Spartacus (Ancients in Action)

Rating:
Summary: Finally Spartacus Enters The Non-Ficton Arena
Review: Theresa Urbainczyk's has written an admirable brief study, published by the venerable Gerald Duckworth and Co. Ltd, as an entry in their recent Ancients in Action series of short incisive books which "introduces major figures of the ancient world to the general reader, including each subject's life, works, and significance for later western civilization."

A senior classics lecturer at University College Dublin who has previously been known for her works on the history of church and state under the late Roman Empire, Ms. Ubainczyk fills her publisher's prescription to a tee in this, her first work on slavery and slave rebellion under the late Republic. In it she offers an explanation of how a gladiator rebel against slavery from two thousand years ago who ultimately failed, was vilified by the establishment of his own time, and left no disciples or writings to carry on his ideas, still managed to become so influential in the modern era. She begins with a brief survey of the impact of Spartacus on such diverse historical phenomena as the French Revolution, the slave uprising under Toussant L'Overture in Haiti, the Italian Risorgimento under Garribaldi, the Marxist movement of the ninteenth century, the failed German revolution in 1918, and the communist regimes of the twentieth century. Stepping back into the Roman Republican period she leads the reader through the background of conquest, slavery, gladiatorial games, and previous slave rebellions that ultimately led to the great Italian servile war. What follows is an up-to-date account of the revolt of Spartacus, his rise, many victories, and final defeat by his arch enemy Marcus Licinius Crassus. Although writing for the general reader the author is not afraid to examine with a critical eye some of the heretofore accepted academic conclusions regarding Spartacus's aims, accomplishments, and potential for greater, more lasting success. The narrative section of the book concludes with a chapter on slaves and slave rebellions in the centuries following Spartacus's uprising which contains accounts of some little known episodes and even major military campaigns which are to be found in the surviving ancient historical texts.

In the central chapter of the book the author illumines how despite the negative press Spartacus received from contemporary ancient historians, Plutarch, one of our main surviving sources on the slave rebellion, presented him in a positively heroic light in his Life of Crassus, thereby transforming him into a timeless hero. She presents an in-depth analysis of how Plutarch, in an attempt to express the anti-Roman and pro-Greek sentiments clearly evident in his accounts of other Greek and Roman lives, contrasted Spartacus's admirable moral and martial qualities with the far baser characteristic traits of his opponent, Crassus. While her arguments are certainly original and convincing, I would suggest that without the more sympathetic accounts of Plutarch's sources, the anti-establishment Roman historian Sallust, and perhaps the polymath genius and Stoic philosopher Posidonius, Plutarch's own near adulatory sketch of the career of Spartacus would not have been possible. But the brevity required for an introductory work for the general reader required that she dispense with the same kind of detailed treatment of their works that she accorded to Plutarch.

The book then shifts to a consideration of the figure of Spartacus in the modern imagination, specifically of the three widely read English language novels about Spartacus published from 1930 to 1951 which are still in print, and of the Kirk Douglas film which stands today as the paradigm for Spartacus in the minds of people worldwide. In fairness to the reader, the author must confess that in her critical chapter on the film, Ms. Urbainczyk makes extensive use of the theme and content of his own essays on the dire role played by studio censorship in diluting the fundamental historical lesson which the filmmakers intended to convey: man's capacity in all ages to resist dehumanization. While gratified by her support of my own critique of the film in opposition to some professional historians who find nothing wrong with the image of the slave revolt which it offers, I would advise the reader judge her conclusions for himself.

Overall this is a very accessible, interesting and eye-opening introduction to the subject that should leave the reader clamoring for more.