Abstract: It is well-known that Robert Graves was deeply engaged with classical antiquity. This engagement results in a literary production that demonstrates a profound understanding and creative interpretation of ancient texts. I, Claudius (1934) (hereafter IC), a celebrated bestseller, exemplifies Graves’s ability to breathe new life into historical figures and narratives of the past. Specifically, as Maria Rosa Llabres I Ripoll aptly observes, IC serves as an early instance in Graves’s work where the feminine role is foregrounded over the masculine.[1] In this paper I will delve into the construction of female characters within the novel, with a particular focus on Claudius’s mother, Antonia, and examine how Graves intertwines classical sources with his own imaginative insights to create compelling and enduring figures who, though grounded in their historical context, emerge as complex and surprisingly modern individuals living in a world still defined by political intrigues and personal ambitions.

Keywords: I, Claudius, Roman history, Antonia Minor, female agency, Classical reception, historical fiction

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Robert Graves and (His) Women

As Judy Chicago’s feminist artwork proclaims, at the very beginning of civilization stands the Primordial Goddess. Housed at the Brooklyn Museum in New York, The Dinner Party (1979)[2] features a triangular banquet table with thirty-nine place settings, each honouring a significant female figure from the ancient world to our contemporary era. The work’s relevance lies in the powerful reclamation of historical women and their contributions to society, which have often been overlooked or marginalized.

Any reader familiar with Graves will readily recognize a clear connection to his concept of the ‘White Goddess’, a central theme Graves was extensively developing and that became fully articulated in his work and thinking after its publication in 1948. Indeed, not only does the White Goddess – ‘the mother of all living’[3]– influence what he considered true poetry but manifested for him through actual women. In Robert Graves: Life on the Edge (2003) Miranda Seymour highlights Graves’s love for the women he regarded as embodiments of the Goddess, and consequently, the inspiration of his poetry.[4] Seymour divides her biography into five sections, each one named after women in Graves’s life, to emphasize their authority. Graves’s romantic experiences, both positive and negative, informed his theoretical framework, compelling him to explore the complex dynamics of gender, power, and creativity.

Graves’s captivation by what he understood as the feminine principle also powerfully informs his literary output as well, as evident in IC. Llabrés i Ripoll rightly emphasizes the relevance of the biographical factor in the construction of his female characters within the duology, specifically admitting the influence of his mother, his first wife Nancy, and finally Laura Riding.[5] Furthermore, women held a significant place in the conflict driving Graves’s narratives, as Bruce King observes: ‘While Graves’ poetry usually concerns his love life, his prose fiction is about the competition between members of a family in which women are the driving force’.[6]

Reading Women in the Ancient Past: Approaching the Narrative of I, Claudius

I, Claudius (1934) and Claudius the God: And his Wife Messalina[7] (1935) significantly contributed to Graves’s worldwide reputation as a writer and brought him to the attention of classicists and literary scholars. Alicja Bemben has summarised the debate within what she terms as the ‘early Claudian criticism’.[8] A central aspect of the discussion on Claudius concerns the intersection/interplay between of past and present, meticulously crafted through painstaking research on ancient sources. Furthermore, critics have paid attention to the constructions of characters, specifically, the portrayal of women. These figures have been scrutinized as ‘proto versions of the White Goddess’, showing characteristics that pave the way for insightful considerations.

Graves’s meticulous investigation of ancient sources is a seminal aspect of his writing practice, which no scholar has ever neglected. In the often-quoted preface to Claudius the God Graves himself names every author he had consulted for his books.[9] Though Graves ironically did not consider himself as a classicist (as he ironically noted in a letter)[10] he condemned critics who claimed that ‘he had merely consulted Tacitus’s Annals and Suetonius’s Twelve Caesars, run them together and expanded the rest with my own “vigorous fancy”’ (Claudius, pp. 342–43). In order to gain a faithful reconstruction, he could not limit his research to Tacitus and Suetonius but had to extend it to all the available texts. Remarkably, as with all his work, Graves provides us with a detailed description of his approach to ancient texts. In a letter he wrote to Thomas Mathews in 1934, Graves claims his authentic approach to ancient texts in terms of language. A common translation would have obscured his ‘sense of original’ (Select Letters, pp. 236–37). In addition, in another letter of 1932, Graves writes: ‘Lately I’ve been getting a book of poems […] and writing with the help of three large volumes of a Classical Dictionary, an encyclopaedia, a Latin Dictionary, four Latin historians, one Greek, and a lot of other books, the story of Emperor Claudius’ (pp. 218–19). Martin Seymour-Smith acknowledges the extent and preciseness of his research: the books Graves had consulted ‘comprise most of the general scholarly works on Ancient Rome then available’.[11] His novels guarantee a well-crafted knowledge of the ancient world, and it is this remarkable fidelity to Greek and Latin authors that largely contributed to the worldwide popularity of the duology.

