Memorias de Adriano is the masterpiece of the French author Marguerite Yourcenar. It is a remarkable work that has captivated readers for generations. This is the third time I have read this novel, and I hope it won't be the last. It is that kind of book that one can and should return to every decade.

Yourcenar presents us with an old and ailing Adriano in the first person, who writes a letter to the young Marco Aurelio. The protagonist attempts to offer his experience and advice to the future emperor, and in the process, he gifts us a complex and multi-faceted personality. The personality of the Roman and Hellenophile emperor, the pragmatic lover of beauty, the powerful, efficient, and dreamy man.

The book is filled with reflections that seek to bring us closer to the lights and shadows of the human condition, with its load of poetry and certain philosophical meanderings; sometimes Stoic and at times Epicurean. It is a wonderful read, but so dense that I had to leave days and sometimes weeks between sittings. That concentration of thought is not a defect but a quality, but it is so hard and precise that each portion deserves its digestion.

Memorias de Adriano rightfully plays in the same league as I, Claudius; that of historical novels that are also high literature. For wisdom, for entertainment, and for execution. It is a work that demands to be read and reread, a work that will continue to inspire and fascinate readers for years to come.

My rating: 9.2/10

Marguerite Yourcenar presents an ambitious and sympathetic inner portrait of Emperor Hadrian.

Her work offers a unique perspective on this historical figure, delving into his thoughts, emotions, and motivations.

The book is a captivating read that allows readers to gain a deeper understanding of Hadrian's complex personality.

It showcases Yourcenar's thoughtful approach to historical research and her ability to bring the past to life.

RELATED READINGS:

Empire by Alberto Angela takes readers on an exciting journey through the Roman Empire, following a coin from Scotland to Iraq.

Histoire de la Rome antique by Yann Le Bohec is a small but infinitely gorgeous miscellany about the Romans.

L'univers, les dieux, les hommes by Jean-Pierre Vernant presents Greek myths told by a renowned historian and anthropologist.

These related readings provide additional context and perspectives on the Roman Empire and ancient history.

Together, they offer a comprehensive exploration of this fascinating period.

C'est le portrait intérieur sympathique et ambitieux que Marguerite Yourcenar fait de l'empereur Hadrien, avec un certain succès à mon avis. J'ai eu beaucoup de plaisir à le lire.

Pour moi, ce livre témoigne d'une des aspirations les plus essentielles de la littérature : faire se rencontrer plusieurs subjectivités et se rencontrer à travers elles.

LIVRES AFFILIÉS:

Empire is a pretext for a voyage in the Roman Empire under Emperor Trajan, Hadrian's predecessor.

Histoire de la Rome antique is a small and charming introduction to the social, professional, and cultural life of the Romans.

L'univers, les dieux, les hommes is a delightful retelling of the founding myths of ancient Greece by Jean-Pierre Vernant.

These affiliated books complement Yourcenar's work and offer further insights into the rich tapestry of ancient history.

What are masterpieces? Let us name a few. There is the Testament of Villon, the Essays of Montaigne, the Fables of La Fontaine, the Maxims of La Rochefoucald and La Bruyère, the Fleurs du Mal and Intimate Journals of Baudelaire. In feeling, these masterpieces contain the maximum of emotion compatible with a classical sense of form. Observe how they are written. Many are short and compressed, fruits of reflective and contemplative natures, prose or poetry of great formal beauty and economy of phrase. There are no novels, plays or biographies included on the list, and the poetry is of the kind that speculates on life. They have been chosen by one who most values the art which is distilled and crystallized out of a lucid, curious and passionate imagination. All these writers enjoy something in common, “jusqu’au sombre plaisir d’un coeur mélancolique”: a sense of perfection and a faith in human dignity, combined with a tragic apprehending of the human situation, and its nearness to the Abyss.

