Mark Antony: His Life and Times

by Alan Roberts

This biography of Mark Antony is a factual account, not only of his life but also of the times in which he lived. The five turbulent decades from 80 BC to 30 BC saw the slow but violent death of the centuries-old Republic, the expansion of Roman power and dominion under Julius Caesar, and finally the birth of the Empire.

The leading part which circumstances thrust on Antony is usually treated from the standpoint of others, in biographies of Caesar and Octavian Augustus for example, and often in stereo-typed and conventional terms, so that he is seen largely through Shakespearian eyes in association with Cleopatra.

The aim of this book is to show Antony as a central figure and in the context of his own time, to portray the man as he was and as he appeared to his friends, and enemies, and to analyse the events that shaped him and which he sought to shape. A generous and impulsive nature coupled with a brash, flamboyant arrogance and a quality of personal magnetism made Antony a man whom soldiers would follow and women would love, whose common touch and impatience with conventions in peers would distrust, but whom no man or woman would ignore.

438 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 1988