‘A Fatal Thing Happenedon the Way to the Forum’ by Emma Southon: Review

By George Legget, First-Year History

The title is not a lie, the author of A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Emma Southon, is a revolutionary history writer, and at least with regard to ancient historians, I can testify to this with some authority. Herodotus goes rich in detail but is accused of being tangential and embellishing things for dramatic effect. Thucydides literally admits in the introduction to his history on the Peloponnesian Wars that he’s more interested in being accurate (even this is debatable) than being entertaining. Sallust in both his War with Jugurtha and Catiline Conspiracy seems to almost use historical events as a means of telling a moral story about the decline in the morality of the Roman Republic, and Plutarch (despite sneering at Herodotus for this) is sometimes criticised for his inaccuracy due to prioritising the story like aspects of history in his literal biographies. (My Ancient Historical Writers lecturer would be somewhat disappointed with this fairly limited summary of my personal favourite historians in antiquity, but it provides some context.)

Southon, however, writes about ancient history with the most hilariously unserious tone-direct and constantly cracking quips, but nonetheless consistently proves to us how well-researched and scholarly her book, A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, is with a massive breadth of detail. She makes reading a book about different angles and aspects of murder in ancient Rome a thoroughly entertaining, funny, light-hearted adventure. And yes, she goes off on tangents to make things more engaging for the reader with funny anecdotes about idiot Romans, and yes, given it’s a work of scholarship most would take themselves more seriously, but as I’ll get on to. The fact is she remains accurate (or at the very least, well-informed) in her subject matter whilst also making a book about murder into a dark-humoured comedy show is exactly the point and it makes her work of history so much more original than any other I’ve read. (I haven’t actually read as many as you’d think.) But as Sarah Perry says in her review of the book, “Emma Southon wears her learning lightly but we never for a moment doubt her authority”.

That said, Southon doesn’t always come across as a total black-humoured, carefree, no-Fs-given genius. There are also times when you’ll be taken aback by the quickness she’ll go from light-hearted quips about Romans, even in fairly dark scenarios, to genuinely serious topics that simply can’t be joked about. For example, she comically marvels at the fact Milo even had to stand trial for the “pathetic murder of Clodius”, because “no one even liked Clodius”, and the very next page (a different chapter, but a massive tonal shift nonetheless) starts talking about the murder of a child, which isn’t something anyone can joke about. Perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised that a book about murder in ancient Rome feels tonally inconsistent. As Southon addresses in her introduction how we have a weird fascination with murder in Western society, bordering on an obsession because there’s something simply so darn entertaining to us about it in a morbid sense. But it throws the reader off to laugh (half-shocked, half-hysterical because Emma Southon is absolutely hilarious) at some serious topics which have a certain glamour to them, but some serious topics are…. too serious for the other serious topics? It’s like “Oh, laughing at the buildup to Caesar’s brutal murder is fine, but then laughing at child murder is just disgusting”. This is perhaps true, but we’re not often forced to confront that. So very occasionally it comes across that the book is an entity in and of itself, and it's one that’s suffering from some fairly severe mood swings.

Nonetheless, there are still further aspects which improve the quality of the book and make Southon an incredible writer. Another one is the references to the modern world she makes, some of my favourite of which occur in the section on gladiatorial killing, in which Southon calls gladiator fights a mixture of Ascot, a Premier League football match and a political rally, but “with much more blood”. She compares the executions in between gladiatorial fights to Justin Timberlake at a Super Bowl halftime show. It’s honestly surprising as to how culturally knowledgeable Southon proves herself to be about the modern world because she’s writing about antiquity, but it adds to the humour perfectly and makes the reader feel pleasurably smart when they get the reference; it also breaks things down quite nicely for an ancient history novice like me.

Another great aspect Southon incorporates into A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum is her obvious disdain for her own subject matter. In particular, her annoyance at every Roman name being so damn similar is fantastically relatable, and whilst I’ve touched on how quick-witted she is, the humour in the book being conversational makes things engaging and virtually interactive for the reader. Her relatable nature makes any Ancient History student or enthusiast feel not only engaged with the subject matter but also makes us feel like she’s just one of us. By having our own inside jokes about how annoying ancient history is sometimes and how close to pulling out our hair we get at how annoying some figures in antiquity are, like poorly written fictional characters in a TV show. Yet she also clearly maintains a passion for what she’s writing about too, that’s why the over-invested “f*ck yous” to Cicero and company come across as funny, we hate to love and love to hate on ancient history. (She also doesn’t hesitate to be loose-lipped in her work of academia.)

Honestly, to be as cavalier with one’s wittiness as Southon, is a style of writing that I aspire to emulate. I mentioned the sins of ancient historians, but modern historians are, too, guilty of making their works a total snooze fest (don’t lie, we all know this), though there are exceptions, and Southon’s is one of them. Does anyone question why Horrible Histories got so many people genuinely interested in history? Because it made history fun! If you combine all the gross, bloody and genuinely hilarious bits of history into a massive ball of well-written humour and fun you are bound to get people engaged with the subject matter. This same attraction to the events she writes about is achieved by Southon, and it is why I believe her unique work is so valuable, because plenty can write a scholarly work that is of interest to some, but not many people can write a work that gets people interested in history. Yes, there is value in seriousness and formality, and with the more serious topics such as the brutal murders of slaves, Southon does adopt a less quippy tone. But despite this, this book I have no doubt many scholars would consider unprofessional, scattered and unserious is simultaneously iconic, and hilarious and draws you into the ancient world Southon writes about in a completely original way of writing about history.

So, more historians should write like Southon and A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum is a treasure of a book that redefines what it means to write history. The real question is, can I reference it in an essay? (Probably not.)