Yes, having read through I, Claudius, and having a copy of the sequel to hand, Your Humble Blogger was unable to help himself. This despite knowing that the book isn’t very good, that I hadn’t enjoyed it the last time, and that I wouldn’t enjoy it the next time.
It was bound to be bad. I mean, there’s a good deal of fun, in the first book, with Claudius’ supposed republican sympathies and his Forrest Gump floating around the events and personalities of his time. Mr. Graves also invented a marvelous villain, Livia, who poisons seven out of every eight citizens of Rome. Once Livia is of necessity out of the book, and Claudius is tyrant of Rome, most of the fun of the first book is gone. Mr. Graves could have made Messalina a memorable villain, but it’s tricky, because is Claudius is aware of Messalina’s villainy, he is responsible for being quite a bad emperor, whereas if he is oblivious to it, he can concentrate on writing about his successes (public works and the expansion of not only the borders of the Empire but the franchise of Roman citizenship). Sadly, the obliviousness makes the villainy rather dull; we figure out that it’s happening, but as Claudius is trying to distract us from it, Mr. Graves can’t (or at any rate doesn’t) entertain us with it.
And, of course, part of the fun of the first book is watching while everybody around Claudius is killed off, leaving him the last man standing. He starts the second book as the last man standing; where’s the fun in that?
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.