Jen Bergmark: I'm interested in the origins of Kleopatra, your first novel. Writing an epic, historical novel seems like a departure from your work as a journalist and screenwriter. How were you initially drawn to Kleopatra as a subject matter?

Karen Essex: Actually, I have always written fiction. I wrote another novel which did not get published. (I like to think it was years ahead of its time!) So the journalism was always a means to support my fiction habit. But it is true that in 1992, I was looking for a new direction in my life. I was considering a return to graduate studies and toying with the idea of a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature with an emphasis on Women's Studies. I do have a nerdy scholarly side which I have always enjoyed indulging -- and thank God, because if I didn't I would never have gotten through half the research for Kleopatra. Anyway, to that end, I was going about studying the ways in which history has either cut women out of its pages or misrepresented women, and Kleopatra seemed to me the most egregious example of that. I couldn't abide that one of the most powerful women EVER has been reduced to her sexuality. It's a great way of undercutting a woman's power, of discrediting her, and I guess my sense of justice wouldn't let that rest. That was the genesis of the idea.

Camille Renshaw: Can you talk more about how Kleopatra has historically been reduced to her sexuality and how you approached redeeming her from that depiction?

KE: There are several reasons why Kleopatra has been reduced to her sexuality. First and foremost, just read history and ask yourself, "where are the women?" Historians have traditionally undercut women's roles and reduced them to appendages of men. Women's stories are often told as by-products or side-stories of the men with whom they were involved. We're like the subplots of history, if that. The most complete story of Kleopatra's life is from Plutarch, who told her story as part of his Life of Antony. Suetonius, for example, writes about her when he writes about Julius Caesar. So that is how she is traditionally viewed -- as a lover of great men. She is rarely put at the center of her own story, so that was a big ambition of mine.

Secondly, Kleopatra's story has for the most part come down to us through the pens of her enemies. The Romans, led by Octavian, who later became Augustus, the first emperor of Rome, conducted an enormous smear campaign against her, portraying her as some foreign temptress who had bewitched the mighty Antony. Octavian was in a massive power struggle with Antony, but he couldn't attack him directly because Antony was so popular in Rome and throughout the world. Instead, he attacked Kleopatra, preying upon Rome's xenophobia and misogyny.

Since history is written by the winners and Octavian won, the story was written, or rewritten, by his court biographers, court historians, court poets. Thus, the image.

Most scholars now concur that this image is false and the work of her enemies. The real Kleopatra raised armies and built navies. She was a brilliant woman who spoke nine languages, dialogued with philosophers, and ran a kingdom. What I've tried to do is to present her in all her glorious dimension. I haven't de-sexualized her by any means, but like any other sexual being, she was much, much more than that.

CR: Given that "side stories" are the primary way we know about Kleopatra's life, naturally every source's reliability had to be questioned. For instance, there are multiple opinions regarding how Kleopatra's life ended. Some scholars believe suicide; others suspect deception - that she left a dead handmaid in her costume and went into hiding for the rest of her life. How did you deal with these contradictory scholarly opinions when writing Kleopatra?

KE: Actually, Camille, your memory is almost correct. I was toying with the idea of having Kleopatra fake her own death and go into hiding...but it's not historical. Almost everyone agrees that she died in the manner that Plutarch describes, and that is because he had access to the records of Olympus, her personal physician. So there's no reason to doubt the snake story, except that the idea of putting a cobra to one's neck is pretty outrageous. Some say it was a symbolic death. The cobra was the symbol of pharaonic power, and whoever died from its bite was said to ascend immediately to the gods. It has also been suggested that she was assassinated, which is possible. But working from Plutarch and taking into consideration her pride, I do think that it is entirely possible that she committed suicide rather than be taken prisoner by Rome.