Those who study classical history know how rare it is that a scholar can take us in a consistent line from the development of classical and Hellenistic Greece to the conquering might of Rome, and illuminate both worlds.

Robin Lane Fox has pulled off this unusual achievement in his The Classical World. Taking three very ancient-world concepts - Liberty, Justice and Luxury (in its sense of extravagance, decadence) - Fox manages to walk confidently from Archaic Athens to the mid-point in the Roman Empire (the Emperor Hadrian, perhaps the most Greek-influenced of Roman Emperors, second century A.D.) and brilliantly evoke both the changes within the Greek and Roman cultures as they rose to empire and then fell from that high point, and to `compare and contrast' the two great cultures in a way that makes sense to the reader. Perhaps more importantly, this is a deeply satisfying book both for the expert scholar and the interested reader who doesn't have his M.A. in classical studies. It's amazing to see how these three `civilized' needs or qualities are dealt with in differing ways by the various cultures of Greece and Rome, and how complaints of decadence always seem to follow the cultural richness of a developing civilization.

At heart, the question is - what constitutes a civilization? How do you reconcile the needs of Liberty and Justice, and what happens to both when the rich become richer and the poor become poorer? Is wealth in and of itself a clue that a civilization that has lost its earlier energy? How did the Greeks and Romans deal with wealth and poverty, and how did they view them as influencing both liberty and justice? How did the great warrior ideals Homer exemplified influence the cultures after them, for good - or ill? Did Athens fall, in part, because of its increasing wealth drawn from its increasingly-resentful allies? Did the largesse of the Caesars do more harm than good to the average Roman citizen? These and other questions are discussed (but not intrusively) as the reader time-travels through the rise and decline of the Athenian Greeks; Fox takes his leave with the Emperor Hadrian. In his time, Rome was still the greatest, most civilized nation on earth - but the hints of the decline to come were already visible with those who had eyes to see.

Fox is best known, perhaps, for his marvelous biography of Alexander the Great (and his consulting participation in Oliver Stone's movie Alexander). Similarly, Fox was able to make Alexander both comprehensible and accessible, wading through a multitude of conflicting sources and eons of contradictory scholarship.

The Classical World feels, simply, like a labor of love from a man who finds much to love, to deprecate, and to honor in both the ancient worlds of Greece and Rome.