An inspiring account of the uprising of the slaves against the Roman Empire in 73BC, led by the gladiator Spartacus. For Karl Marx, Spartacus was: "the most splendid fellow that all ancient history has to show; great general, noble character, real representative of the ancient proletariat".
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About the Author
Lewis Grassic Gibbon (aka James Leslie Mitchell) was a prolific writer of novels, short stories, essays, and science fiction, and his writing reflected his wide interest in religion, archaeology, history, politics, and science. The Mearns trilogy "A Scots Quair" is his most renowned work and has become a landmark in literature.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Immensely rich,
By ilmk "ilmk" (UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Spartacus (Paperback)
Lewis Grassic Gibbon (or James Leslie Mitchell) has written a novel of Spartacus that is as refreshing as it is clearly one of the forerunners of historical fiction. Opening through the eyes of the eunuch Kleon and his mission to find the heroic leader of the Slaves the novel centers more around Spartacus 'inner circle' and his relationship with Elpinice. Book I is told through Kleon and deals with the period up to the defeat after the Battle of the Lake. Books II and III with Spatracus' victories until we move towards the well-known and inexorable end on the Appian way at the hands of Marcus Licinius Crassus at the end of Book VI. The novel ends as it begins, with Kleon, and his crucifixionThe novel is well written, well-paced and pauses sufficiently to voice greater philospohical views than historical novels of the current generation. It is easy to see why this has been heralded as one of the great novels of its genre.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A flawed novel of striking narrative style,
By Anson Cassel Mills (Lake Santeetlah, NC) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Spartacus (Polyg9on Lewis Grassic Gibbon) (Paperback)
The strength of this novel is its strong prose style, a style that Ian Campbell has correctly described as "flexible and arresting." (xxvi) The novel's weakness is its limited characterization. For all its fine evocative passages, the characters are flat and fail to develop. Perhaps we can excuse former slaves for being emotionally stunted, but the reader may soon cease to care whether such people live or die.
And die they all do. This is a novel littered with corpses. Even though Mitchell, writing in the 1930s, could not have anticipated the sort of blood lust in which twenty-first-century Hollywood wallows, his numerous unpleasant deaths, coolly observed, are still multiple deaths from which the humanity has been drained. Finally, mention should be made of what Campbell calls Mitchell's "occasionally injudicious reliance on one effect." (xxix) Some characters have a leitmotif that follows them insistently (and sometimes irritatingly) through the story. The author also has a fascination with Latin, Greek, and obscure English words. Although the reader can usually deduce what the unknown word must mean, occasionally Mitchell goes overboard, as when he writes that "beyond the horreum itself, through a fence of osiers, the steadings of a farm loomed." (56)
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Amazing!,
This review is from: Spartacus: a novel (Paperback)
This novel is an amazing masterpiece of prose. I cannot praise this book enough! The opening scene is one of the most memorable and epic works of writing I have ever read.
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Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs):
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provincial praetor, slave legions, slave horde, great white stallion, slave host, slave army, curled beard Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Free Legions, Gershom ben Sanballat, Crassus the Lean, Gershom of Kadesh, Mount Papa, Thracian Gladiator, Battle of the Lake, Western Isle, Stone Way, Gnaeus Manlius, Cisalpine Gaul, Golden Age, The Pits of Death, Appian Way, New Republic, The Falling Star, Messine Straits, Pirates of Sicily, The Conqueror, Titul the Iberian, City of the Masters, Mount Garganus, Lex Servorum, Gallia Cisalpina, The Defiles of Mutina Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
provincial praetor, slave legions, slave horde, great white stallion, slave host, slave army, curled beard Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Free Legions, Gershom ben Sanballat, Crassus the Lean, Gershom of Kadesh, Mount Papa, Thracian Gladiator, Battle of the Lake, Western Isle, Stone Way, Gnaeus Manlius, Cisalpine Gaul, Golden Age, The Pits of Death, Appian Way, New Republic, The Falling Star, Messine Straits, Pirates of Sicily, The Conqueror, Titul the Iberian, City of the Masters, Mount Garganus, Lex Servorum, Gallia Cisalpina, The Defiles of Mutina Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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