Claudius, the stammerer, was known as a buffoon and a pitiful fool. He made it his business to watch from the sidelines and record the antics, funny, violent and lustful, of the imperial households as its members vied with each other for power. Then he found himself Emperor. From the great days of Augustus and the cruelties of Tiberius to the deified insanity of Caligula, he records a story breathtaking in its murderousness, greed and folly. Throughout the swings of fortune, his own disastrous love affair with the depraved Messalina and surprisingly successful reign, his voice sometimes puzzled, sometimes rueful, always sane, speaks to us across the centuries in two great, classical historical novels.