Add Memoirs of Hadrian to Cyril Connolly’s Latinate, festal-funereal list, on which it will manifest the novel (where’s Madame Bovary?), and perhaps biography, a mode Yourcenar at once avoids and transcendently augments. Like Lolita, Memoirs of Hadrian is a model of the sustained and elaborate testamentary récit, the world told in a dying voice. Warrior-peacemaker, austere sensualist, skeptic/cultist, philosopher/mythomane, avid connoisseur of all gods and rites, of humanity’s myriad senses of the sacred, the mobile and various emperor Hadrian, “that man alone and yet closely bound with all being,” is an ideal humanist mouthpiece, Yourcenar his learned animator and prefect of “that imperial guard which poets and humanists mount in relay around any great memory”.

Hadrian wants to know where flesh becomes soul, how the experienced body becomes the soul’s knowledge and transport. Reading “the swimmer to the wave”, and another passage in which Hadrian pictures the body’s sleep as a time when the soul is washed back out into an unconscious ocean of all being, I was reminded of similar imagery in a novel I read a few weeks ago, A Single Man. Both novelists explore the consciousness of the dying animal. Borges once wrote that the powerful recurrence of human dreams is greater miracle than any of the biblical levitations or apparitions.

"I was beginning to find it natural, if not just, that we should perish." This memoir is an old man's arduous attempt to endure humanity a little longer and make his approaching death more bearable. As he contemplates on his short life and all the random yet weighty choices he has made, he realizes that it is impossible to reconcile all the contradictions in his life. Nevertheless, he endeavors to find peace in death without overly obsessing about people and things yet to be born. What alleviates his fear of death the most is the memory of the death of the beloved Antinous, who had "served to enrich but also to simplify my life." Those who enrich and simplify our lives also happen to be the ones who do the same for our death. The memory of them seems to tell us that we no longer belong to this world, and only death can reunite us with those to whom we truly belong. Hadrian/Yourcenar thinks of Homer: "And the shade of Patroclus appears at Achilles' side." The isle of Achilles, which is also the isle of Patroclus, has become a secret haven for him: "I shall doubtless be there at the moment of my death." Hadrian vaguely extends this conclusion drawn from his meditation on his own death to the impending downfall of Roman/Greek civilization as well. At a certain point, a civilization will no longer desire more refinement, success, or life, because it feels that it already belongs more to the dead than to the living.

This is an unlikely candidate to be on my all-time list of the 5 best books I've ever read. But it is.

An "autobiographical" account of a long-dead Roman emperor (not even one of the glamorous, or truly filthy ones), written by a 20th century Frenchwoman - who'd have thunk it?

And yet, I beg, I implore you - if you haven't already - buy, steal, or scrounge a copy of this book. It will draw you in.

Can't promise it will change your life. All I know is that I find myself re-reading it every two or three years. Why? Because each time I learn something more about what it is to be human.

A "sodden" cliché, but I don't know how else to put it.

This remarkable book offers a unique perspective on the life and times of a Roman emperor. Despite not being one of the more well-known or flamboyant figures, the account provides valuable insights into the human condition.

The author, a 20th century Frenchwoman, brings a fresh and unexpected voice to the story. Her writing style is engaging and captivating, drawing the reader in and making them eager to learn more.

Whether you're a history buff or simply looking for a good read, this book is definitely worth checking out. It may not be the most obvious choice for a bestseller, but it has the power to touch your heart and expand your understanding of what it means to be human.

Historians classify Hadrian among "The Five Good Emperors," together with Nerva, Trajan, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius (the intended audience for Hadrian's Memoirs). However, this sequence would be disrupted by the despicable Commodus (the son of Marcus Aurelius).

The book is extremely philosophical. It contains several favorite quotes. For instance, "Our great mistake is to try to exact from each person virtues which he does not possess, and to neglect the cultivation of those which he has."

"The true birthplace is that wherein for the first time one looks intelligently upon oneself; my first homelands have been books, and to a lesser degree schools."

"There are books which one should not attempt before having passed the age of forty."

"The written word has taught me to listen to the human voice, much as the great unchanging statues have taught me to appreciate bodily motions. On the other hand, but more slowly, life has thrown light for me on the meaning of books."

