Williams's use of polyphony — we don't hear from Augustus himself until the valedictory final chapter — makes this a more interesting and engaging portrait than Memoirs of Hadrian which I read recently. We hear from the top dog's inner retinue — Agrippa, Maecenas, the ambiguous Livia — and from his enemies, as well from the literary stars of the day including Vergil, Horace, and (too briefly for me) Ovid, and more peripheral characters like his childhood nurse. Anthony and Cleopatra get plenty of screentime. We get senatorial decrees and edicts and lots of "burn upon reading" letters from one intriguer to another. It's hot stuff actually and smartly put together. The Augustus here is as ruthless and calculating as I'd imagined him to be, but ends up waxing somewhat more philosophical, as he looks back on it all, than I'd have expected of such an accomplished dictator. Still, I think it's a reasonable depiction. But the star of the show is Julia, who despite her long sufferings as a three-time political bride and "brood sow" comes out of it as a complex and strong personality.

Having recently read the poems of exile, I just wish Williams had and told us exactly what Ovid did to incur Caesar's wrath (Augustus does mention with heavy irony, a few days before his death, that he's about to pardon the reluctant bard of Tomis).