Cleopatra the Great by Joann Fletcher

Cleopatra the Great by Joann Fletcher

"Joann Fletcher has the good grace and specialist knowledge to do away with Roman romances. This book's bedrock is Egyptology. . . . Cleopatra was, indeed, not just a 'baleful beauty;' she was great." --History Today 

Cleopatra the Great tells the story of a turbulent time and the extraordinary woman at its center. Intelligent and compulsively readable, this is an unparalleled biography worthy of one of history's most fascinating leaders: politician, mother, and goddess, the legendary Cleopatra.

The subject of myth for more than two millennia, Cleopatra has long been obscured by Roman propaganda, Shakespearean tragedy, and Hollywood glamour. Yet Cleopatra was a woman of passion, magnetism, and political genius, the last and perhaps the greatest Egyptian pharaoh. In Cleopatra the Great, world-renowned Egyptologist Joann Fletcher draws on a wealth of newly discovered information and research to reveal this vital woman as she truly was--a polymath monarch; a potent combination of traditionalist and innovator; an astute futurist; and a ruthless opportunist who would let nothing stand in her way.

Professor Joann Fletcher works at the University of York's Department of Archaeology, where she teaches world mummification and funerary archaeology. She is the author of eight books, including Cleopatra the Great and The Quest for Nefertiti. Among her many television appearances, she won a BAFTA, a Royal Television Society Award, and an Association for International Broadcasting Award for the follow-up episode to The Search For Nefertiti. She recently created and presented Life and Death in the Valley of the Kings for BBC2, and she is currently working on the four-part BBC and PBS series The Story of Egypt.