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August 31, 2005
More Rome
I am currently listening to The History of Rome in the Modern Scholar tape lecture series. I had wanted to try out one of these series for a while and thought this one would be good. It is only about 17 hours worth of lectures which is about half of what you would get in a normal university class, plus you have no homework, although you can take a final if you want to. All the fun and most of the learning of a college course without the work or credit! The professor from this series is a very good lecturer and has focused much of the series on Rome’s culture (as opposed to important battles and dates), which I think is the right way to go since that was the most influential part of Roman society anyways. The first two lectures focused on the Aeneid and the Romulus and Remus founding myths, which she explained quite well.
I just started reading The Elements of Murder: A History of Poison by John Emsley. I was hoping it would be a bit more thorough then it is turning out to be, but it seems to be more entertaining this way. Emsley is focusing on the chemistry involved in poisonings and using many different case studies to make his points. I was hoping for a more linear approach, but this is still interesting and useful if I ever want to become emperor of Rome or something and need to start knocking off rivals without causing too much suspicion.
Posted by Pete at August 31, 2005 09:42 AM
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