Rating: 
Summary: The Author Makes Presumptions
Review: All writers make certain decisions about the potential readers of their work. "The Dream Of Scipio", is unlike any other work that Iain Pears has offered his readers. He places this work only alongside, "An Instance At The Fingerpost". His others 7 novels are omitted from the list of books he has written, which is an interesting insight as to how the author views his work. He evidently feels he writes for two distinct groups. I would not have agreed with the two lists until I read his latest work. The questions to ask prior to reading this book is how much do you know about many of history's great philosophers, and how much do you enjoy reading philosophy? Religion in the form of Christianity, Judaism, perceived heretics, Mary Magdalen, and St. Sophia all play a role as well. Aristotle, Salon, Cicero, Catullus, Vergil, Horace, and Ovid to add a few more names to the list.As in his previous work we are given three viewpoints although this time they are not from different views of a single event, but three periods of time when there is a great crisis at hand. There is some mingling as the most recent time period of World War II is represented by Julien Barneuve, a frustrated historian trying to sort out what he believes are errors in the historical record surrounding, "The Dream Of Scipio". His problems are far more severe for while he tries to gain answers to the most fundamental of life's questions, he decides to work for the Vichy Government. By just agreeing to work for them he becomes as loathsome as history has judged this government. Three women also take center stage in these time periods and their choice of identity will give you an indication of how complex these stories become. During World War II the woman is Jewish and trying to exist as if she is not, being French is meaningless as France shipped off her own citizens to the camps. A love affair with a Vichy government official is dicey to put it mildly. Then there is the woman who during her time period is labeled a Heretic who lives with a Rabbi and pretends to be Jewish when she is not. And finally a woman who pretty much sets herself up as a female Plato destined to corruptd the young. Just as with the first woman the other two also have made matches or attachments that are impossible at best. The jacket on the novel puts the questions that will be explored in the book in addition to others so I will not repeat them here. "Power without wisdom is tyranny; wisdom without power is pointless", pretty much sums up the conflict that Mr. Pears explores. There is no question that the book is very well written and equally well executed. I don't believe it will succeed as; "Fingerpost" did for it is a bit too presumptuous. There is also nothing subtle about what is right and wrong when choices are needed, what is terribly wrong is that people are making those choices.
Rating:
Summary: Good historical fiction
Review: This book asks us to consider what constitutes virtue, moral expediency, and the definition of "good deed" by the example of three men, all from the same town in southeastern france, at three different and widely separated moments of social crisis. In each time period a breakdown of social order forces each of the book's three protagonists to draw upon their own personal beliefs to make difficult choices and each character goes on to make slightly different choices, based as much on their personal character as well as their convictions and values, with the attendant consequences.
Others have summarized the plot very well so I won't repeat that here. I found this book to be above average fare but be forewarned...it is far more complex than Pears' mysteries and has a..., for lack of better words - Dickensesque quality of switching back and forth between multiple storylines, chapter by chapter. Also although one can admire the three main characters to a certain extent one also develops a sense of disaster on the horizon as the stories unfold. I must admit to throwing it down on the floor next to the bed when finishing it at 1AM but the next few days as I mulled it over a bit more I began to reconsider some of the themes. That's always a good sign when it sticks with me for a few days after or challenges me in some way. I recommend it if you like historical fiction.
Rating: 
Summary: Erudite performance
Review: This book is a bequest to the intellectual from Pears. I believe Pears did not write The Dream of Scipio for the satisfaction of the masses or the publisher but for self preservation of the deliberations he as a human being has evoluted through.
The disappointment of our human existence is the continued, unabashed and brazen repetition of history. This elegant prose from Pears expounds on this mere fact through the ages, from varied angles, so as to break through to the masses of a diverse readership that we are. What survives is... as related in the book forces and pierces through the thick fog of severe indoctrinated thinking enforced through religion, through social or cultural customs or through a falsified dictatorial and misguided existentialist thinking… that love… and purity of it live on. Further disappointment enforced from The Dream of Scipio is that our human recognition is limited to the here and now. The comprehension of the act, of the event of love does not register till generations have passed.
