Paolo Cesaretti

Anyone who reads ancient and medieval biographies has probably found one whose author dealt with the lack of information poorly, but thankfully Theodora's biographer Paolo Cesaretti was creative with the spotty details of the Empress's life. Writing biographies about people who themselves left almost no account of their own history must always be challenging, but Theodora's was that much harder since the person who wrote the most complete contemporary history of her rise to the throne was extremely hostile towards her (Procopius). Cesaretti seems to have carefully sifted through every angle of each major event of Theodora’s life and given his reader a neutral viewpoint whenever possible. He also added some educated guesses on what Theodora must have been thinking or feeling at various times, which I thought I wouldn’t like at first but ended up adding dimension to someone who might have otherwise seemed flat and distant.

Having said that, Theodora’s life as a subject is already pretty interesting. Once an actress (slash prostitute), she renewed her faith on a chance trip to Egypt and wound up winning the Emperor’s heart when she arrived back in Constantinople (supposedly) a reformed woman. She went on to rule sometimes cruelly but almost always effectively and even saved the Empire from certain destruction. A life almost too good to be fiction, I would definitely recommend reading up on Theodora and I would certainly recommend this biography to do that.… (mais)