Let's see, if you include the unofficial book club meeting last summer, then this is our 26th book. I've read 25 of them (chose to not go to a book club meeting out of state). Unless I'm forgetting something, Memoirs of Hadrian was absolutely the toughest one to get through. I'm not saying it was the worst (I can think of at least one other one I liked less), and I'm not saying that it's going to be a bad discussion because of it (indeed, sometimes the worse books inspire the better discussions). But I am saying that these past ten days with Memoirs of Hadrian were fucking rough. There wasn't a single point in which I lost myself to the book. Every page, every word felt like a chore.
The premise of the book is that these are letters written by the Roman Emperor Hadrian to his adopted grandson and future emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Hadrian gives an account of his life, as well as offers up some philosophical and emotional thoughts, as his life gradually comes to an end. The endless details of Hadrian's tasks and accomplishments as leader were so dry and uninventive—I'm assuming the 30-page note from the author at the end explained that much of it was historically accurate, based on all accounts we have about Hadrian, but I did not read those 30 pages, because I was tapped out by the end of the book proper.
The philosophical thoughts were intriguing and occasionally thought-provoking. I feel like I stacked up a bunch of them in my phone memo, and I can picture much of them fueling the discussion, which is good. I'd venture to say that, through the act of writing them down and then talking about them today, I'm going to remember some Hadrian quotes for a long, long time. Which is impressive of a book that I did not enjoy!
Still, picking through a bloated and droll book for choice quotes is no way to read a novel. It's not fun! We can salvage the pieces afterward and making it palatable, but it does not make for a pleasant experience while reading. It's like the childhood game hide-and-go-seek-in-the-dark. Most of the time spent in that game is disorienting, with occasional physical contact with another being, but totally at random and mostly by accident.
It's possible that my feelings about my reading experience (as echoed, I have to imagine, by other members of book club, but we'll see) have something to do with the fact that this novel was published in 1951. Many empires have risen and fallen in the 74 years since its release, and it could just be that our modern sensibilities as readers in 2025 are just not in tune with a book written so long ago. I struggled through Shakespeare too, not because it "wasn't good," but because the style shift from what I was used to was just too much for me to handle. Plus, add the fact that this is a 1951 book that is supposed to be historically accurate to a letter that would have been written in 138 A.D. It's probably closer, stylistically, to 1951, but still, the context and setting do it no favors.
It's possible that my feelings about my reading experience (as echoed, I have to imagine, by other members of book club, but we'll see) have something to do with the fact that this novel was published in 1951. Many empires have risen and fallen in the 74 years since its release, and it could just be that our modern sensibilities as readers in 2025 are just not in tune with a book written so long ago. I struggled through Shakespeare too, not because it "wasn't good," but because the style shift from what I was used to was just too much for me to handle. Plus, add the fact that this is a 1951 book that is supposed to be historically accurate to a letter that would have been written in 138 A.D. It's probably closer, stylistically, to 1951, but still, the context and setting do it no favors.
My final thought has to do with "modern sensibilities" as well. I think that maybe readers like us, short-attention-spanned millennials, are less inclined to be invested in a book that doesn't have a strong narrative as the engine. I won't go as far as saying that "nothing happened" in Memoirs of Hadrian, but the focus was absolutely more on the thoughts and feelings of the author of the letters, as opposed to the story of that author's life. If a book amounts to a stack of philosophical musings, then your modern-day reader might be inclined, subconsciously perhaps, to dismiss it, since you can get your musings for free on the internet, and in brighter colors.
Anyways, I'm glad to be done this, and I'm excited to talk about it.
GRADE: 2 pukes out of 5
BOOK CLUB DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
(**SPOILERS!!!!!!)
1. Does it weaken or strengthen the book that we start with Hadrian close to death, and circle back to it by the end?
1. Does it weaken or strengthen the book that we start with Hadrian close to death, and circle back to it by the end?
2. Did the author of Memoirs of Hadrian, Marguerite Yourcenar, have an agenda? Did she, for example, use this mostly historical account to make a case for pacificism, anti-consumerism, etc.?
3. Do you agree with Hadrian when he said that challenges and even torture are bearable if you give your whole self to them?
4. Was Hadrian clear sense of empathy effectively portrayed? E.g. his anti-war stance being formed by his disgusted feelings about stepping over dead bodies on the battlefield.
5. Hadrian's sexuality was made pretty clear without him ever actually defining it. How do you think this was handled? About as well as it could have in 1951, perhaps? Or could the author have been even more daring?
6. To echo a Hadrian question: is courage defined as being cool and detached, or is it defined as a wild recklessness toward life?
7. Not really a question, more a choice quote. When Hadrian writes about how Trajan chose him to be the next emperor: "One of those series of events which will forever be impossible for me to reconstruct, and upon which nevertheless my destiny has been built."
8. Same for this. "All nations who have perished up to this time have done so for lack of generosity."
9. What do make of the references to Judea, Palestine? As well as Jesus, and the "possibility" of a bishop making Rome his capital? Do they stick out in their obvious attempts at the author hinting at history? Or just the sign of a wise emperor?
10. Wait, was Hadrian supposed to be a good person, according to historians? Would knowing literally anything about Roman history have helped me in liking this book?
10. Wait, was Hadrian supposed to be a good person, according to historians? Would knowing literally anything about Roman history have helped me in liking this book?
11. What was the best part of the book? For my money, it was the grieving after the death of Antonous.
BONUS: How likely, from a scale of 1 to 10, is it that, when Puke on Your Birthday finally calls it quits, the final post will somehow incorporate the following Memoirs of Hadrian quote? "It made me vomit, but the experience had been tried."
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