Read, and reread… and rejoice in the purity of complex expression!
NOTE: I have taken the privilege to define “the process of evolving” in the word “evoluted”.
Rating:
Summary: Labors of Love
Review: When I come across books such as 'The Dream of Scipio' lying in a discounted novel pile, or a remainders bin...it saddens me to see the top of the bestseller list crowded with the Koontzs, Steeles, and Grishams, while some books languish into oblivion, because they require more than a few moments to read and interpret.
I could attempt to give a high-brow review to this book, but it is just plainly a good read. Not being overly versed in the history of the French Revolution, nor of the time of the black plague, I cannot define what is accurate and what isn't. However, this does not detract from the enjoyment of Pears' novel.
Set in three historical eras, the two aforementioned, and World War 2, the story weaves back and forth between the stories of three men...Manlius Flavius, Olivier De Moyen, and Julien Barneuve, all touched by the love of extraordinary women, and bound together by an ancient manuscript, 'The Dream of Scipio', by Prospero Cicero.
While the manuscript itself is not really a plot point, in my opinion, it is a strong enough thread to tie the three tales together with.
The depth of love that these men feel, as well as their senses of right and wrong, honor, and duty, compell them to take actions that could/do lead to their downfall, and to great loss. Each is faced with an 'impossible' choice, and must only follow their heart.
Out of this trio of tales, the one that touched me the most was that of Julien Barneuve, set in the WW2 portion of the novel, for various reasons. To list them would give away too much of the ending of the novel, so I will refrain.
Again, there are many complexities to this book which will invariably drive people who want 'quick fix' reading away from it...which is regrettable, as it is a fine read, captivating from start to finish, and a gem of a historical story.
Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: It's just so different from his other books
Review: I've read Iain Pears' art history mysteries and thought Dream would be similar, with perhaps a dash of Da Vinci Code thrown in. I just couldn't get into the book, but then I'm not the intellectual type who enjoys philosophy. It's likely that if you admire Jonathan & Flavia you won't like this one.
Rating:
Summary: A book to get you thinking. Deep.
Review: The title of Iain Pears book refers to an ancient manuscript by the philosopher Cicero. This is appropriate for "The Dream of Scipio", which is hardly a novel in the traditional sense. Rather, it serves as a vehicle for some interesting questions and ideas. Pears introduces 3 main characters - men living in Provence in different periods of history - to explore the concept of civilisation and what it means. To him, it means freedom from the struggle of daily survival, and the time and energy to think, learn and discuss the world. The time periods chosen represent cultures known for promoting such pursuits: the Roman Empire, Renaissance Europe and early 20th Century France. And yet all of these civilisations are under threat at the time the novel is set - through slow decline, invasion by the Nazis or the random scourge of the Black Death. Pears looks at how the three men each weigh up the importance of friendship and human life (raw emotive instincts) against the "higher" ideals of philosophy based on rational thinking. He shows us that these are not always separate issues, and that sitting on the fence can destroy both.
While I admired the ideas this novel tried to convey to me, I am not schooled in philosophy and I sometimes found myself annoyed that there weren't any answers to the questions I was forced to ask, and that just when I had worked something out, there seemed to be a contradiction to that very principle (but I guess that's the nature of philosophy). I wouldn't recommend this as a novel to entertain based on plot. It is designed to get you thinking. Be prepared to ponder its precepts long after you finish.
Rating:
Summary: The plot is going nowhere
Review: I admire history and philosophy. I have an excellent knowledge of the Roman history, and love the times of Medieval Europe, but the book has disappointed me so dearly, that I was thinking to leave it on the shelf unread. I am struggling with reading despite reachness of language (1 star) and interesting characters (2nd star). But the way the plot (what plot?) is constructed, and the story is followed, the book is uninteresting and one stops caring about heros and heroines, and looks for something else to be hooked on. I could not find so far anything exciting, and maybe this novel should not be treated as a beach reading, I thought, I would have been smitten at least by historical landscape and philosophical mystery. I dare to say, you won't find any of that stuff.
