertly guides you through 21 essential insights to the creation of a successful show, and takes you behind the scenes for exclusive and enlightening interviews with showrunners from some of TV's most lauded series.
Twain's Feast
by Andrew BeahrsOne young food writer's search for America's lost wild foods, from New Orleans croakers to Illinois Prairie hen, with Mark Twain as his guide. In the winter of 1879, Mark Twain paused during a tour of Europe to compose a fantasy menu of the American dishes he missed the most. He was desperately sick of European hotel cooking, and his menu, made up of some eighty regional specialties, was a true love letter to American food: Lake Trout, from Tahoe. Hot biscuits, Southern style. Canvasback-duck, from Baltimore. Black-bass, from the Mississippi. When food writer Andrew Beahrs first read Twain's menu in the classic work A Tramp Abroad, he noticed the dishes were regional in the truest sense of the word-drawn fresh from grasslands, woods, and waters in a time before railroads had dissolved the culinary lines between Hannibal, Missouri, and San Francisco. These dishes were all local, all wild, and all, Beahrs feared, had been lost in the shift to industrialized food. In Twain's Feast, Beahrs sets out to discover whether eight of these forgotten regional specialties can still be found on American tables, tracing Twain's footsteps as he goes. Twain's menu, it turns out, was also a memoir and a map. The dishes he yearned for were all connected to cherished moments in his life-from the New Orleans croakers he loved as a young man on the Mississippi to the maple syrup he savored in Connecticut, with his family, during his final, lonely years. Tracking Twain's foods leads Beahrs from the dwindling prairie of rural Illinois to a six-hundred-pound coon supper in Arkansas to the biggest native oyster reef in San Francisco Bay. He finds pockets of the country where Twain's favorite foods still exist or where intrepid farmers, fishermen, and conservationists are trying to bring them back. In Twain's Feast, he reminds us what we've lost as these wild foods have disappeared from our tables, and what we stand to gain from their return. Weaving together passages from Twain's famous works and Beahrs's own adventures, Twain's Feasttakes us on a journey into America's past, to a time when foods taken fresh from grasslands, woods, and waters were at the heart of American cooking.
Tweak: Growing Up on Methamphetamines
by Nic SheffNic Sheff was drunk for the first time at age eleven. In the years that followed, he would regularly smoke pot, do cocaine and Ecstasy, and develop addictions to crystal meth and heroin. Even so, he felt like he would always be able to quit and put his life together whenever he needed to. It took a violent relapse one summer in California to convince him otherwise. In a voice that is raw and honest, Nic spares no detail in telling us the compelling, heartbreaking, and true story of his relapse and the road to recovery. <p><p>As we watch Nic plunge the mental and physical depths of drug addiction, he paints a picture for us of a person at odds with his past, with his family, with his substances, and with himself. It's a harrowing portrait -- but not one without hope.
Tweak
by Nic SheffNic Sheff was drunk for the first time at age eleven. In the years that followed, he would regularly smoke pot, do cocaine and Ecstasy, and develop addictions to crystal meth and heroin. Even so, he felt like he would always be able to quit and put his life together whenever he needed to. It took a violent relapse one summer in California to convince him otherwise. In a voice that is raw and honest, Nic spares no detail in telling us the compelling, heartbreaking, and true story of his relapse and the road to recovery. As we watch Nic plunge the mental and physical depths of drug addiction, he paints a picture for us of a person at odds with his past, with his family, with his substances, and with himself. It's a harrowing portrait -- but not one without hope.