In line with Graves’s rigorous historical inquiry, the role of women within the history of Imperial Rome has been extensively documented.[12] According to Eva Cantarella, their status and rights underwent a notable positive shift within the Principate. While still excluded from formal political participation, Roman women acquired greater personal freedom, which reinforced their influence on the social and political level. They increasingly had the chance to be educated, to educate the new generation themselves, and to marry.[13] Furthermore, in her chapter titled ‘Women of power or power to women’, Francesca Cinerini recalls Susan E. Wood’s theory positioning Livia Drusilla as the real founder of Julio Claudean dynasty.[14] However, this seemingly positive view of increasing female freedom and influence during the Principate contrasts with the portrayals often presented by major historians of the period such as Tacitus, Suetonius, and Cassius Dio. While women may have gained certain social liberties, these historians frequently depict them through a lens of moral judgment, highlighting instances of their perceived ambition, manipulation, and involvement in court intrigues, often casting them as negative influences or even threats to the established order.[15] It is not unsurprising that Josiah Osgood[16] (remarks on the idea that Graves has emphasized the relevance and the power women acquired from the principate onwards. This suggests a deliberate authorial choice to portray women not merely as passive figures within a male-dominated world, but as active participants who wielded social, economic, and sometimes even political power. Consequently, Susan Fischler concurs that ‘Graves had no need to use his creative energy to devise these characters: such depictions of Roman imperial women can be found throughout ancient historical writing on the imperial period’.[17]

This perspective highlights the extent to which the portrayals of women in Graves’s novels align with established historical narratives. However, the specific analysis of female agents within the novels reveals further nuances. While figures like Livia and Messalina have been extensively investigated as primary antagonists,[18] their characterizations in these fictional works often reflect a complex interplay of both contemporary and ancient concerns, going beyond mere historical reproduction. Llabres i Ripoll remarks on the biographical factors, emphasising the role that women played within the composition of IC. Graves knew free emancipated women.[19] At the same time, critics have recognized the influence of the ancient women in the elaboration of the theory on the White Goddess. His portrayals of historical figures like Livia and Messalina, while drawing from ancient sources, can also be seen through the lens of this overarching archetype Their roles as antagonists in his novels might be interpreted not just as reflections of historical accounts but also as manifestations of the White Goddess’s complex and sometimes destructive aspects, informed by Graves’s own intricate relationships with women and his enduring fascination with this potent feminine ideal.[20]

Antonia Minor: Fact, Fiction and Familial Ties

My analysis will turn its attention to the seemingly more minor character of Antonia the Younger or Minor. [21] Despite often being overshadowed by influential women such as Livia and Messalina, Antonia held a significant position within the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Indeed, Susan E. Wood aptly stresses that her ‘lifetime spanned more than two principates”, her ‘image continued to be a potent dynastic symbol even after death’, and consequently she defies ‘categorization in one principate or another’.[22]

Due to a relative lack of surviving documentation, ancient traditions report a positive image of this woman, in contrast with the subjective perspective of her son in Graves’s novel. This analysis will explore how Graves employs the first-person narrative of Claudius to offer a nuanced and critical perspective on his mother Antonia, in contrast to the largely positive image preserved by classical antiquity. Therefore, analysing Antonia’s portrayal within the novel will shed light on the intricate interplay between historical accuracy and fictional creativity, showing Graves’s remarkable abilities as classical scholar and novelist.

In the seminal book Antonia Augusta: Portrait of a Great Roman Lady, Nikos Kokkinos aptly remarks Antonia’s relevance within the roman history, describing her as ‘the greatest lady the Empire ever produced’.[23] Kokkinos asserts that Antonia ‘not only equalled Livia in status in the later part of her life, but on many counts (social, political, economic) even surpassed her’.[24]

