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A review by tildahlia
Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar
2.0
A few caveats:
1. I'm not really that interested in the Roman Empire.
2. I can see why people love this book.
3. I did not love this book.
So, given my first caveat I suspect many wonder why I chose to read this book. I stumbled upon it on Goodreads and the reviews were just so raving, I thought I'd give it a spin. Before you all lynch me for knocking Your Favourite Book Of All Time, as I concede in caveat 2, I get why y'all love it. The prose is lush and elegant and it comes across as a well researched, insightful summation of Hadrian's life. I wanted to love it, I really did. But it was just too self-aggrandizing (I'm such a cool progressive guy!) and frankly, boring for my palate and by page 130 I really had to psych myself up to open it up. Perhaps this is attributable to caveat 1, but two stars from me.
1. I'm not really that interested in the Roman Empire.
2. I can see why people love this book.
3. I did not love this book.
So, given my first caveat I suspect many wonder why I chose to read this book. I stumbled upon it on Goodreads and the reviews were just so raving, I thought I'd give it a spin. Before you all lynch me for knocking Your Favourite Book Of All Time, as I concede in caveat 2, I get why y'all love it. The prose is lush and elegant and it comes across as a well researched, insightful summation of Hadrian's life. I wanted to love it, I really did. But it was just too self-aggrandizing (I'm such a cool progressive guy!) and frankly, boring for my palate and by page 130 I really had to psych myself up to open it up. Perhaps this is attributable to caveat 1, but two stars from me.