Tweaked: A Crystal Memoir
by Patrick Moore"There are moments when I suddenly realize that I'm a nice boy from Iowa who is entirely comfortable sitting in a room of freaks. " So begins Patrick Moore's unforgettable account of life as a crystal meth addict—a "tweaker. " Like a wild ride down Alice's rabbit hole with a guide who is darkly funny and heartbreakingly honest, Tweaked chronicles a twenty-year trip that stretches from Moore's lonely childhood in Iowa with his grandmother, Zelma—an alcoholic artist who, when loaded, turns frozen food into crafts projects —to the day he sits, naked, in a Los Angeles rental, hallucinating about psycho-robbers while talking to a possum he's sure is God. Along the way, there are acid trips at the V. F. W. , Dexetrim study halls with his Bad Girl Posse in the seventies, teeth-grinding nights of dancing and anonymous sex in New York City's hottest eighties clubs, taking pictures of Andy Warhol, losing friends and lovers, and navigating a Byzantine underworld of cookers, users, club kids, dealers, and colorful characters as intense as the drug itself. There is Lee, the glamorous, outr#65533; bad boy with a devastating wit and a taste for danger; Tony, the tweaker who likes to remove his eyebrows; Ding-Dong, the Depends-wearing, nearly blind housemate; Hisako, the artist and squatter with an impenetrable Japanese accent and a fondness for hot plate cooking; "Mother" Judy, the tough, butch rehab counselor who takes no prisoners, and countless others on the road from crystal meth hell to eventual sobriety. Candid, gripping, and ultimately triumphant, Tweaked is that rarest of memoirs—a tale so vivid and personal in the telling it feels like fiction, but every word is true.
Tweaked: A Crystal Memoir
by Patrick Moore"There are moments when I suddenly realize that I'm a nice boy from Iowa who is entirely comfortable sitting in a room of freaks. "So begins Patrick Moore's unforgettable account of life as a crystal meth addict—a "tweaker. " Like a wild ride down Alice's rabbit hole with a guide who is darkly funny and heartbreakingly honest, Tweaked chronicles a twenty-year trip that stretches from Moore's lonely childhood in Iowa with his grandmother, Zelma—an alcoholic artist who, when loaded, turns frozen food into crafts projects —to the day he sits, naked, in a Los Angeles rental, hallucinating about psycho-robbers while talking to a possum he's sure is God. Along the way, there are acid trips at the V. F. W. , Dexetrim study halls with his Bad Girl Posse in the seventies, teeth-grinding nights of dancing and anonymous sex in New York City's hottest eighties clubs, taking pictures of Andy Warhol, losing friends and lovers, and navigating a Byzantine underworld of cookers, users, club kids, dealers, and colorful characters as intense as the drug itself. There is Lee, the glamorous, outré bad boy with a devastating wit and a taste for danger; Tony, the tweaker who likes to remove his eyebrows; Ding-Dong, the Depends-wearing, nearly blind housemate; Hisako, the artist and squatter with an impenetrable Japanese accent and a fondness for hot plate cooking; "Mother" Judy, the tough, butch rehab counselor who takes no prisoners, and countless others on the road from crystal meth hell to eventual sobriety. Candid, gripping, and ultimately triumphant, Tweaked is that rarest of memoirs—a tale so vivid and personal in the telling it feels like fiction, but every word is true.
Tweaked
by Patrick Moore"There are moments when I suddenly realize that I'm a nice boy from Iowa who is entirely comfortable sitting in a room of freaks."So begins Patrick Moore's unforgettable account of life as a crystal meth addict--a "tweaker." Like a wild ride down Alice's rabbit hole with a guide who is darkly funny and heartbreakingly honest, Tweaked chronicles a twenty-year trip that stretches from Moore's lonely childhood in Iowa with his grandmother, Zelma--an alcoholic artist who, when loaded, turns frozen food into crafts projects --to the day he sits, naked, in a Los Angeles rental, hallucinating about psycho-robbers while talking to a possum he's sure is God. Along the way, there are acid trips at the V.F.W., Dexetrim study halls with his Bad Girl Posse in the seventies, teeth-grinding nights of dancing and anonymous sex in New York City's hottest eighties clubs, taking pictures of Andy Warhol, losing friends and lovers, and navigating a Byzantine underworld of cookers, users, club kids, dealers, and colorful characters as intense as the drug itself. There is Lee, the glamorous, outré bad boy with a devastating wit and a taste for danger; Tony, the tweaker who likes to remove his eyebrows; Ding-Dong, the Depends-wearing, nearly blind housemate; Hisako, the artist and squatter with an impenetrable Japanese accent and a fondness for hot plate cooking; "Mother" Judy, the tough, butch rehab counselor who takes no prisoners, and countless others on the road from crystal meth hell to eventual sobriety. Candid, gripping, and ultimately triumphant, Tweaked is that rarest of memoirs--a tale so vivid and personal in the telling it feels like fiction, but every word is true.
