• Cleopatra

  • A Life
  • By: Stacy Schiff
  • Narrated by: Robin Miles
  • Length: 14 hrs and 16 mins
  • 4.0 out of 5 stars (1,589 ratings)

Prime logo Prime members: New to Audible?
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.
Cleopatra  By  cover art

Cleopatra

By: Stacy Schiff
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $24.95

Buy for $24.95

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.

Publisher's summary

The Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer brings to life the most intriguing woman in the history of the world: Cleopatra, the last queen of Egypt.

Her palace shimmered with onyx, garnets, and gold, but was richer still in political and sexual intrigue. Above all else, Cleopatra was a shrewd strategist and an ingenious negotiator.

Though her life spanned fewer than forty years, it reshaped the contours of the ancient world. She was married twice, each time to a brother. She waged a brutal civil war against the first when both were teenagers. She poisoned the second. Ultimately she dispensed with an ambitious sister as well; incest and assassination were family specialties. Cleopatra appears to have had sex with only two men. They happen, however, to have been Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, among the most prominent Romans of the day. Both were married to other women. Cleopatra had a child with Caesar and—after his murder—three more with his protégé. Already she was the wealthiest ruler in the Mediterranean; the relationship with Antony confirmed her status as the most influential woman of the age. The two would together attempt to forge a new empire, in an alliance that spelled their ends. Cleopatra has lodged herself in our imaginations ever since.

Famous long before she was notorious, Cleopatra has gone down in history for all the wrong reasons. Shakespeare and Shaw put words in her mouth. Michelangelo, Tiepolo, and Elizabeth Taylor put a face to her name. Along the way, Cleopatra's supple personality and the drama of her circumstances have been lost. In a masterly return to the classical sources, Stacy Schiff here boldly separates fact from fiction to rescue the magnetic queen whose death ushered in a new world order. Rich in detail, epic in scope, Schiff 's is a luminous, deeply original reconstruction of a dazzling life.

©2010 Stacy Schiff (P)2010 Hachette Audio

Critic reviews

"Stacy Schiff does a rare thing: She gives us a book we'd miss if it didn't exist."—Wall Street Journal

"A masterpiece."—Daily Beast

"Captivating...Ms. Schiff strips away the accretions of myth that have built up around the Egyptian queen and plucks off the imaginative embroiderings of Shakespeare, Shaw and Elizabeth Taylor. In doing so, she gives us a cinematic portrait of a historical figure far more complex and compelling than any fictional creation, and a wide, panning, panoramic picture of her world."—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

Featured Article: 25 of the Best Witchy Listens to Cast a Spell for Halloween


Spooky season is upon us, and it's the perfect time of the year to sink into some wonderful witchy listens—although to be honest, we don't need an excuse to enjoy great stories about the fascinating world of witches. Whether you're into fantastical fiction tales of magic, the more practical informational guides on how to practice witchcraft, or historical tales about the real lives of famous witches, we've rounded up some of the very best witch audiobooks.

What listeners say about Cleopatra

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    718
  • 4 Stars
    447
  • 3 Stars
    243
  • 2 Stars
    104
  • 1 Stars
    77
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    614
  • 4 Stars
    295
  • 3 Stars
    117
  • 2 Stars
    41
  • 1 Stars
    26
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    558
  • 4 Stars
    300
  • 3 Stars
    146
  • 2 Stars
    59
  • 1 Stars
    41

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

Approach this book with caution

An interesting read (or listen) but hardly an objective view of history. It is apparent from the outset that Schiff is a woman with an ax to grind and will not allow the facts to get in the way. Her overriding theme of every negative thing ever written about Cleopatra being false and every positive thing true is at first only annoying but quickly becomes tedious. She takes to task everyone from ancient historians Plutarch and Dio, to Shakespeare and Shaw for supposition, personal prejudices and outright fiction in their writings about Cleopatra and then merrily does the same for over 300 pages. Worse yet, she happily credits those historians whenever they prop up her slant on the subject and disingenuously discredits them when they do not. In the end this is just another persons take on a subject and time that there is very little actual documented accounts.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

77 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Save your money or credits, please!

This book is truly horrible. I am an historian and history teacher. I can't believe the author wasted her time on this book. It is one of the worst historical accounts I've ever read. No new discoveries and no real story to tell. It could be this, or it could be that. Endless droning about Egypt in general and possible explanations of Cleopatra's choices. This book is so bad it hurt my feelings...lol.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

61 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Not "just" a Biography!