Wood’s analysis of Antonia aptly highlights both the similarities and differences with Livia. For instance, the honours bestowed upon Antonia by Claudius – specifically the titles of ‘Augusta’ and ‘priestess of the deified Augustus’ – ‘drew the attention of the public to parallels between Antonia and Livia, whom Claudius had recently deified. Die-cutters of the imperial mint clearly wished to indicate that Antonia, although not a diva, was second in prestige only to the deified wife of the first emperor’ (p. 149). Nevertheless, Antonia, like Livia, successfully presented herself ‘as a public example of the chaste, loyal wife and widow’ while simultaneously acting ‘in very public ways with a considerable degree of independence, a situation that no one seems to have considered paradoxical’ (p. 150). Crucially, Antonia ‘did not require rehabilitation’, being ‘never the subject of any sexual scandal’, with portraits that ‘conform well to her reputation of chaste modesty’ (p. 143). Her long-standing relevance stems from her deep involvement in Imperial affairs, even with a different role as she ‘never enjoyed the status of the living wife or mother of a ruling emperor’ (p. 142).[25]

Despite the scarcity of information about Antonia, her influence can be still discerned by tracing back to her family history and its implications. She is strictly connected to the Julio-Claudian dynasty. The daughter of Mark Antony and Octavia, she was the ‘celebrated niece of Augustus, sister-in-law of Tiberius, mother of Claudius, grandmother of Caligula, and great-grandmother of Nero’ (ibid).

Jasper Burns has crafted a well-constructed depiction of Antonia in a chapter of his Great Women of Imperial Rome: Mothers and Wives of the Caesars. The lady is praiseworthy for her ‘supreme beauty’ and her status of true univira, a ‘one-man woman’. She actively participated in the political life of the Empire and was also responsible for/supervised the education of her children and of numerous foreign princes and princesses. Nevertheless ‘she was also the second richest woman of the Empire after Livia’.[26]

The novel crafts a dual portrait of Antonia, meticulously detailing Claudius’s private relationship with his mother while simultaneously incorporating her public image as preserved by ancient history. This dual perspective allows for a nuanced exploration of both her private essence and her established historical role. In IC, the initial on Antonia recalls the idealized image – ‘so fine and stately’ (p. 43) – that comes down to us from Classical Antiquity. She accompanied her husband on his campaigns (p.40), and she actively participated in the subsidization of a public show (p. 103). Moreover, her obedience to the emperor’s will (p. 205), coupled with her significant role in the discovery of Sejanus’s conspiracy against Tiberius, thereby proving her to be a courageous lady devoted to her family, as Claudius recounts: ‘My mother said that the only reward that she would ask was that the family name should not be disgraced: that her daughter should not be executed and her body thrown down the Stairs. ‘How is she to be punished then?’ Tiberius asked sharply. ‘Give her to me, ‘said my mother. ‘I will punish her.’’ (p. 267)

However, by devoting much more space to examining her relationship with Claudius, the novel illuminates Graves’s (in)visible hand as a novelist. Indeed, Antonia’s actions and reactions are presented through a subjective lens, shaping our interpretation of her behaviour The details we read (‘beautiful and noble woman’, ‘brought up to the strictest virtue’, ‘the one passion of my father’s life’) suggest a loving and devoted mother. However, the qualifying phrase ‘It will be supposed’ challenges this depiction, nudging the reader toward a different opinion, which the narrative later reinforces:

It will be supposed that my mother Antonia, a beautiful and noble woman brought up to the strictest virtue by her mother Octavia, and the one passion of my father’s life, would have taken the most loving care of me, her youngest child, and even made a particular favourite of me in pity for my misfortunes. But such was not the case. She did all for me that could be expected of her as a duty, but no more. She did not love me. No, she had a great aversion to me, not only because of my sickliness but also because she had had a most difficult pregnancy of me, and then a most painful delivery from which she barely escaped with her life, and which left her more or less an invalid for years. (pp. 41–42)

Through direct and impactful sentences, the narrator, Claudius, clarifies his relationship with his mother, providing reasons for her aversion towards him. The passage insists that Antonia was not loving, but she merely fulfilled her duties as mother. The emphasis on the difference between duty and love represents the main theme of Claudius’s representation of his mother, which posits his historian’s regard or detail while it may suggest that Claudius possesses an unusual degree of independence, and possibly resentment. Through Claudius, Graves skilfully announces that love and devotion to his mother will play a major role in his novel.

