Books by Tom Holland
Tom Holland is an award-winning historian, translator and novelist. In 2007, he was the winner of the Classical Association prize, awarded to ‘the individual who has done most to promote the study of the language, literature and civilisation of Ancient Greece and Rome’.
Pax: War and Peace in Rome's Golden Age
by Tom Holland
Pax: War and Peace in Rome's Golden Age by British historian Tom Holland is now out in both in the US and the UK. It's the third book in a trilogy that started with Rubicon, about Julius Caesar and the last years of the Roman Republic, and then went on to Dynasty, covering the rule of the Julio-Claudian family, the emperors we know so well: Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero. Pax starts with the funeral of Nero's pregnant wife, covers the years when the Roman Empire was at its largest under Trajan, and ends with Hadrian (whose beautiful villa in Tivoli you can still visit).
“What’s nice about Dynasty is that if anyone wants to talk about this period, they’ll immediately mention I, Claudius. They’ll know their Nero, they’ll know their Caligula, and lots of things here and there. This book fills in all the gaps.” Read more...
Interviews with Tom Holland
The best books on Ancient Rome, recommended by Tom Holland
How accurate is what we think we know about the Romans? Tom Holland, the author of Rubicon, tells us about the exercise of power, the staging of ceremony and the influence of religion in ancient Rome. If you’ve enjoyed these recommendations you might be interested in our interview on the best books on Ancient Greece.
Interviews where books by Tom Holland were recommended
The Best Classics Books for Teenagers, recommended by Olly Murphy (Wycombe Abbey School)
Caesar, Cicero, Achilles, Socrates, Plato: millennia later, we still talk about them. Olly Murphy, classics teacher at Wycombe Abbey, one of England’s top girls’ schools, recommends books and explains why classics remains one of the most exciting subjects for teenagers to study.
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1
Pax: War and Peace in Rome's Golden Age
by Tom Holland -
2
Vergil: The Poet's Life
by Sarah Ruden -
3
Ian Fleming: The Complete Man
by Nicholas Shakespeare -
4
The Secret Lives of Numbers: A Global History of Mathematics & its Unsung Trailblazers
by Kate Kitagawa & Timothy Revell -
5
The Chile Project: The Story of the Chicago Boys and the Downfall of Neoliberalism
by Sebastian Edwards
Notable Nonfiction of Fall 2023, recommended by Sophie Roell
Notable Nonfiction of Fall 2023, recommended by Sophie Roell
As summer collapses into fall across the northern hemisphere, Five Books editor Sophie Roell takes a look at the nonfiction books that have been published over the last three months. Reading serious nonfiction books remains the easiest way to get up to speed on not only things you’re already interested in, but lots of things you didn’t know you didn’t know.
