Stealing Athena in book reviews

Karen Essex, author

This is the story of the Elgin Marbles - pieces of the Greek Parthenon that currently reside in the British Museum. They are the stuff of international friction as they were taken from Greece in the early 19th Century by Lord Elgin. He believed that they weren't appreciated in Greece and that he was saving them from total destruction.

The story is told from the point of view of his long suffering wife. Basically he married her for her money... then proceeded to go through it as fast as he could with his obsession with antiquities. There's a lot in the book about the class system and how women have NO power... or little power... in family, and the law.

The story is also told from the perspective of the mistress of Pericles, the ruler of Athens who had commissioned the construction of the Parthenon to honor Athena. Again, a woman with little power, class system, and legal system.

The parallel stories are told in such a way that they reach similar crises in their lives. I preferred the sections about ancient Greece, but the story itself is fascinating.