Notwithstanding her gentleness, beauty, and compassion, ancient sources, as Suetonius recounts, also document her conflicting relationship with Claudius:

His mother Antonia often called him ‘a monster: a man whom Nature had begun to work upon but then flung aside’; and if she ever accused anyone of stupidity she would exclaim, ‘He is a bigger fool even than my son Claudius!’ Livia Augusta, his grandmother, never failed to treat him with the deepest scorn, and seldom addressed him personally; her reproofs came in the form of brief, bitter letters or oral messages.[27]

The Latin historian adopts the term ‘portentum’, which has a double meaning, according to Lewis & Short (the Latin dictionary Graves likely used): it typically denotes ‘bad fortune, loss, injury’, yet it can also suggest ‘good fortune’.[28] Interestingly, Graves used the same passage both in his translation of Suetonius and in IC, but chose slightly different English equivalents. In his translation of Suetonius, Graves conveys ‘portentum’ as ‘monster’, a term perhaps chosen to align with the predominantly negative historical tradition surrounding Claudius. However, in IC, where the passage is aptly adapted from the source, Graves prefers the version ‘portent’, a translation more adherent to the Latin ‘portentum’, and, crucially to its inherent double connotation:

I heard from my sister Livilla, a beautiful girl but cruel, vain and ambitious—in a word a typical Claudian of the bad variety—that my mother had called me ‘a human portent’ and said that when I was born the Sibylline books should have been consulted. (p. 42)

This deliberate shift may be intended as a linguistic strategy on Graves’s part to subtly subvert the uniformly negative image of Claudius. By employing ‘portent’ in the novel, which captures both the negative and potentially more powerful or even auspicious aspects of the original Latin, Graves attempts to bring the supernatural beliefs of the period into view and, perhaps unwittingly, foreshadowing Claudius’s eventual good fortune. Given Antonia’s critical opinion and contempt for her son, she unwittingly contributes to foreshadowing Claudius’s complex ‘fatum’ and eventual success.

Antonia’s negative characterisation and her low opinion of her son is strictly related to Claudius’s many illnesses. While the part concerning her lack of love clearly reflects the main sources, the subsequent mention of a premature birth as main cause appears to be the result of Graves’s imagination. Indeed, Claudius attributes his premature birth to a shock Antonia suffered at the feast held in honour of Augustus:

My premature birth was due to a shock that she got at the feast given in honour of Augustus when he visited my father at Lyons to inaugurate the “Altar of Roma and Augustus” there: my father was Governor of the Three Provinces of France, and Lyons was his headquarters. A crazy Sicilian slave who was acting as waiter at the feast suddenly drew a dagger and flourished it in the air behind my father’s neck. Only my mother saw this happening. She caught the slave’s eye and had presence of mind enough to smile at him and shake her head in deprecation, signing to him to put the dagger back. While he hesitated two other waiters followed her glance and were in time to overpower and disarm him. Then she fainted and immediately her pains began. It may well be because of this that I have always had a morbid fear of assassination; for they say that a pre-natal shock can be inherited. But of course, there is no real reason for any pre-natal influences to be mentioned. (p. 42)

This fictionalized account, while portraying a woman of virtue and nobility, worthy of praise, also reveals a more complex and potentially challenging aspect of her character. After the premature and complex birth of her youngest child, she suffered for years afterward remaining largely infirm.

Claudius’s health has been topic for extensive investigation by scholars both in scientific and literary fields.[29] Notwithstanding, there is no mention of a premature birth resulting from shock. Nevertheless, Claudius attributes all his ailments – including ‘The nervous tic of my hands, the nervous jerking of my head, my stammer, my queasy digestion, my constant dribbling at the mouth’ to the pervasive terror within his family (p. 42). He specifically addresses his profound awareness of his mother’s low opinion of him as a direct cause. Antonia’s overt contempt for his son clearly emerges from her public pronouncements, such as ‘He’s as stupid as a donkey – what am I saying? Donkeys are sensible beings by comparison–he’s as stupid as ... as Heavens, he’s as stupid as my son Claudius!’ (p. 42). These assertions contribute to the common belief that, despite his physical challenges, he was incapable of any noteworthy achievement, an idea she constantly repeated to him:

My mother told me that there were three impossible things in the world; that shops should stretch across the bay from Baiae to Puteoli, that I should subdue the island of Britain, and that any one of these absurd new letters would ever appear on public inscriptions in Rome. I have always remembered this remark of hers, for it had a sequel. (p. 171)

Furthermore, the old age exacerbated Antonia’s unpleasant character, thus influencing her attitude towards life:

My mother had always been very economical, and in her old age her chief delight was saving candle-ends and melting them down into candles again, and selling the kitchen refuse to pig-keepers, and mixing charcoal-dust with some liquid or other and kneading it into cakes which, when dried, burned almost as well as charcoal. (p. 262)