"I knew that good like bad becomes a routine, that the temporary tends to endure, that what is external permeates to the inside, and that the mask, given time, comes to be the face itself."

"I was willing to yield to nostalgia, that melancholy residue of desire."

"The founding of libraries was like constructing more public granaries, amassing reserves against a spiritual winter which by certain signs, in spite of myself, I see ahead…"

"There are three means of evaluating human existence: the study of self, the observation of humankind, and books."

No doubt, more was lost in translation from the French.

In the back of the book are the author's Recollections, where she documents, over many years, her progress, and lack of progress, in working on the book.

Manny has a nice summary of her amazing accomplishment.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Raro esempio di romanzo storico perfetto amalgama di alta letteratura, saggezza, visione profetica e cultura filosofica.

The narrator is the emperor Hadrian, already in his sixties and sick, who tells his life while interweaving existential reflections.

The narration, although supported by a highly documented historical base, has a purely existential cut, with reflections on the transience of the things of this world, on the enigmatic and profound aspect of love, with a propensity for the contemplation of nature.

The style has the beauty of a writing capable of always surprising, and intelligence often shines there like a diamond.

This novel is a unique masterpiece that combines the best of different elements. It offers readers not only a historical perspective but also deep insights into the human condition.

The character of Hadrian is brought to life in a vivid and engaging way, allowing us to understand his thoughts, feelings, and experiences.

The author's writing style is both elegant and accessible, making the novel a pleasure to read.

Overall, this is a must-read for anyone interested in historical fiction, philosophy, or simply great literature.

There is a word that constantly appears in my reading. In fact, I would say that this word is, in some way, the fundamental descriptor for the majority of my favorite books. The thing is, I can't precisely tell you what that word is or what it means. In Turkish, it's hüzün. In Korean, perhaps something close to han. In French, maybe ennui (though I'm far from satisfied with that). And in Japanese, mono no aware. None of these words mean exactly the same thing, nor do they have the same connotations or cultural usages. However, they all touch on something - something they all peek and pry at from different angles but don't fully capture. For me, the meaning of all these words is most exquisitely expressed in a Latin phrase: Lacrimae rerum, which is found in the Aeneid. My favorite translation of it (and yes, of course, I'll ignore all others) is “tears of things.” It is said by Aeneas as he gazes at a mural of the Trojan War, overcome with anger and sadness, going to a place beyond either of these emotions to... the “tears of things."

This word, whatever its meaning, does not exist in English. It requires several words to describe what it means in this language, and I think some words need to be repeated and said in the right way to convey it in the same way. But it still wouldn't work. It certainly wouldn't work in America. America is the antithesis of this word. America is founded on the promise that everyone should be free to not know what this word means, and moreover, its residents should make it a point to laugh at it when they see it. This word is considered silly, eye-roll inducing, a “stage.” In the United States, imitations and shadows of it are mostly laughable, thought of as a way to sell black lipstick to 16-year-old goth girls or let floppy-haired boys think they are James Dean for owning a leather jacket. But it doesn't really have anything to do with that. I said I was surprised that Memoirs of Hadrian isn't considered part of the canon here. But I'm not really. How could it be? The closest we get to this book is Gatsby, and Jay Gatsby's nouveau riche problems are (mostly) beside the point. Our coming-of-age novel is Catcher in the Rye. One of the French ones has a title that translates as The Lost Estate. I think the title says enough.

This is not a historical version of The Unbearable Lightness of Being that I'm pitching here. But it does have something to do with time, time and its weight. It has something to do with the last time I was in Italy. I wandered off the standard routes into the side streets and came upon an idle construction site - a building with its foundations dug out, standing on stilts, shining and new, but idle. The sign said it had been idle since the previous March because someone had found the remains of pottery, art, and other foundations from the Roman Empire. The national authorities were so backed up with other discoveries of this kind around the country that they hadn't gotten around to clearing it out, nearly a year and a half later - and this was a site near the center of Rome. It isn't just about the fact that it happened, though.

