Customer Reviews

Boy Caesar

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At the start of the book, Reed basically admits that he is trying to do in fiction what Derek Jarman did in film: make anachronistic works about historical men known to have same-sex sexual relationships, or be what we would call gay today. I can deal with Jarman: independent film has to cut corners and period pieces usually have large budgets. Here, however, it doesn't work. There are authors that do an amazing job of bringing the past to live, think "Beloved" or "Memoirs of a Geisha." Reed fails at his task of re-vivifying this controversial Roman emperor.

Much of what modern people know about Heliogabalus is lies, made by homophobes across the centuries. However, Reed tries to portray Heliogabalus as a cruisy, promiscuous, cottaging, flamboyant, size-queeny gay man and it just does not go far enough. What we do know about Heliogabalus is that he may have represented more than that.

I am not quite sure why Heliogabalus is portrayed as a gender-typical gay man, rather than a transvestite or transsexual. The historic record suggests that he wanted a sex change and to be castrated. He proclaimed his lover his husband, but in this book, he and Hierocles are barely more than casual sex partners. His manservant was a green-eyed Ethiopian, but the author never tells us how that happened. Most Ethiopians are Black, with black hair and dark brown eyes like my own (an African American).

The historical story and the modern tale just don't match up. Just like all the interludes in James Earl Hardy's second book, Reed's modern, added story suggests that his historical story is just admittedly too thin. It is clear that the modern Masako represents Heliogabalus' many wives and touches upon why gay men would become emotionally involved with women. However, who is Slut supposed to be? How is Hierocles like the boyfriend that the main character leaves? In this book, a dissertation adviser tells a character, "You can use fiction to recreate Heliogabalus' life, but not psychology." Now how many history Ph.D.s would suggest something like that!?

This book is filled with anachronisms. In ancient Rome, words are used like "modems," "venture capital," and "spermatozoa" (humans didn't know that existed until the invention of the microscope. Reed goes ever further to suggest that Ancient Romans faced AIDS and amy nitrate. This wasn't creative; it just seemed like the author wasn't doing his homework.

This book is short and the pages could fly by. However, it took me FOREVER to read it. It is just not that good. I still wish I knew more about the real Heliogabalus.

I am a voracious reader of anything, fiction or non, about Heliogabalus, aka Elagabalus, aka Varius Avitus Bassianus, aka Marcus Aurelius Antoninus. The facts surrounding his life are beyond fascinating and are easily moldable to the fictional novel format. Of course, given the historical record, it's often hard to determine exactly what the 'facts' are, and so it might be said that much of what has been written about this openly gay teenage ruler of the most powerful empire of the ancient world is exactly that, fiction.

Before reading Boy Caesar, by Reed, I read Child of the Sun, a 1960's pulp novel from Kyle Onstott and Lance Horner, as well as Alfred Duggan's 1960 hardcover, Family Favorites. Where Family Favorites sticks mostly to the sensationalized versions from the historical record, told in a matter-of-fact style, Child of the Sun goes to the opposite extreme and takes viscious liberties to make Varius seem as odd as humanly possible. The endings of neither are written well. Family Favorites has a staid ending, barely told. Child of the Sun has a very imaginative ending....

The other significant work of fiction you might want to read is Heliogabalus, or the Crowned Anarchist, by Antonin Artaud which has been translated into English. The book is thin, and so is the story. It's barely a novel, and seems more to be the dictation of a near lunatic. The actual story of the emperor comprises little of the book. More is written of his relatives, his beginnings and Artaud's metaphysical nonsense than the life or motives of the title character.

Finally, that brings me to Jeremy Reed's Boy Caesar. I would love to give it 5 stars, but I can't. The last chapter ruined it. The whole thing is profound, moving, easily readable. The reader is drawn in by the beautifully poetic writing style of Mr Reed, and the story flows wonderfully from the very beginning to just before the end. I wish it was a bit heftier, though. The story needs more story! It is only just over 200 pages, and even though Elagablus had a short life, those 200+ pages are divided between him and a story-within-a-story of a modern gay character in London. When the two plotlines merge after much buildup, it is weak. This is the only reason it doesn't deserve 5 stars. I loved the book, but the last bit of it fell flat and left me dissappointed.

If you like reading about Elegabalus, or simply want to read a fascinating story of a gay youth who ruled the world from Rome, buy Boy Caesar. It is worth it.

If you can't tolerate lame endings, don't read the last chapter.