Cicero

Narrator John Curless brings considerable skill and an actor's insight to this biography of the famous lawyer, orator, politician, and writer. His pleasingly cultured British accent and likable voice, joined to a fine understanding and lack of affectation, keep the text comprehensible throughout the complex and intense politics of the last period of the Roman Republic. He acts when appropriate, as in quotations from Cicero's letters, subtly conveying an intelligent, spoiled, self-regarding, upper-class wit, which fits the man as we know him. It's an amusing and sly depiction using very slender means to good effect. An admirable use of talent, without showiness, in service to a text, brings this otherwise effective reading to a higher level of achievement. W.M. © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine