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The Ghosts Of Cannae: Hannibal & The Darkest Hour Of The Roman Republic (2010)

by Robert L. O'Connell(Favorite Author)

3.95 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

1400067022 (ISBN13: 9781400067022)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Random House (NYC)

review 1: This is an excellent brief study of the Second Punic War. The first couple of chapters do a nice job of explaining the Roman army and political system and then the Carthaginian side. The author writes in a clear and entertaining way. I often chuckled to myself in the way O'Connell would criticize Livy's story telling excesses and then proceed to frame up his own "Hollywood styled set piece." The Punic Wars are a part of history it would be really difficult to make uninteresting and this book definitely makes me excited to read Carthage Must Be Destroyed by Richard Miles after I conquer my next pile of books.
review 2: I found this book somewhat disappointing.While I enjoyed the detailed history of the Punic wars, I found both the style of the book and the s... moretyle of the reading to be somewhat grating at times. The attempts to be hip and casual were dated the moment they were written. Furthermore, the argument that Cannae and the treatment of its veterans had a role in re-shaping the Roman Republic seems a bit thin. Scipio Africanus may have been the template for later charismatic generals who took their outsized sway back into the political arena, but the idea that that was a result of Cannae is not substantiated.That being said, if you haven't read Roman history, you should, and this may be a reasonable place to start. Once you get into it, the book is reasonably engaging.One thing I did get out of the book that is relevant for modern readers, especially in a management or a business context, is how the Romans kept using the same tactics against Hannibal, and kept failing in the face of his protean trickery. They would raise a bigger army, and try a different general, but use the same tactics. Fabius Maximus had a clever, successful defensive strategy that changed the game, but even he couldn't defeat Hannibal in battle. It wasn't until Scipio developed new, more flexible tactics, and trained his men to use them, that Hannibal met his match. How often do companies, or government agencies, try what amounts to the same plan over and over again, changing the name of the program and its leader, but not its fundamentals? Real change is hard.Possibly the most interesting thing in the book was the epilogue, which, contrary to the overhyped description on the jacket, points out that Cannae's place in history as the archetypal battle, the perfect victory, wasn't common until the 20th century, when it became a key part of German military doctrine.That little note made me think how much of our history is a reflection not only of the time when the events occurred and the real impact that they had, but also of the fashions of the day, which elevate them or bury them. less

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