This is CBS Eye on the World.

Here's John Batchelor.

This is CBS, I on the world.

I'm John Batchelor.

Marcus Tullius Cicero.

I welcome Josiah Osgood, whose new book very much tells the story of a

lawless republic, the title of the book. This is Rome before the emperors. This is Rome before

Caesar's murder. This is first century BC, born 106 BC and enjoying a career until his death

in 43 BCE, is Marcus Tullius Cicero. We know much about him because he had a very loyal slave named Tiro,

who left a great deal of evidence of Cicero's

best moments in trial and his letters afterwards, because he was not only a masterful orator

and a great defense attorney, he became a political actor involved in all of the machinations right up until the birth of the empire

professor osgood congratulations you and i both have exchanged thoughts about this there's

there's a high entertainment value here at the same, there's serious business about the end of a

republic and the beginning of an empire, always of moment here in the United States, because there's

reason to believe we've built our institutions on the foundations laid down by the Romans

more than 2,000 years ago. First, Marcus Tullius Cicero. As a young man, he was a new man,

that is to say, not born into the elite. What does it mean to be a new man in the first century

B.C.E. in Rome. Good evening to you. Yes. Thank you, John. It's great to be here. So Cicero, as you said,

he was an entertainer. He's laugh out loud funny. I still laugh reading him. My students,

new to Cicero, they laugh as well. So he's always good entertainment value.

But he was a new man, as you say,

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