L'Oeuvre au Noir

This is a very interesting novel and I enjoyed reading it. I found a reference to it in a museum in Paris. It has also been published in translation to English. Its English title is The Abyss. I haven't been able to find more of her French writing but that would probably make her happy. She eventually left France and moved to New England saying that the french are not interested in fiction anymore. She also predicted that French would completely die out by 2030 since French writers are only interested in style (meaning fashion I believe) now.

L'Oeuvre au Noir by Marguerite Yourcenar: Lovely story capable of transporting you to the sites! Excellent writing with a beautiful and concise language. Almost poetic though epic too. Good research about European history!! And for the non native french speakers, an excellent opportunity to learn new words and beautiful expressions! I recommend it without restrictions!

Amazing book in good conditions

The French title of the book is taken from the vocabulary of Alchemy; it refers to the stage of putrefaction of matter when it disassembles to its basic elements, before the process of sublimation to the more advanced stages can take place.Europe in the 16th century is divided by the iron curtain of religion, Zenon born in the Lowlands, the bastard son of a noble Florentine and a Flemish young woman, is an erudite free man, a philosopher, physician and a relentless questioner. He has travelled the world, studied at the Sorbonne and served in the courts of Sweden and the Ottomans while the Lowlands are under Spanish rule and the Inquisition is fervently seeking its victims. In his 6th decade of life, he returns to Bruges under a false name, turns an inherited house into a hospital for poor people where he serves, and embarks on the last phase of his life. In his role of physician, he is an observer, an experimental scientist and a helper without prejudice. He travels back to Greek thought elaborated by Arab savants then imagines the future advances of the sciences and their applications, he can also guess the limitations of their overall significance for the overall human enterprise.Throughout the book, the darkness of the times is contrasted by the brilliance of Zenon's mind and the flexibility of his ideas. The nature of man is his main topic of investigation. His own thoughts, feelings, tastes and complex and sometimes contradictory positions are sources for his nuanced conclusions.As a youngster, he had been given a rigorous religious education, his teachers whom he encounters later in life are still proud of his magnificent intellectual abilities, though he has long abandoned the limits they have set for themselves. He has the courage of freedom and by force is judged a heretic.Zenon's tragedy finally is the tragedy of a man of his times, strangely not different from ours: the tragedy of an individual life lived with the relentless courage of lucidity in the midst of powerful currents of tyranny, intellectual and spiritual compromise, and cowardice.

L'opera al nero è di sicuro in corso; si tratta di valutare quanto non sia stata invece già compiuta. È il prodotto degli alchimisti del potere capitalista e che hanno realizzato il capolavoro di due guerre mondiali. La signora Yourcenar sembra avere scritto soltanto un romanzo storico; in parte è vero, ma nella misura in cui fa la storia dell'irresistibile voluttà di distruzione dell'homo cristianus occidentalis. È un'opera peraltro troppo complessa per farne una sinossi. Ognuno poi è libero di attenersi solo alla superficie narrativa e leggerla per la "storia". Gl'è che di preciso storia non ne racconta. Un romanzo da meditazione, come il suo omologo "Memorie di Adriano"

Il n'y a pas à dire, Yourcenar savait écrire. Chaque mot est choisi, chaque phrase ciselée, rien n'est superflu, les références abondent ... Mais la lecture est parfois ardue : certaines appartés philosophiques sont difficiles à suivre tellement la barre est haute. L'intrigue est néanmoins fort intéressante dans cette période troublée de guerres de religions où chacun pensait avoir plus raison que son voisin.

On sent l'œuvre d'une sybarite qui traverse la vie en dilettante et pond une perle. La lecture achevée je me dis qu'il faudrait qu'un jour je revienne sur deux des chapitres de haute volée du roman: " la conversation à Innsbruck" et " la visite du chanoine ". Sinon Yourcenar nous réconcilie avec l'emploi du subjonctif imparfait. Une perle noire!

Passionnant, un récit qui nous plonge dans la renaissance et ses turpitudes dans la tête d’un personnage totalement fictif mais que Marguerite Yourcenar nous rend tellement réel. Bien écris quelques références et parfois, un dictionnaire, peuvent être utile à sa lecture.

Un gros zéro