Memoirs of Hadrian is a meditation on finding a pile of pottery shards and deciding what to do with them. Your decision depends very much on what you see in them, or more precisely, who you see in them. What tale takes shape in your brain - what is relevant to be put down on paper, if you think there's anything genuine to be found or what genuine means to you, and most importantly, if perhaps you'd just as well better get on with building your office park, which is after all supported by some stilts right now and won't (and shouldn't) wait forever. Yourcenar changed her mind about her particular pile of pottery shards many times. She changed her mind so hard the first time that she burned the remains. Then she did it again, five years later. But she retained one sentence from her 1934 bonfire: “I begin to discern the profile of my death." With that sentence, she had, like a “painter who moves his easel from left to right,” found the proper viewpoint for the book. But pottery shards look different in the light of Europe, 1939. They look even more strange in 1942, in a Yale library next to newspapers whose headlines speak of many, many office parks that need to be rebuilt, and some that never will be, until one thinks of the shards “with something like shame for having ever ventured upon such an undertaking.”

But then a trunk arrives from Switzerland in 1948. It bears letters from old friends, many of whom are now dead... and one letter to someone who has been dead much longer. “Dear Mark,” it begins. Something else escaped Europe's bonfires, something she hadn't remembered she'd created at all - the beginning of another letter, from an imagined Hadrian, to his young heir, Marcus Aurelius. Somehow, it survived. And then she thought of something else to do with her pottery shards - perhaps it was time to begin putting them back together. Or better, it was time to tell the young heirs how to put them back together.

But how do you do that? How do you pick up the pieces and go on when you can't even honestly say you know where they should rightfully go? You may have lived more than thirty years trying to figure it out, immersing yourself in the craft of it until you could do it blind, but you're just guessing in the end. Aren't you painting it just a little bit shinier than it was before? Doesn't everything fit together better than it should? What should you do with this notation from a critic that says there was a crack in it from the very first time he saw it? Do you restore the cracks? Or do you have a responsibility to put the best face you can on it, to present it as the maker would have ideally wanted it to be seen? Don't the ideas matter more than the reality? Whatever the answers to these things, you have to start with the hardest task: looking the remains in the face.

“Sheltering the flame of my lamp with my hand, I would lightly touch that breast of stone. Such encounters served to complicate memory's task; I had to put aside like a curtain the pallor of the marble to go back, in so far as possible, from those motionless contours to the living form.. Again I would resume my round; the statue, once interrogated, would relapse into darkness; a few steps away my lamp would reveal another image; these great white figures differed little from ghosts. I reflected bitterly upon those magic passes whereby the Egyptian priests had drawn the soul of the dead youth into the wooden effigies… I had done like them; I had cast a spell over stones which, in their turn, had spellbound me.”

Who is the story of your life for? Why are you creating this memory for someone? Why should one more pottery shard rule someone's life, for however long? Is it only a decoration for an already grand tomb? Or, perhaps, is it one more way to make your peace with your own point of view before it too is thrown on the bonfire? Hadrian is delving into his memory as deeply as he can and fighting it at the same time. He just wants to leave advice for an heir, and it is advice that is needed more than ever. It is, after all, being left for a young man who is at most an afterthought - a lucky find after a series of disasters wherein the chosen heirs proved monstrously unworthy or have already died uselessly and horribly from an excess of virtue. He is simply the one left standing in the ashes while an old man is staring his death throes in the face and, like all his predecessors, finding it difficult to let go.

So what do you do to tell him all he should know? Someone not of your blood, who you haven't really had the education of. What you can do is tell him what happened to you - as fairly as you can, with whatever inner battles you need to fight laid open. You tell him a story. You tell him a story with as much as you can bear to tell left in, and let it go on… and on... and on. Make sure he feels the years as you build one temple after another, fall in love and out again, win one city and watch another fall. Make sure he hears about your errors, your flaws. Especially make sure to destroy the biggest positive myth about you - he must know the way it is, lest he look to myths for support when you are gone and find nothing but air. You may have constructed gods, but he will need to support them and say why they are there, in order for them to live on. You should temper the worst tales about you, but not too much - it is better if he finds out for himself that you've no need to protest your innocence. He must feel your despair, your Spenglerian conviction that the Faustian wintertime has come, that there is nothing more to be done:

“I was beginning to find it natural, if not just, that we should perish. Our literature is nearing exhaustion, our arts are falling asleep. Pancrates is not Homer, nor is Arrian a Xenophon; when I have tried to immortalize Antonious in stone, no Praxiteles has come to hand. Our sciences have been at a standstill… our technical development is inadequate…even our pleasure seekers grow weary of delight… the masses remain wholly ignorant, fierce and cruel when they can be so, and in any case limited and selfish…”

He'll read these words, words from the mouth of a generation so far removed from his own, brought up with such wildly different expectations and knowledge about the world, irrevocably shattered by events that they could not conceive of… It could almost make you laugh with relief to read this and then think of Michelangelo's angels screaming out of the marble. Then, almost unnecessarily, you can tell him that:

“Life is atrocious, we know. But precisely because I expect little of the human condition, man's periods of felicity, his partial progress, his efforts to begin over again and to continue, all seem to me like so many prodigies which nearly compensate for the monstrous mass of ills and defeats, of indifference and error. Catastrophe and ruin will come; disorder will triumph, but order will too, from time to time. Peace will again establish itself between two periods of war; the words humanity, liberty, and justice will here and there regain the meaning which we have tried to give them. Not all our books will perish, nor our statues, if broken, lie unrepaired; other domes and other pediments will arise from our domes and pediments; some few men will think and work and feel as we have done, and I venture to count upon such continuations, placed irregularly throughout the centuries, and upon this kind of intermittent immortality.”

That is how you make a memory without burden - to reconcile Catcher and The Lost Estate after all. If you cannot do it, someone else will. To paraphrase Stoppard: we die on the march, but nothing is outside of it and nothing can be lost to it. If a sixteen-year-old math prodigy does not make calculus known to the world, another man, not long later, will do it. The weight of these statues, these ghosts, is not your obligation. They are there for those who need to look at them and find themselves in their shadows, and that is all. Time can continue to pile down minute by minute, but you are not its prisoner. Merely a welcome guest, who may stay as long as you like. If you do not choose to walk in Time's garden, your loss will not bring haunting down upon you in another, New, world - there will be enough who choose to stay. Those who do stay will not be unmarked by it, and those who leave will be the same with their choice - we can but choose and choose and choose again. We are what we consistently do. What Time throws up for notice enough times to be remembered.

…There is an epilogue, though. Of course there is. Telling him the essential information to get through the day isn't enough. Not even telling him a story and setting him free. No - he needs to know why you got up every morning - he needs to know about the lacunae between the temple building and warring in the desert. He has to know why he should listen to you. Digressions, pauses, and footnotes make the man, and the boy you are reading to knows that better than anyone, or he will, by the time he finishes this. So tell him about how heaven is the constellations in the Syrian night, about the wind whispering out of the sands of Judea, about the memory of an old man in a garden in Spain. He needs to know about women you cherished and men you hated. But most of all, most of all, he needs to know about the man you loved, how you loved him, and for how long - how you thought of him more and more as death came close. How Love seemed to be the way your story would end. But it wasn't. We end with only ourselves. History is in the last line of this book - what Hadrian dies with is why History exists and should exist and we should all remember, and yes, beat on, boats against the current, borne ceaselessly back into the past.

Why did I take so long to read this masterpiece?!

I'm going to initially blame Santiago Posteguillo. I'm an avid reader of this writer's work and deeply loved his Trajan trilogy. In that work, Hadrian, Trajan's successor and the protagonist of the memoirs written by Yourcenar, doesn't come off very well, so to speak. It was this negative image that kept me away from this book for several years.

Big mistake! Fortunately, I corrected it!

The almost journalistic realism of a rigorous writer like Posteguillo is one thing, and the incredible literary craftsmanship of Yourcenar's work is quite another.

