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How long does it take to read The Ides of March?

Thornton Wilder

The Ides of March by Thornton Wilder takes about 4 hours 31 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.

About 4 hours 31 minutes

A weekend read

First published 1948. 246 pages, about 67,650 words.

10 days at 30 minutes a day

Estimate based on 275 words per page.

At other speeds

Slow, 150 words a minute 7 hours 31 minutes
Average, 250 words a minute 4 hours 31 minutes
Fast, 400 words a minute 2 hours 49 minutes

The page count is the median across 24 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.

About the book

The Ides of March, first published in 1948, is a brilliant epistolary novel set in Julius Caesar's Rome. Thornton Wilder called it "a fantasia on certain events and persons of the last days of the Roman republic." Through vividly imagined letters and documents, Wilder brings to life a dramatic period of world history and one of history's most magnetic, elusive personalities. In this inventive narrative, the Caesar of history becomes Caesar the human being. Wilder also resurrects the controversial figures surrounding Caesar -- Cleopatra, Catullus, Cicero, and others. All Rome comes crowding through these pages -- the Rome of villas and slums, beautiful women and brawling youths, spies and assassins.

Subjects: Murder, Fiction, Romans, nouvelles, Heads of state, City and town life, History

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