The Persian Boy by Mary Renault Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Persian Boy
Book Review: Recommended by The Cybermale Bookshelf
Summary: 5 Stars
History tells us much about the conquests of Alexander the Great, whose military campaigns brought virtually all the world he knew under his domination. And history even hits of his relationship with Bagoas, a Persian slave who became the emperor's love! But it takes a work of imagination to breath life and passion into this age-old tale. Mary Renault has provided that imagination in a moving and convincing novel that follows Bagoas from the home of his honored father to a life of degradation and whoredom and finally to the bed of the most powerful man of the ancient era.Book Review: Renault's best historical novel
Summary: 5 Stars
"The Persian Boy" is the second book in Mary Renault's Alexander trilogy and it's by far the best of the three, probably because Renault did a total shift in narrative and style and continued the story in the first person. When Renault writes in the first person, something magical happens; we're so totally caught up in the action that we're inside the book, not only watching but feeling it come alive.
Renault realizes that Alexander underwent a fundamental transformation on becoming Great King after defeating Darius at Gaugamela; he was no longer the king of Macedon but king of most of the known world, most of whose inhabitants were considered by Macedonians to be "barbarians", and she chose to tell her story through the eyes of one of them, the Persian eunuch Bagoas, an actual historical character of whom next to nothing is known except that he had been sold to Darius in childhood as a slave and after Darius's final defeat at Gaugamela was passed on to Alexander. He must have made the most of his position as the historian Aristobulos wrote about Bagoas six years afterwards, when he was evidently still in Alexander's good graces, and had probably seen and heard a great deal.
Renault had to fabricate almost all of Bagoas's own story; we see him as the beautiful child of a Persian nobleman who was betrayed and executed; sold into slavery and castrated to preserve his exquisite good looks, and then presented to Darius, standing by his king and seeing him betrayed and murdered by his own men after his defeat by Alexander, and then being passed on to this strange young Macedonian who looked more like a barbarian than the Persians looked to the Macedonians. Renault's choice of a Persian narrator was inspired; who else could have told from a sympathetic viewpoint about Alexander's growing identification with his conquered subjects, and his insistence in finding excellence in people of all races and nationalities, when most Macedonians considered Persians as little more than subhuman? Bagoas's love for Alexander doesn't blind him to Alexander's faults; he gives us Alexander warts and all; his overwhelming ego and conceit which must have driven his best friends up the wall; his hot temper and intemperance which led him to kill a trusted officer in a drunken rage, and the lack of moderation which made him a candle burning at both ends and ultimately burned him out. And although Bagoas must have hated Hephaistion in real life and the feeling was probably mutual, he can still realize that Hephaistion's death removed a vital prop in Alexander's life and left him not only bereft, but with a vital part of himself gone without which he could no longer live.
"The Persian Boy" brings us the ancient world from Asia Minor to India and makes it so incredibly alive that we hate to close the book and return, reluctantly, to the ho-hum present. It's a glowing, vivid work of art.
Judy Lind
Book Review: Renault's finest novel and a beautiful story...
Summary: 5 Stars
Wow. This is definitely Renault's greatest book. Told from the point of Alexander's lover, Bagoas, you truly get to know another side of Alexander. At first, I was angry when I began to read. By making the story from Bagoas' point of view, it made it seem as if Alexander was a distant stranger even though I felt like I knew him after reading Fire From Heaven. But as the story progressed, Renault's choice of words totally took over me. I began to feel Bagoas's hate of Roxane and of Hephaistion. I felt Alexander's disappointment that his men did not love him fully. This novel truly shows the nature of Alexander.Book Review: Slow Moving Epic
Summary: 3 Stars
This novel was perhaps a landmark at the time of its publication because of its home-erotic references to Alexander. Since then we have had much made of this aspect of his character, so i think the novelty has worn off a bit. Mary Renault is a gifted writer, and her prose is both picturesque and compelling, but this work is a hard go even for someone interested in Alexander! The story moves slowly. The narrator, a enuch who happens to be named Bagoas, provides a more sympathetic account of who this person really was. The real Bagoas was not killed by Darius, and he proved to be an evil, insidious influence for both Alexander and Darius. This Bagoas is full of longings and pathos, which gets really tiring after a while. Also, his/her longings for sex with Alexander, no matter how tastefully done, can be somewhat revolting to some readers. The constant references to his wearing sexy loin-clothes and long hair to perform errotic male dances is both annoying and disquesting at the same time!
What this novel does show was how wide and perverse sexual habbits were at this time, and how women often featured very little in them! At least in the circles of the ruling elites. We do get some inferences of Alexander's character, which offer some interest, and this can be what makes good historical fiction worthwhile if it paints a convincing portrait of a famous person and his time. Still, no matter how you slice it this is slow, tedious read. This book is probably more suited to gay readers than those really interested in Alexander's life and times. For me Alexander has so many more fascinating aspects to his career besides just his sexual habbits which seem to be the real interest for the recent fascination in him lately. The equally slow moving Oliver Stone epic marches at about the same tedious pace as this novel. I'll bet the producers read it at their bedside.
Book Review: Terrific entertainment
Summary: 5 Stars
The late author had a way of making you feel that she lived in Greece during the time of the Great Alexander. One of the best book I have read concerning this unique historical era. Her writing seems to flow effortlessly. It is part of my permanent collection of nearly all of her works.