While Santiago entertains and informs, Marguerite, with no less erudition, turns the reflections of an aging Caesar, his passions, his loves, the political and historical events of his tumultuous era, even the most prosaic aspects of the protagonist's daily life and those of his close ones, almost into poetry.

"Memoirs of Hadrian" is an immortal work that I hope to reread many times. Because of it, I've created a shelf here on GoodReads dedicated solely to the books I want to reread.

On almost every page, I found a profound thought, an accurate reflection, all beautifully achieved. The level of descriptions is so great, the realism of the words, the events, the characters is so high that it's really easy to forget that the memoirs were written by a 20th-century woman and not by an ancient emperor in the 2nd century after Christ.

Truly masterful!

Now, a warning.

Reading Yourcenar is not easy. This is not a book for everyone. It's not an entertaining chronicle nor a light book of reflections. Yourcenar's erudition often leads her in these memoirs to delve into details that overwhelm even the most patient enthusiast.

The thread of the story is quite convoluted: there are temporal leaps back and forth that make the reading confusing and, although they also give it a touch of realism and make it seem like real memoirs, they can make the enjoyment of the work heavy. I've seen these same characteristics in other works of the author.

The book is also more enjoyable when one knows and appreciates the history of Rome and Greece. It's not a book to start reading about these topics. I highly recommend first reading Posteguillo's Trajan Trilogy.

The final notes that come with the book are almost as entertaining as the content of the memoirs itself. The author reveals to us some of the vicissitudes she lived during the more than 20 years that the book circulated in her mind: how she started and abandoned it several times, some even making part of her writings pass through fire; or the moment when, after many comings and goings, she finally decided to finish it.

The historical notes at the end also offer an incredible look inside the work of a historical novelist of the level of Marguerite Yourcenar.

I was left with only one question: why didn't Marguerite Yourcenar win a Nobel Prize?

Surely "Memoirs of Hadrian" would have been enough to deserve it.

I couldn't leave without having read this majestic work by Marguerite Yourcenar. It is a beautiful and epic biographical tale, written as a long letter from the Roman emperor Hadrian to his successor Marcus Aurelius. The penetrating and awe-inspiring prose sometimes overflows my sensibility; it is a glory among the glories of 20th-century Western literature, whose genesis dates back to 1924 and which did not see the light until the middle of the 20th century.

Undoubtedly, this epistolary tale is bound to be one of the masterpieces that will accompany me for the rest of my days. Perhaps I am being carried away by an impression that still beats within me and I am forgetting the memorial, the past that now seems less close to my senses. I am certain that we tend to lean towards the most immediate because it is what impresses our senses most vividly at the present moment. However, trying to be objective – which is no easy task in these matters – I do passionately believe that it is a masterful work that I will always keep in my memory and in my heart. And if we still lived in those times of superstitions and occultism when the dead were buried with the objects that would be useful to them in their afterlife, this book should be within my reach among my favorite personal effects, destined to accompany me in my final abode.

As the author herself mentions, there are books that one should not dare to read until the age of forty for several reasons. I believe this is one of them, at least for me. Seventeen years late, but I arrived at it. Everything comes at its due time and Hadrian patiently waited for me from glorious Rome and almost 2,000 years ago, just as every important event in each person's life does: they present themselves at the right moment. This work has come into my life like a kind of oracle.

A long and introspective letter that Hadrian addresses to Marcus Aurelius, wrapped in an intense poetic glow and inflamed by the most vital of philosophies that Marguerite Yourcenar delicately and masterfully chisels throughout the entire work. The narrative touches on various themes of the events of those glorious times of the Roman Empire in the second century AD; all of it described under the wise gaze and poured out by the passionate hand of Hadrian, who was more than a megalomaniac emperor, he was a man in love with life.

The narrative shows us how Hadrian becomes emperor, tells us in an exquisite and detailed way his adventures and maneuvers on the throne, his struggles, his goals, the measures he took to try to govern an empire that was hitherto feared so that it would be less unjust, less cruel and more human. It tells us about his battles, his loyalties, his ideas and his worldview. But it also tells us in detail about his inner self, his affections, his fears, his ideals and, towards the end, his doubts, his fears and his certainties about death: “…my little soul, guest and friend of my body, where will you now dwell? Let us try to enter death with our eyes open.”