This book is no mere biography of Cleopatra's life. The author paints a vivid portrait of the end of the Hellenistic Period. For to understand Cleopatra's life you need to understand the places she went, the people she knew, and the times she inhabited; Cleopatra was as much a product of her times as the times were a product of her life. Stacy Shift interweaves fact with narrative flawlessly and engages the reader with such rich language that at moments I forgot I was reading non-fiction. Robin Miles narration is both relaxing yet filled with passion. This was my second time listening to the book and I will most likely be listening a third time in the near future! It is simply that fabulous!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

32 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

A pretty good listen.

For someone who reads a lot of ancient history, and is deeply interested in the Hellenistic era...added to the fact that I was looking for newer material...this was the first audio book I listened to upon creating my account. I enjoyed it...the narration is good, and Schiff does an amazing job with breathing new life into Cleopatra and her era. As for Schiff's narrative, it is excellent, and I don't think many of the inferences she has to make are that over the top. Her great retelling of the Alexandrian War that first brought Caesar to Egypt and Cleopatra to power was a great, fresh take on an event that isn't talked about much in many books despite its importance.

That said, this book might be a bit misleading...I'm not sure I would recommend it to casual readers/listeners. Despite the subject matter that appeals to average readers (many people know a little about this story) and the slick cover that looks like it is meant to draw women readers in.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

28 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Writing style was not for me . . .

Sorry, but I gave up on this audiobook after the first twenty minutes. I was wondering why the narrator was reading the blurb from the back of the jacket, probably written by some young editorial assistant, and then I realized that no, this was the actual book. I'm sure the author did a lot of research, but she started off telling me that all the previous histories of Cleopatra are inadequate. I was thrown off by hearing phrases like "zero-sum game" and "Page-Sixer" in the biography of an ancient figure. Pompous tone. Oh, well, some people might enjoy this style.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

21 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

Interesting subject, painful listen

By the end of the book, I couldn't wait for it to be over. The listening wasn't a pleasant experience.

The narrator's sense of appropriate pauses and emphasis were off and anoying. Part of this was due to an awkward writing style. (Perhaps a better editor and a different narrator would have helped?)

Never-the-less, I kept up with it because the subject was interesting and I did learn a lot about Cleopatra, Julius Ceasar, Mark Antony, and Augustus.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

20 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Very Enjoyable

I found this interpretation of the life of Cleopatra a refreshing take from a different angle. Accurate conclusions based on the existing ancient historical accounts must consider the spin their authors gave the story to suit their own audience. So in all fairness, Schiff's views offer a well reasoned alternate approach. A must-read for those interested in Roman history of the time.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

20 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

Disappointment

I had high hopes for this, particularly since the reviews were pretty good and there was a lot of hype leading up to its release. Well, I was left very disappointed. The "story" is scattered so it doesn't read like a story. I know it's about Cleopatra's real life so perhaps it's meant to be a little dry by nature, but I still thought it would read like a tale of her life beginning to end - tumultous and exciting. Unfortunately, the author is constantly back and forth on each point between the time period she is actually discussing and the past and future that relate to the point she is discussing (if that makes any sense at all? I don't know how best to explain that, but if that's confusing, just try following along with the audio...). Many times, I thought I was losing it (e.g., Cleopatra's brother was dead, wait he wasn't dead, wait no he is dead, wait he didn't die - yet - she's just saying that he would be dead at some point although she's talking about it as if he is dead...Same issue with her dad and everyone else who passes through Cleopatra's life. Are we in Greece? No of course not, we're in Egypt. Though it really sounds like we're in Greece...). I will say, perhaps it reads better in written format than in audio. I'll give it the benefit of the doubt. There are just so many footnotes that it interrupts any potential fluidity that I have to assume exists in the hardcopy. I didn't bother to finish it although I may at some point.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

17 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Boring - worst title I've ever selected

Expected to learn something about the historical context in which Cleo lived. Instead author assumes you have encyclopedic knowledge of her times. Can't listen to any more. Sorry but I only am speaking of the first two chapters- couldn't go further than that.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

15 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Excellent historical perspective.

This is a fascinating story of the ultimate queen of history. The narrative is extraordinary and the story beautifully complex. The facts (or the lack of) that engulfs the period is marvelously put together from ancient texts and supposition. It’s a must listen for those who are interested in history and the strength of our past human achievement.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

12 people found this helpful