Robert Harris has added another novel to his shelf of historical thrillers with the impressive and thought-provoking Imperium. Set in Ancient Rome, the novel centres on the political adventures of Cicero before he became consul, as told by his private secretary Tiro.
Though this sounds fairly academic material for a novel, the book’s style makes it clear that it is not interested in simply relating a little Roman history. Harris’ liberal use of modern political terminology (“joint ticket”, “electoral college”, “draft-dodger”, “high crimes and misdemeanours”, “special prosecutor”) forces the reader to draw parallels with modern events. The technique is similar to the title of Somerset Maugham’s Then and Now, about the early career of Niccolo Machiavelli.
One particular plot demands to be read with this double vision: the political manoeuvrings which resulted from the attacks of pirates on the Roman Empire. The handing over of supreme military command to one man, Pompey the Great, and the use of the phrase “who is not with us is against us”, signals a concern with the current geopolitical situation. This is not simply a roman a clef, however: the pirates actually take up a relatively small part of the action, and Pompey deals with them quickly off-stage.
Tiro states his ostensible intention in recording Cicero’s career in an intriguing paragraph on the second page. “And it is of power and the man that I shall sing”, the character says (adapting the famous opening of Virgil’s Aeneid, “I sing of arms and the man”), “By power I mean official, political power – what we know in Latin as imperium – the power of life and death as vested by the state in an individual.” The relatively simple explanation of a Latin term resonates throughout the whole book, probing the notion of “democracy” and how it is carried out.
Harris covers a lot of Cicero’s career, and the early parts about his training in law and philosophy do feel like a rather extended prologue. Once he gets underway, however, the plot moves fast and engagingly. There isn’t the same depth of characterisation to be found in Harris’ more modern settings such as Enigma, but that level of complexity has shifted from individuals to the functioning of politics. For those who like political thrillers, this is an exciting twist on the genre, and one which will raise questions about the workings of our democracy, as well as its origins.
