In an age where politics feels more like theatre than governance, Robert Harris’s Cicero Trilogy — Imperium, Lustrum (Conspirata in the US), and Dictator — reads like a mirror held up to our own chaos.
Told through the eyes of Tiro, Cicero’s loyal slave and secretary, the trilogy charts the rise and fall of Marcus Tullius Cicero — Rome’s greatest orator and a man of principle caught in a world where ambition, corruption, and populism rule. From his unlikely ascent as a “new man” outsider, to his struggle against the ruthless Julius Caesar, to his tragic end as the Republic collapses into tyranny, Harris brings ancient Rome to life with uncanny modern resonance.
At once political thriller and moral tragedy, the Cicero Trilogy reminds us how fragile democracy can be — and how eloquence and integrity can both elevate and destroy those who wield them.