Twelve Against the Gods: The Story of Adventure
by William BolithoAn instant bestseller when first published in 1929—biographies of twelve bold individuals from history and what they did to separate themselves from the pack.In his trademark journalist style, author William Bolitho details the lives of twelve great adventurers—Alexander the Great, Casanova, Christopher Columbus, Mahomet, Lola Montez, Cagliostro (and Seraphina), Charles XII of Sweden, Napoleon I, Lucius Sergius Catiline, Napoleon III, Isadora Duncan, and Woodrow Wilson. Bolitho elucidates both the struggles and successes that made these figures so iconic, and demonstrates how they all battled convention and conformity to achieve enduring fame and notoriety.&“We are born adventurers,&” Bolitho writes, &“and the love of adventures never leaves us till we are very old; old, timid men, in whose interest it is that adventure should quite die out. This is why all the poets are on one side, and all the laws on the other; for laws are made by, and usually for, old men.&” Though his essays are nearly one hundred years old, they encompass the timeless values of perseverance, bravery, and strength of spirit that have proven to resonate with the pioneers and thought leaders of today.&“It&’s really quite good.&” —Elon Musk&“Twelve Against the Gods provides an interesting perspective on what drove and impeded this group of adventurers . . . A good read for anyone who&’s interested in history or looking to find some motivation to switch things up and break the rules.&” —Áine Cain, Business Insider&“I think Twelve Against the Gods is also very appropriate for this day and age. We need adventurers, and there still are a lot of adventurers.&” —China Ryall, daughter of William Bolitho
The Twelve Apostles: Michael Collins, the Squad, and Ireland's Fight for Freedom
by Tim Pat CooganIreland, 1919: When Sinn Féin proclaims Dáil Éireann the parliament of the independent Irish republic, London declares the new assembly to be illegal, and a vicious guerrilla war breaks out between republican and crown forces. Michael Collins, intelligence chief of the Irish Republican Army, creates an elite squad whose role is to assassinate British agents and undercover police. The so-called 'Twelve Apostles' will create violent mayhem, culminating in the events of 'Bloody Sunday' in November 1920. Bestselling historian Tim Pat Coogan not only tells the story of Collins' squad, he also examines the remarkable intelligence network of which it formed a part, and which helped to bring the British government to the negotiating table.
Twelve Babies on a Bike: Diary of a Pupil Midwife
by Dot May DunnA young midwife's account of her training in the Midlands in the 1950s. A SUNDAY TIMES bestseller.It's 1957, and in a shattered post-war world, life goes on. Dot, a pupil midwife, negotiates the streets on her trusty old bicycle - come rain or shine - to help women in need.Living and working under the supervision of the strict Mrs O'Reilly, she must complete her training with twelve deliveries: there's Mrs Wardle who lives in a seedy slum; the eighth Clarke baby, born in an unusual place; the superstitious Wests, desperate for a boy; baby Murphy who is received with laughter; and brothel-worker Mrs Maloney.Amid lectures, textbooks and university dances, Dot must saddle up at any time of the day and night to attend deliveries. But just when she thinks she's got the measure of the job, fate deals her an unexpected hand...
Twelve Babies on a Bike: Diary of a Pupil Midwife
by Dot May DunnA young midwife's account of her training in the Midlands in the 1950s. A SUNDAY TIMES bestseller.It's 1957, and in a shattered post-war world, life goes on. Dot, a pupil midwife, negotiates the streets on her trusty old bicycle - come rain or shine - to help women in need.Living and working under the supervision of the strict Mrs O'Reilly, she must complete her training with twelve deliveries: there's Mrs Wardle who lives in a seedy slum; the eighth Clarke baby, born in an unusual place; the superstitious Wests, desperate for a boy; baby Murphy who is received with laughter; and brothel-worker Mrs Maloney.Amid lectures, textbooks and university dances, Dot must saddle up at any time of the day and night to attend deliveries. But just when she thinks she's got the measure of the job, fate deals her an unexpected hand...
