Product Description

The expansion of the congestion charge zone, prices going up on the Underground, bendy buses - all ideas brought about to try to make the traffic situation in our capital city run more smoothly. Surely there must be a better way? In fact there is. In Roman times, when the streets were even more crowded, Caesar decreed that all vehicles (except those involved in building work) were banned from the City, while Nero took advantage of a major fire to broaden the streets to improve access. Whatever the problem, from the leader whose deputy wants to replace him to the question of how to make democracy really work, you can guarantee that our Classical forebears faced the same situation and came up with some far more effective solutions than our current politicians. In this enthralling, informative and hugely entertaining book, Peter Jones, one of the UK's leading Classicists, highlights just how much we have to learn from the past and how things really were once so much better.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #161072 in Books
• Published on: 2009-04-30
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

Review
'a useful antidote to the assumption that what we've got today is either laready the best we could have or will be soon' (GUARDIAN )

About the Author
Peter Jones was educated at Cambridge University and taught Classics at Cambridge and at Newcastle University, before retiring in 1997. He has written a regular column, 'Ancient & Modern', in the Spectator for many years now and is the author of various books on the Classics.

Customer Reviews

For Daily Mail readers only!
An excellent idea, to compare the problems of today with Greek and Roman society. Unfortunately the author uses the book largely to express his own decidedly right-wing ideology. I have read about half - 126 pages. So far his targets include New Labour (naturally), the Guardian, Polly Toynbee (twice), Alistair Darling, Gordon Brown (numerous times), Dennis Skinner, Tony Benn ("ignorant, complacent, self-satisfied"), Roy Hattersley, Kenneth Baker (a Tory, though obviously too left-wing!), Derek Conway (who?), John Prescott ("remember him?") and "the unappealing Sir Alan Sugar". He quotes the crime figures in the UK as 11 million a year , then adds that this is, "in fact, nearer to 60 million" (says who?) and he deliberately misrepresents (Daily Mail style) some of the education initiatives of the past few years. Now I agree with a lot of his comments, but ultimately the book reads merely as an excuse for a right-wing political rant. The names he mentions ensure that the book will have only a short shelf-life. BUT - if his view of the present is so biased, I now question the impartiality of his views of the past, which is a shame - as it is this area that is potentially the most interesting.

An easy read--if you are not politically correct
This is a quirky book. It is composed of largely self-contained textual vignettes. This makes it easy to dip into for short and entertaining reads. Previous reviews have correctly inferred that a few of these short pieces appear to have a tenuous link to ancient practices. You probably have to be as contemptuous of bumbling, overbearing, intrusive, and taxing Big Government as I am to enjoy the bits where the author mounts his soap box. Because of the vignette layout these bits are easily skipped by those who object.

For the rest, Peter Jones provides many fascinating insights into how the Ancients dealt with--or failed over--issues that we still experience today. It would be difficult to compare ancient and modern governance without injecting a viewpoint. He openly colours his with a fairly libertarian view. This is surely better than adopting the all too common pseudo-objectivity affected by many lesser Academics. It provides a clear anchor point against which can be measured the selectivity and validity of the arguments or facts marshalled by any author. Allowances can be made for the colour. Mr. Jones is sometimes biting, but supports his 'prejudices' rationally and with a generally easy style. Those who believe in government coercion and collectivism as the solution for our problems might gag--on the other hand they might learn something too!

Cue Visigoths!
If you are able to perceive the merest whiff of a scintilla of merit in parliament, the EU or the BBC then this man holds you in contempt. Don't give him your money.

It's a lovely proposition for a book, and when Jones interrupts his rant to zero in on an aspect of Greek or Roman society we get a glimpse of what might have been. But most of the time he seems so hell-bent on peddling his distorted view of modern society that you have to wonder whether the historical bits are distorted too.

Even if they aren't, there are some big questions - for example, about how people's health, wealth and fair treatment compare between the two periods - that he simply dodges. He compares systems but pretty much ignores their relative outcomes. The subtitle "How the Ancient Greeks and Romans Solved the Problems of Today" makes an empty promise.

I suspect it's because he knows that, as a Roman, he'd live a life of grinding poverty and abiding fear.

I suspect the fiction of Lindsey Davis, Steven Saylor, Robert Harris and others gets closer to the truth than this vicious pamphlet.