"One of the greatest gestures of love in contemporary Italian literature."
Sabina Minardi, El Espresso Magazine
On a summer morning in 415 BC, four boys sit on a rock jutting above the port of Piraeus. The screeching of cicadas drowns out the whispers of the crowd. There is a festive atmosphere, but the specter of war looms on the horizon, so the four boys remain silent, lost in their thoughts. Among them was a 12-year-old boy, who showed signs of fever.His name is Aristocles, and five years later, because of his broad shoulders, he will bear a name destined for immortality: Plato. And next to him, on that fateful morning, stands the man telling his story. This story. love story.
What you have in your hands is an honest story. A novel that redraws, for the first time, the biography of the greatest philosophers in history. A shy, irritable child, he mourns the early death of his father. He is controlled by his mother, who is present everywhere, and is cared for by his sister, who accompanies him on his journey without revealing it. The boy looks closely at the events of his time with sharp eyes.He witnesses, in amazement, the defeat of Athens at the hands of Sparta.
His uncles invite him to participate in a bloody political process, but he refuses. He meets Socrates, the strangest man in Athens, and devotes himself to philosophy with him. But philosophy is not enough for him; Socrates is sentenced to death. Then Plato sets out for Cyrene and Egypt in search of his way. It will be a straight and winding road at the same time.But what distinguishes it is Eros, the sensual love experienced with dissolute boys and men with brilliant minds, universal love, and sublime passion, the most powerful engine of the human spirit.
In his distinctive style, Matteo Nucci presents us with an immortal novel, the result of years of study and healthy obsession, which manages to make us once again go beyond the shadow line of literature, making our experience as readers an epic, exciting and enlightening chapter of life.In Plato, we discover a man constantly striving for justice and happiness, the “athlete of the soul.” After following his pain, his failures and his emotions, we will find ourselves at the end of this captivating read changed: profoundly changed thanks to a philosophical writer who is able to challenge every cliché to give us the opportunity to constantly rethink the way we live the time that has been given to us.
Love always, forever. Fight for justice with all your love. From two to one. Earth and sky. Nothing else can be done.