Twelve Babies on a Bike: Diary of a Pupil Midwife
by Dot May DunnIt's 1957, and in a shattered post-war world, life goes on. Dot, a pupil midwife, negotiates the streets on her trusty old bicycle - come rain or shine - to help women in need.Living and working under the supervision of the strict Mrs O'Reilly, she must complete her training with twelve deliveries: there's Mrs Wardle who lives in a seedy slum; the eighth Clarke baby, born in an unusual place; the superstitious Wests, desperate for a boy; baby Murphy who is received with laughter; and brothel-worker Mrs Maloney.Amid lectures, textbooks and university dances, Dot must saddle up at any time of the day and night to attend deliveries. But just when she thinks she's got the measure of the job, fate deals her an unexpected hand...Read by Sara Poyzer(p) 2010 Orion Publishing Group
The Twelve Caesars: The Dramatic Lives of the Emperors of Rome
by Matthew DennisonAn unforgettable depiction of the Roman empire at the height of its power and reach, and an elegantly sensational retelling of the lives and times of the twelve CaesarsOne of the them was a military genius, one murdered his mother and fiddled while Rome burned, another earned the nickname "sphincter artist". Six of their number were assassinated, two committed suicide—and five of them were elevated to the status of gods. They have come down to posterity as the "twelve Caesars"—Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, Titus, and Domitian. Under their rule, from 49 BC to AD 96, Rome was transformed from a republic to an empire, whose model of regal autocracy would survive in the West for more than a thousand years.Matthew Dennison offers a beautifully crafted sequence of colorful biographies of each emperor, triumphantly evoking the luxury, license, brutality, and sophistication of imperial Rome at its zenith. But as well as vividly recreating the lives, loves, and vices of this motley group of despots, psychopaths and perverts, he paints a portrait of an era of political and social revolution, of the bloody overthrow of a proud, five-hundred-year-old political system and its replacement by a dictatorship which, against all the odds, succeeded more convincingly than oligarchic democracy in governing a vast international landmass.
The Twelve Caesars
by Robert GravesThis ancient biographical history of Roman rulers from Julius Caesar to Domitian is translated by the acclaimed classicists and author of I, Claudius. As personal secretary to Emperor Hadrian, the second century scholar Suetonius had unlimited access to the Roman Imperial archives. Drawing on this wealth of source material, he wrote a sweeping account of the lives of Rome&’s first twelve emperors. From the empire&’s most accomplished leaders, such as Julius Caesar and Augustus, to its most depraved and doomed rulers, such as Caligula and Nero, this ancient biographical study presents an enlightening and colorful picture of these historical figures from remote antiquity. This edition of The Twelve Caesars is translated from the Latin by the renowned classicist, historian, and historical novelist Robert Graves. With his expertise in classical history and talent for telling a lively story, Graves presents an excellent translation that makes this classic work accessible to modern audiences
The Twelve Caesars
by Gaius Suetonius TranquillusAn essential primary source on Roman history, Suetonius' The Twelve Caesars is a fascinating achievement of scholarship covering a critical period in the Empire. This Penguin Classics edition is translated from the Latin by Robert Graves, author of I, Claudius, revised with an introduction and notes by James B. Rives. As private secretary to the Emperor Hadrian, the scholar Suetonius had access to the imperial archives and used them (along with eyewitness accounts) to produce one of the most colourful biographical works in history. The Twelve Caesars chronicles the public careers and private lives of the men who wielded absolute power over Rome, from the foundation of the empire under Julius Caesar and Augustus, to the decline into depravity and civil war under Nero and the recovery that came with his successors. A masterpiece of observation, anecdote and detailed physical description, The Twelve Caesars presents us with a gallery of vividly drawn - and all too human - individuals. James B. Rives has sensitively updated Robert Graves's now classic translation, reinstating Latin terms and updating vocabulary while retaining the liveliness of the original. This edition contains a new chronology, further reading, glossaries, maps, notes and an introduction discussing Suetonius' life and works. Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus was probably born in AD69 - the famous 'year of the four Emperors'. From the letters of Suetonius' close friend Pliny the Younger we learn that he practiced briefly at the bar, avoided political life, and became chief secretary to the Emperor Hadrian (AD117-38). Suetonius seems to have lived to a good age and probably died around the year AD140. If you enjoyed The Twelve Caesars, you might like Tacitus's The Annals of Imperial Rome, also available in Penguin Classics. 'Suetonius, in holding up a mirror to those Caesars of diverting legend, reflects not only them but ourselves: half-tempted creatures, whose great moral task is to hold in balance the angel and the monster within'Gore Vidal