Cleopatra: A Life – Stacy Schiff

Description

Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff is an award-winning, vividly told biography of one of history’s most enigmatic and powerful women. A Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer, Schiff cuts through centuries of myth and misinformation to reveal the real Cleopatra — a brilliant, politically astute ruler whose life and reign reshaped the ancient world. Far from the one-dimensional seductress of popular legend, Cleopatra emerges as a shrewd strategist, an ambitious leader, and a woman whose intellect matched her famed beauty.

Set against the backdrop of ancient Egypt’s glittering palaces and Rome’s treacherous political stage, the biography recounts Cleopatra’s extraordinary rise and dramatic fall. Married twice to her brothers, locked in power struggles from her teenage years, and ultimately entwined with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, Cleopatra navigated a ruthless world of intrigue and shifting allegiances. Schiff meticulously separates fact from centuries of embellished fiction, painting a rich, complex portrait of a queen whose death marked the end of the Ptolemaic dynasty and the dawn of a new world order under Rome.

Epic in scope and exquisite in detail, Cleopatra: A Life is essential reading for history enthusiasts and anyone fascinated by power, politics, and the lives of extraordinary women.