As featured on Beating Tsundoku

Beating Tsundoku

Classics scholar and Alexander expert David Grant does a very good job piecing together what we know as opposed to what we assume into a clear picture of Alexander. Eye witness testimonies of Alexander's contemporaries are suspect, as well as the paucity of written records, has left us with gaps in objective knowledge. Mr. Grant goes far to help us realize that.

NetGalley, CASPER HILEMAN

This attempt to present or revisit details of Alexander is pretty interesting and it was really compelling as the author did well in conveying and discussing the sources/ differing works that were used as kind of basis of this subject.

I would say this is kind of an essay (but not really an essay) discourse of the subject which I believed would compel others to get into the book.

I look forward on reading other book such as this.

NetGalley, June Reads

This work analyzes the sources of information for the life and deeds of Alexander the Great. Grant looks at the bias of the writers as well as the agenda of the writers. The problems with the sources go back to the very beginning starting with the historian Alexander appointed to his Generals that wrote about him and their own great deeds years later. False news and propaganda are nothing new.

The work is extensively researched and written in a straightforward way that pretty much anyone can follow.

NetGalley, Juliane Silver

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Alexander the Great, a Battle for Truth and Fiction is a layman accessible and interesting monograph on the analysis and evaluation of historical sources, specifically sources detailing the history surrounding Alexander the Great written by David Grant. Due out 30th April 2022 from Pen & Sword, it's 336 pages and will be available in hardcover format.

Alexander the Great and his generals and ancient Macedonian history are perennially popular subjects and always fascinating to revisit. Recent political and media "truthfulness" should have left every one of us more jaded and cynical about their objectivity. How much more so are accounts of ancient history, sometimes written centuries after the fact by people who had a distinct desire to present a biased view (unconsciously or with conscious inclination)?

The author, who is a specialist in the subject, takes on the task of evaluating sources and attempts to tease the actual facts out of the historical hyperbole. The book is arranged thematically and the chapters include a pretty good general resource evaluation which will be of use to any students of history, as well as specific instances of historical sources on Alexander the Great and using sources to evaluate and interpret their objectivity by comparison and contrast.

It could have been an impenetrable dry-as-dust bore-fest but the reality was that it's anything but. I honestly began reading without unusually high hopes (I'm a keen reader of ancient Greek & Roman history, but by no means an expert). I was genuinely surprised at the accessibility and readability here. The book is extensively and meticulously annotated, but it was never boring. As a relative neophyte with the period, it was an information rich deep-dive into the histories of the surrounding characters. The chapters which contained glimpses of his familial and conjugal alliances were particularly illuminating, showing how polarized many of the sources were.

Five stars. This would be an excellent choice for readers of history as well as for public or school library acquisition. The chapter notes and bibliography alone are worth the price of admission although it's not lavishly illustrated at all, and most readers will want to keep a period atlas at hand to look up places and events.

NetGalley, Annie Buchanan