Contrary to what the previous emperors had been, Hadrian tries not to be unjust or abuse his power. His policy is based not on the expansion of the empire at the cost of more wars and human lives, but on consolidating and pacifying the regions that he already dominates. Known as the traveling emperor, Hadrian undertakes great and long journeys to calm and order his empire. He is aware that it is a unique opportunity for him and for Rome to transform the world and for this he promotes and cultivates qualities, both in society and in general customs as well as in himself, qualities such as moderation, freedom, equity and justice.

His dedication to tasks of great depth does not prevent him from striving to achieve a spiritual formation that will lead him to be himself. There is also a brief mention of how he confronts the enlightenment of Roman culture, nourished by Greek wisdom, with the relatively new religion of Christianity, questioning some of its postulates in that remote era during which this religion had practically just been born.

The development and conception of this work has been the product of a titanic intellectual effort as well as of profound documentation and study, as well as of a great process of introspection carried out by the author. A transportation into the interior of another person, all of it guided towards a descent into the most impenetrable depths of that other human soul and then gathering monumental forces to have the ability to come out with a single impulse from those depths towards the exterior of that being and be able to manifest itself in the way that it does: through the soul and the senses of the great emperor Hadrian. Astonishing!

Under the delicious prose of Yourcenar, Hadrian, an avowed extremely Hellenized man, struggles and prostrates himself before themes that leave us an intense and edifying reflection of those years and of that culture and we conclude that, two thousand years later, the bottom of the well remains the same, only the dense and deep waters have changed in form and sometimes in intensity.

A beautiful book of those that leave an indelible mark, of those that will always come to our memory when we are asked about our favorite books; it is that kind of book that becomes a beloved homeland and from which a kind of affectionate embrace emanates, a special warmth that can only be replicated by very dear beings and by special entities that inhabit the world such as books and music.

This work will be one of those personal and sacred symbols that are constituted over time in the dearest memories and whose trace never disappears. I only hope that the curious and unpredictable subterfuges of forgetfulness do not play a bad trick on me.

Among all the wise reflections full of philosophy, wisdom and clairvoyance that Hadrian makes during his letter, I could stay with many, many of them truly, but there is only space for one now:

“Above all, I wanted to be myself before dying…”

The translation by Roberto Mares Ochoa is simply exquisite and captures all the splendor of Marguerite Yourcenar's narrative. Likewise, at the end of this edition there are some very illustrative notes by the author about the genesis and the transformations that the work underwent in order to see the light.

Als deze man niet de vrede in de wereld had bewaard en de economie van het rijk had vernieuwd, zouden zijn persoonlijke geluk en ongeluk mij minder interesseren.

His story is not just about personal joys and sorrows. It is much more than that. It is an obsession and a deed of love that manifests as a great novel about a person who is acting, responsible, doubting, passionate, and wise, right in the center of the world.

This historical novel belongs to the best and most worthy books that I have ever read. It is not because of the historical subject matter alone. It is because of the wisdom it contains and because of the superior classical style, which is superbly translated by Jenny Tuin. But above all, it is because of the wisdom.

The wisdom within these pages offers profound insights into human nature, society, and the choices we make. It makes us reflect on our own lives and the impact we can have on the world around us.

This novel is a true masterpiece that will stay with you long after you have turned the last page. It is a must-read for anyone who appreciates great literature and the power of wisdom.

Exceptionally!

Marguerite Yourcenar managed to capture the rhythm and tone of the thoughts of the Roman emperor Hadrian, so that all of this seems authentic. Calmly summing up his life, aware of transience and approaching death, Hadrian is presented to us as both a citizen and a philosopher and a humanist (within the framework of the then social norms, of course). Intrigues, conspiracies, some military movements are also mentioned, but the greater focus is on Hadrian's inner life and his introspection. A brilliant book for slow savoring.