Britain's best known classicist speaks her mind on the ancient, and modern, worlds. A wide-ranging selection from her 'best hit' blog.

Mary Beard's by now famous blog A Don's Life has been running on the TLS website for nearly three years. In it she has made her name as a wickedly subversive commentator on the world in which we live. Her central themes are the classics, universities and teaching -- and much else besides. What are academics for? Who was the first African Roman emperor? Looting -- ancient and modern. Are modern exams easier? Keep lesbos for the lesbians. Did St Valentine exist? What made the Romans laugh? That is just a small taste of this selection (and some of the choicer responses) which will inform, occasionally provoke and cannot fail to entertain.

"Delightful ... it has the virtues of brevity, eclecticism and learning worn lightly ... Beard is a very funny and penetrating commentator on academic life - and has a fantastic knack for controversy. If they'd had Mary Beard on their side back then, the Romans would still have their empire" - Daily Mail

"Enjoyable ... Beard is an exuberant communicator" - Observer

"Sharply observed, often hilarious slices of academic life" - Guardian

"Beard's studies of bygone times are infused with a peppering of wit that is unusual in an academic work, but given free rein here" - Sunday Business Post

"This collection of her posts is pithy and engaging. The casual, humorous tone is seemingly informal. But the rhythm and cadence of the short blog have been honed to a fine art ... Beard remains self-deprecatory, invigoratingly sane and zestful" - Independent

"The marvellously educative, hilarious It's a Don's Life by Mary Beard, the blogging queen" - Daily Telegraph

"Beard has a spry, pithy, conversational style ... a diverting read" - Sunday Times

"Well-written, in short column-length bursts, it's the thinking person's loo book" - Glasgow Herald

"It's a Don's Life is, by turns, enlightening, funny, outrageous" - Weekend Australian