In this passage, the repetition of her actions in old age, marked by extreme parsimony and recycling, reflects the pejoration of her character, transforming what might once have been viewed as a sensible economy into a somewhat obsessive and perhaps even distasteful stinginess. The meticulous, even somewhat grotesque, nature of these tasks – melting them down,’ ‘mixing charcoal-dust with some liquid or other and kneading it into cakes’– emphasizes a certain meanness of spirit that becomes increasingly prominent with age. This deterioration in her public and private presentation through such seemingly minor actions strikingly mirrors, and perhaps even explains, her attitudes towards Claudius. Just as she sees value only in what can be salvaged or reused, she consistently fails to recognize the inherent worth or potential in her son, as she had previously remarked: ‘Caligula’s a monster, and Drusilla’s she-monster, and you’re a block-head, and I believe my eyes more that their oaths or your nonsense’ (p. 228).

Therefore, it is unsurprising that Antonia’s contempt for her son, evident from his birth, persisted until her death. While the exact circumstances of her demise remain unclear,[30] it undoubtedly occurred under Caligula. Their final encounter, as depicted, epitomizes their problematic and conflicted dynamic:

I said: ‘What, Mother! Kill yourself? Why? O don’t do that!’ She smiled sourly. ‘My life’s my own, isn’t it? And why should you dissuade me from taking it? Surely you won’t miss me, will you?’ ‘You are my mother’, I said. ‘A man only has one mother.’ ‘I am surprised that you speak so dutifully. I have been no very loving mother to you. How could I have been expected to be so? You were always a great disappointment to me – a sick, feeble, timorous, woolly-witted thing. Well, I have been prettily punished by the Gods for my neglect of you. (pp. 290–91)

The passage aptly illustrates Antonias’s profoundly negative and abusive relationship with her son. Her words paint a woman wholly consumed by self-regard with still no consideration for her son. Indeed, upon announcing her impending suicide, she relentlessly expresses her disdain for Claudius, characterizing him as a lifelong ‘disappointment’. Notably, she attributes her personal tragedies, including the deaths of Germanicus (her favourite son), Nero, Drusus, Gemellus, and Livilla, not to her own faults, but to divine punishment for her perceived neglect of her youngest son. Despite Claudius’s attempts to engage with her and question her decision, Antonia’s demeanour remains consistently cold, critical, and entirely lacking in maternal affection. Their final interaction concludes with a formal ‘Good-bye’ conspicuously lacking any expression of warmth or blessing. Furthermore, her precise instructions regarding her death and funeral are delivered with a scolding tone that underscores Claudius’s perceived incompetence, thereby highlighting the utter contempt and absence of love that defined their relationship.

Interestingly, although Graves presents a largely negative portrayal Antonia, depicting her as often cold and dismissive, he also points up her significance. While often suggesting she considers Claudius an idiot, Graves simultaneously highlights her crucial role within his upbringing. Indeed, sources generally agree upon her relevance in the education of the noble men and women of the Empire, recognizing her as a figure of considerable intellectual standing and influence. Though it is still problematic to reconstruct the nature of her literary patronage, her influence on education is undisputable. Antonia’s relevance is also supported by the Greek poet Crinagoras, whose poetry implicitly underlines Antonia’s gentleness and erudition, further suggesting her deep engagement with Greek intellectual circles and her appreciation for its cultural heritage. Yet, Antonia’s intellectual relevance is precisely illustrated in the novel by an early childhood memory. At age seven, Claudius overhears a conversation between Emperor Augustus and the Stoic philosopher Athenodorus, in which Augustus makes a seemingly witty, yet ultimately critical, epigram about Antonia: she ‘breeds’ her own ‘marmosets’ (referring to her children, particularly Claudius) instead of nurturing them. Athenodorus’s sharp retort highlights Antonia’s lack of care for her ‘poor child’. However, Claudius, whom they considered a ‘half-wit’, fully understands their Greek conversation:

So Athenodorus drew me towards him and said playfully in Latin: ‘And what does young Tiberius Claudius think about the matter?’ I was sheltered from Augustus by Athenodorus’s ‘big body and somehow forgot my stammer. I said straight out, in Greek: ‘My mother Antonia does not pamper me, but she has let me learn Greek from someone who learned it directly from Apollo.’ All I meant was that I understood what they were saying. The person who had taught me Greek was a woman who had been a priestess of Apollo on one of the Greek islands but had been captured by pirates and sold to a brothel-keeper in Tyre. (pp. 43–44)

