Let's Read: "Clodia of Rome: Champion of the Republic"

Let's read "Clodia of Rome: Champion of the Republic," by Douglas Boin. (Powell's, Amazon, Audiobook)

The two main reasons I've selected this book are that, first, Boin's book on Alaric the Goth was a huge success in the book club a few years ago. Boin flipped the narrative on the Goths to discuss the late Roman Empire context in a fun and illuminating way. I strongly suspect he has done the same here, except this time he uses the figure of Clodia, "the forgotten power broker," to illuminate the creaking pillars of the late Roman Republic. Which takes me to the second reason: This interview with Boin on Tides of History was excellent and convinced me the book would work well for the club.

Here's the book description:

A thrilling new history of the late Roman Republic, told through one woman’s quest for justice.

One of Rome’s most powerful women, Clodia has been maligned over two thousand years as a promiscuous, husband-murdering harlot―thanks to her starring role in one of Cicero’s most famous speeches in the Forum. But Cicero was lying, in defense of his own property and interests. Like so many women libeled or erased from history, Clodia had a life that was much more interesting, complex, and nuanced than the corrupted version passed down through generations

Drawing on neglected sources and deep, empathetic study of Roman lives, classicist Douglas Boin reconstructs Clodia’s eventful passage through her politically divided and tumultuous times, from her privileged childhood to her picking up a family baton of egalitarian activism. A widow and single mother, Clodia had a charisma and power that rivaled her male contemporaries and struck fear into the heart of Rome’s political elite. That is, until a sensational murder trial, rife with corruption and told here in riveting detail, brought about her fall from grace. For generations of women who came after her―including a young Cleopatra, who might have met a disgraced Clodia when she first came to Rome―Clodia’s story would loom as a cautionary tale about the hostilities women would face when they challenged the world of men.

Freed from the caricature that Cicero painted of her, Clodia serves as a reminder of countless women whose stories have been erased from the historical record. In a Rome whose citizens were engaged in heated debates on imperialism, immigration, and enfranchisement, amidst rising anxieties about women’s role in society, Clodia was an icon―one worth remembering today.