These questions are at the core of The dream of Scipio by Iain Pears, an absolutely beautiful book.
It is set
in France, in the Provence in the area around Avignon, in three different
historical periods.
At the end
of the 5th century Manlius Hippomanus saw the world change. He was a
well educated Roman nobleman and the Roman Empire was almost at its end. There
was hardly any government left, there was no more infrastructure and trade
almost disappeared.
Manlius was
interested in philosophy and he was taught by Sofia, a philosopher from
Alexandria.
He was
determined to withdraw from the world and surround himself with his books and
philosophy, but Sofia convinced him he should play a part in making the
situation better.
At that moment
the only organization with some authority was the Catholic Church and Manlius
takes the offer of becoming the bishop of Vaison, even though he is not a
Christian and he has little patience for what he sees as illogical nonsense.
For him, becoming bishop was purely the means to an end.
In 1322
Olivier de Noyen was born in Vaison. His father wanted him to become a lawyer,
but Oliver had no patience for the law, he wanted to write poems. He joined the
household of cardinal Ceccani, at the papal court in Avignon. By coincidence
Olivier read a text by Cicero and this stirred his interest in ancient writers.
He wanted to discover more of these texts and the cardinal often send Olivier
on missions to find them.
At a
certain point Olivier found a text called The dream of Scipio, written by Saint
Manlius, the bishop of Vaison. It was a summary
of philosophical ideas and Olivier did not really understood it all, but the
Jewish scholar rabbi ben Gershon helped him to understand the text.
In the
meanwhile the pest broke out in Avignon, and the Jews were blamed. Olivier gets
involved because he is in love with the rabbi ben Gershon’s servant girl,
Rebecca, and he has to make some difficult choices.
Finally, in
the 20th century Julian Barneuve lives in Vaison. He is a historian who
researched bishop Manlius and Olivier de Noyen, because he found a 14th
century copy by Oliver of the text Manlius wrote.
When the
second world war broke out, the Provence was under the Vichy regime. Julian was determined not to let Barbary get the upperhand, he had seen how horrible that could be in the first world war. An old schoolfriend asks him to join the Vichy-regime and despite himself, Julian finds himself working as the head of the department for the Censorhsip, while he also tries to keep the woman he loves, the Jewish artist Julia, safe.
Each of
these three men had to make a choice; what do you do and which side do you
choose?
In a
masterly way Iain Pears combines
these three stories, in the place where they live, how their lives cross
sometimes and the women they love. Each of these men has different motives for the choice they make and you think very long about these men and who made the right choice and why.
The title
is from a manuscript that Manlius wrote, and he copied it from Cicero. In The dream of Scipio Cicero wrote
about how Scipio Africanus looked at the world and the society and the way
people should behave.
The dream of Scipio is a beautiful historical novel. The three periods in history are well written and come to live. The characters are definitely not one-dimensional but have all kinds of different traits, good and bad.
Very beautifully is also shown how facts change during the course of time, as what happened with Sofia shows.
I read this
book in 2002 and re-read it again a few weeks ago. Again I was gripped by these
three stories, the way Iain Pears
combines them all and the moral implications of each story. Again the story
stayed in my mind for a long time, thinking about the choices I would make or
would like to make in situations like that. I am afraid I still don’t know for
sure, but this is probably something you never know for sure.
Published
in 2002
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