THE DREAM OF SCIPIO

Pears, Iain

ISBN 10: 0224060163 / ISBN 13: 9780224060165

Published by Jonathan Cape Ltd, London, 2002

About this Item

First U. K. edition, first printing, hardcover. Black cloth with gilt lettering on spine. 393 pages. Fine with pages age toned, in a fine, mylar-covered dust jacket.

Seller Inventory # 133311

Bibliographic Details

• Title: THE DREAM OF SCIPIO
• Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd, London
• Publication Date: 2002
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0224060163
• ISBN 13: 9780224060165
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First U. K. Edition
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Fine

About this title

Synopsis

The Dream of Scipio, lain Pears' first mainstream novel since An Instance of the Fingerpost, is a work of astonishing ambition that appeals equally to the head and heart. It is set in Provence at three different critical moments of Western Civilisation - the collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century, the Black Death in the fourteenth, and the Second World War in the twentieth - and follows the fortunes of three men, Manlius Hippomenes, a Gallic aristocrat obsessed with the preservation of Roman civilisation, Guilaume Noyen, a poet, and Julien Barneuve, an intellectual who joins the Vichy government. The story of each man is woven through the narrative, linked by the classical text that gives the book its title, and by each man's love for an extraordinary woman. Dense, dark, erudite and yet, like The Instance of the Fingerpost, utterly compelling, The Dream of Scipio confirms lain Pears as one of Britain's most imaginative novelists.

About the Author

Iain Pears was born in 1955. Educated at Wadham College, Oxford, he has worked as a journalist, an art historian and a television consultant. He is the author of seven highly praised detective novels, a book of art history and countless articles on artistic, financial and historical subjects, and An Instance of the Fingerpost.