In this section, by employing an epigram clearly aimed at disparaging Claudius, Graves let the reader implicitly empathize with the main character, thus shifting the perception of him. As observed elsewhere in the novel, Graves frequently uses prophecies and epigrams, though their credibility is still ambiguous and debatable, inviting the reader to consider the complexities of historical interpretation. Graves crucially shifts the focus from the comparison to a donkey, instead stressing Claudius’s erudite mind as a direct result of his education. When playfully addressed in Latin, he surprises them by responding articulately in Greek. As the language of literature, Greek was considered the main subject of a well-trained education.[31] Notably, it is Claudius himself who relates his well-trained education to his mother. She is praised for choosing as a governess a woman who had learnt Greek directly from Apollo, and who had once served as his priestess. Hence, the epigraph is relevant in that it acknowledges the seminal role Antonia played in shaping Claudius’s character. Though she clearly preferred the other sons, she provided Claudius with a refined education, enabling him to pursue his intellectual interests. While, as mentioned before, distinguishing between historical accuracy and fictional creativity is sometimes quite challenging, as seen in the use epigrams,[32] Emily Hemelriijk remarks that Greek culture not only served ‘a status symbol for member of the subélite’, but also positions Antonia and Octavia as model for ‘a growing number of upper-class women, the well-educated women of the imperial family, from Augustus’ who actively cultivated and disseminated the classical legacy of Greek learning within the education of nobility.[33] This historical context provided by Hemelrijk refines our understanding of Antonia’s character in Graves’s novel, when considering Claudius’s own intellectual pursuits and his mother’s role in fostering them. Given this strong relationship between Antonia and Greek culture, it is hardly surprising that Claudius deliberately decides to write his autobiography entirely in Greek, as he explicitly states in the first chapter:

As you see, I have chosen to write in Greek, because Greek, I believe, will always remain the chief literary language of the world, and if Rome rots away as the Sibyl has indicated, will not her language rot away with her? Besides, Greek is Apollo’s own language. (p. 9)

In this light, Graves’s attempt to restore Claudius’s reputation starts from the exploration of his relationship with his mother. Antonia, who, despite her often cold and dismissive attitude towards him, significantly contributes to Claudius’s formative years. Even highlighting her own appreciation for classical learning and her active role within his education, Antonia’s overall portrayal in Graves’s work remains overwhelmingly negative. This contrast underscores the complex and often contradictory nature of Antonia’s character as presented by Graves.

Conclusions

While Classical Antiquity portrays her as the ideal Roman woman, Graves examines in depth the negative image of Antonia within the context of Claudius’s narrative. Ironically, Antonia’s abuse seems to be the driving force behind Claudius’s intellectual development, ultimately shaping his reign as emperor. Despite her persistent criticism, Antonia’s role in introducing him to Greek, the language of higher education and the chosen language of his autobiography, is also noteworthy, if apparently overlooked by Claudius. This complex interplay of maternal rejection and intellectual nurturing becomes a turning point in Claudius’s development as both writer and emperor, thereby suggesting a necessary re-evaluation of her often overlooked and misunderstood historical significance.

All of Graves’s early work, encompassing both prose and poetry, subtly reveals invisible traces of the presence of the White Goddess, a theme that he would fully develop a decade later in The White Goddess. Beginning with his strong-willed mother, Amalie von Ranke, Graves encountered independent women who influenced his entire oeuvre. Indeed, it is unsurprising that critics such as John Smeds have observed and established the influence of the Goddess in the portrayal of women from antiquity within his work. This can be extended to the instance of Antonia Minor, the cruel mother of Graves’s Emperor Claudius. Yet, such a consideration may serve as a point of reference for an investigation into her relevance in connection to Graves’s personal mythology. As the analysis has shown, in crafting the character of Antonia, the novel intertwines historical accuracy drawn from ancient sources with his fictional imagination, which serves dramatic and no doubt psychological ends. This approach emphasizes Graves’s multiple roles as historian, creative novelist, and romantic poet. It also demonstrates how historical figures can be reimagined in fiction to offer insights into the past as well as the psychological needs [poetic imperatives?] of the author. 

Adriana Marinelli is a third-year PhD Candidate in Linguistic, Terminological and Intercultural Studies at Parthenope University of Naples. In 2022 she received a fellowship from G. d’Annunzio University (Chieti-Pescara) to conduct her research on Robert Graves and Ovid. Her PhD project focuses on the influence of classical antiquity on Robert Graves’s poetry. She has conducted her research with the Robert Graves Collection, housed in St. John’s College, Oxford. She has participated in several national and international conferences presenting papers on Robert Graves and the Classics.