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Augustus

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WINNER OF THE 1973 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD By the Author of Stoner In Augustus his third great novel John Williams took on an entirely new challenge a historical narrative set in classical Rome exploring the life of the founder of the Roman Empire To tell the story Williams turned to the epistolary novel a genre that was new to him transforming and transcending it just as he did the western in Butcher s Crossing and the campus novel in Stoner Augustus is the final triumph of a writer who has cometo be recognized around the world as an American master Winner of the 1973 National Book Award In Augustus the third of his great novels John Williams took on an entirely new challenge a historical novel set in classical Rome exploring the life of the founder of the Roman Empire whose greatness was matched by his brutality To tell the story Williams also turned to a genre the epistolary novel that was new to him transforming and transcending it just as he did the western in Butcher s Crossing and the campus novel in Stoner Augustus is the final triumph of a writer who has come to be recognized around the world as an American master In Augustus John Williams re creates the Roman Empire from the death of Julius Caesar to the last days of Augustus the machinations of the court the Senate and the people from the sickly boy to the sickly man who almost dies during expedi tions to what would seem to be the ruthless ruler Read it in conjunction with Robert Graves s more flamboyant I Claudius and Claudius the God Hermann Broch s The Death of Virgil and Marguerite Yourcenar s Memoirs of Hadrian Harold Augenbraum Executive Director of the National Book Foundation