Do we long for the past to be a familiar place – or a strange and baffling one? A. and A. bring the classical close enough to touch in this book, balancing a wide-ranging overview of Greek and Roman culture and society with a forceful argument for the contemporary world's debt to the ancient. It is written avowedly for ‘the general reader’ (p. x) – and from the strongly-held belief that while ‘history languishes as a subject in schools’ (p. x), it is the duty of scholars to make a pugnacious case for their subject. ‘The ancient Greeks and Romans’, A. and A. declare, ‘were the parents of the world we live in today’ (p. x). The book fuses past and present together – insisting that ancients and moderns ‘would probably feel quite at home’ (p. 6) in one another's company. This work, then, raises an interesting question: just how should we argue for the relevance of the classics, and engage the non-specialist? Is the approach taken here the most fruitful one?
At its best, this volume is a wonder-cabinet of ancient curiosities. Successive chapters provide an overview of politics, daily life, travel, entertainment and religion in ancient Greece and Rome – relating ancient practices to contemporary (American) ones wherever possible. Where these connections are strained, or strange or surprising, the narrative often fascinates. Descriptions of dubious ‘giant's bones’ and miniature souvenir models of the Pyramids sold to ancient tourists (p. 120) are rich delights – not to mention the juxtaposition of modern parades with one of Ptolemy II's processions in Alexandria, which featured ‘a 180-foot-long, gold-plated phallus with a giant ribbon and bow tied around it’ (p. 205). A comparison of ancient and modern debauchery is sliced through with a reference to ‘officials called oinoptai, or “wine-watchers,” [who] ensured that everyone drank the same’ (p. 9) amount. When A. and A. disrupt preconceptions about the ancient world, and challenge the reader's understanding of it, they are on promising ground: few of their intended audience, I suspect, would have guessed that ‘game-boards and gaming-tables’ (p. 106) had been found in the House of the Vestal Virgins. When it is allowed to be sly and a little shameless, this narrative flies along.
In the fourth chapter on politics and government, and the sixth chapter on religion, the book most truly finds its voice. Here, the dialogue between the ancient and contemporary worlds – which is the driving force of A. and A.'s work – is at its sharpest and most sophisticated, allowing space for the provoking point of similarity and the provoking point of difference. The details steal the show: ghost stories are told with relish (p. 233) – and many will grin at the image of a Roman lawyer coming to court with an armful of props and ‘swords encrusted with blood’ (p. 284). Most importantly, the otherness of the ancient world does not slip out of focus in these chapters: we are reminded, for instance, that a ‘ritual role of music that we no longer require was to drown out the ill-omened noises made by animals being sacrificed’ (p. 262).
This is a book where every idea is in search of an answering echo in another age. A. and A.'s determination to find those echoes is at times the book's undoing. They are driven by the desire to show that there is ‘nothing new’ (p. 94) under the sun – insisting that antiquity ‘seems surprisingly contemporary’ (p. 65), that an ancient book is ‘as relevant today as when it was written’ (p. 150). Too many chapters end with an almost-identical conclusion: ‘many of the ways in which these fundamental items shape our lives have their origins in the world of antiquity’ (p. 42). Past and present are often pressed uncomfortably close together: by pairing Glenn Close with Medea (p. 296), do we really gain an enriched understanding of either? Even though it is not written for an academic audience, I would question this book's determination to fuse the ancient and contemporary worlds so neatly – not only does it go against the grain of much current scholarship, it also leads to a flattening of the narrative, a loss of richness and nuance.
As things stand, A. and A.'s tone is often programmatic: ‘Why bother telling you all this? Actually for a very good reason’ (p. 131). ‘Can you guess what these two famous Roman buildings are?’ (p. 167). Extended lists (pp. 40, 279, 326) break up the narrative flow – and A. and A. return to the Latin and Greek roots of English words (p. 50) somewhat too regularly. General readers might struggle with references to the ‘Tuscan order’ (p. 168) and ‘vegetal crowns’ (p. 99), as well as some of the more convoluted passages: ‘One might think of the orders as a combination of ornamental style and modules of dimensions that can be combined and arranged in different ways’ (p. 190). There is not enough snap and brio to carry one through the volume.
‘We in the United States’ (p. 146) form the clear audience for A. and A.: the ‘shadow of antiquity’ is not traced back across the Atlantic. At their best A. and A. are passionate and engaging communicators – and I wished that they had cast their net for readers more widely and ambitiously. Here, the implied reader must nod at the reference to ‘a fancy Italian restaurant’ (p. 2) or ‘Rachmaninoff's “Rhapsody on a Theme from Paganini”’ (p. 302) – and will not feel alienated by the narrative's roots in prosperous trans-Atlantic life: ‘the next time you find yourself patronizing the steam room and the juice bar or socializing at a gym; or the next time you walk on a bathroom floor equipped with radiant heat’ (p. 107). The past is recollected in comfort, here: the classical is a soothing presence. Are we not to be challenged by the past? If not, what kind of link between ourselves and the ancient world is left?
‘You can't escape the past’ (p. 321), A. and A. insist in their conclusion. I thought at once of Gatsby. F. Scott Fitzgerald's American Trimalchio was equally sure that recollection was easy: ‘“Can't repeat the past?” he cried incredulously. “Why of course you can!”’ Catching the past securely is a more difficult business than this book admits: we may not be able to escape it, but it can escape us. Past and present meet with almost unnerving serenity, here. This volume's forthright celebration of the triumph of the classics – of another and still ‘another timeless piece of wisdom’ (p. 46) from antiquity – is also its missed opportunity. In spite of its beauties and delights, it is ultimately a work of rather too-laboured love.
