Spartacus

by Theresa Urbainczyk

For many today Spartacus is Kirk Douglas. The influence of Kubrick's film has been enormous, but Spartacus was famous before 1960. For hundreds of years he has been a byword for resistance, revolution and the fight for freedom. He has given his name to a revolutionary party in Germany and a political group in the USA; he is the subject of several novels and films, and even a ballet. Though only a slave, he is as famous as Julius Caesar. Not much information, and much of it negative, survives about him from the ancient world, yet his reputation has survived this character assassination and he is still famous as a popular hero two thousand years after his death. Theresa Urbainczyk explores the man and the myth in this fascinating short treatment of an icon of revolution.

Genres: Nonfiction, History

144 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2004

About the author

Dr. Theresa Evelynne Urbainczyk is Associate Professor in the School of Classics, University College Dublin. She has published two books on church historians, Socrates of Constantinople (1997) and Theodoret of Cyrrhus (2002), both with the University of Michigan Press and two on slave revolts, Spartacus (Duckworths, 2004), and Slave Revolts in Antiquity (Acumen, University of California Press 2008). Currently she is in the preliminary stages of research on the twelfth-thirteenth century Byzantine historian, Niketas Choniates. She teaches on a wide range of subjects, all aspects of Greek and Roman history, Greek and Latin language and literature. Her favourite course was on ancient history on film but has only had the opportunity to teach that once.

Reviews

[Babette Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

Questo saggio sulla figura di Spartaco, famoso gladiatore che guidò la più nota ribellione di schiavi contro l’Impero Romano, analizza sia la storia che l’iconografia del personaggio, nata in epoca moderna, comprese tutte le interpretazioni, letterarie e cinematografiche, che ne sono derivate. La nota più interessante è l’approfondimento su come sia stato possibile che un personaggio storico che terminò la sua vita da sconfitto, sia stato trasformato nel simbolo di tutti gli oppressi che si ribellano agli oppressori. Spartaco è stato un perdente, commise errori inspiegabili e la rivolta che guidò non fu certo l’unica, eppure è divenuto un’icona di eroismo e audacia, una figura intramontabile.
(Fernanda Romani per il Blog di Babette Brown)