Catullus' poems and the closing section by Suetonius are the only documents in the book that are not imagined; however, many of the events are historical, such as Cleopatra's visit to Rome.

Thus, the violation of the Bona Dea mysteries by Publius Clodius Pulcher, Caesar's subsequent divorce of his second wife Pompeia, and the circulation of two poems by Catullus suggesting that Caesar and his engineer, Mamurra, were lovers (and Catallus's subsequent apology) are transposed from December 62 BC to December 45 BC.

Note that names, relationships, and events are described as they occur in the novel and are not necessarily historically accurate.

American publisher Bennett Cerf remarked at that year's meeting of the American Booksellers Association that there had been "only three novels published since the first of the year that were worth reading ... Cry, the Beloved Country, The Ides of March, and The Naked and the Dead.

[2] Wilder himself once wrote that the book was "a kind of crossword puzzle" that "only begins to speak at its second reading.