Rating:
Summary: Not really a novel -- more of a didactic exercise
Review: I had difficulty connecting to this book because it seems purposely designed to be more of a didactic exercise or an intellectual puzzle than a novel. The key to the puzzle is the title - the book plays out the theme of the actual "Dream of Scipio" by Cicero. Cicero posits that men are placed on earth to pursue "virtue," rather than fame, and that only if they have been successful will their spark of divine fire return to its source. If they are unsuccessful, their divine spark will remain on earth, presumably passing from body to body until the spark finds the necessary connection to the ultimate. I read the book as constructed to show these sparks (and perhaps really only one single spark) attempting to "connect" in three different generations, while at the same time illustrating history's repeating wheel. The book presents two iconic representations of "true" civilization - first, three love interests, who bear no resemblance to actual breathing women and seem to be little more than incarnations of the Muses. The second are the Jews; the state of their treatment by surrounding societies is civilization's bellweather. In each generation an individual's reaction to incitement against the Jews will be a mark of his real virtue. These two representations are connected: in each generation, the "love interest" draws closer to the Jews, perhaps making the protagonist's ability to connect to virtue symbolically more difficult in succeeding generations. (The first, Sophia, prefers Jews to Christians; the second, Rebecca, pretends she is a Jew; and the third, Julia, really is a Jew, albeit a lapsed one.)
The failure of the first generation's attempt to connect to the divine (Manlius') demonstrates that what we traditionally think of as "civilization" can be an active hindrance to virtue, since its rationalizations lead Manlius to betrayal and murder. Manlius identifies his own interests (mostly financial) as "civilization," and cannot divorce himself sufficiently from those interests (as Cicero's text suggests he must) to find virtue. In the second attempt, Olivier spends much of his life pursuing Manlius' civilization in the form of the same texts that fascinated Manlius; but in the end he recognizes that the texts he has been so assiduously gathering are a mere "form of words," and that he should instead follow his "soul's desire" and put himself in harm's way, if necessary, to save what he loves. Julien follows the model of Manlius until love, a human connection, forces him to throw his rationalizations to the wind, and then loyalty, another human connection, pushes him into the ultimate sacrifice (in a true martyrdom he burns not only himself, but his sacred texts, which he realizes are meaningless).
The message here that I like is that theory can lead you down a slippery slope of rationalizations justifying evil deeds, and that philosophical exercises are dangerous both in and of themselves, and because they persuade the thinker of his own intellectual and therefore moral superiority. I also like the message that human connection tempers theory and is necessary to find virtue. What I don't like is the implicit conclusion that the compromises inherent in any involvement in public affairs are corrupt and corrupting. While the book has an admirable philo-Semitic theme, at the same time it is very Christian - "love is the solution." While this is equally a philosophical extreme that can lead to intemperate results, it seems to be a favorite of Pears', since it is also at the heart of his Instance of the Fingerpost book.
Rating:
Summary: Curiously Lifeless
Review: I gladly give this novel one star for erudition and one reluctant star for artifice, but after the outstanding "An Instance of the Fingerpost" I disappointed in the nonexistent plot and stick figure characters.
Almost nothing happens in this novel expect the characters spewing forth set "academic" sounding speeches.
Maybe Pears should have written a piece of straight history or I should have re-read Tarnus' "Passion of the Western Mind" or maybe Barzun's "From Dawn to Decadence" instead of attempting this novel. My standard, with notable exceptions, is to give a book fifty pages to captivate me but after 140 pages, the entire first section of "dream" I knew I wasn't going to finish it. Reading this novel became too much like an irksome homework assignment in high school. In spite of all the fine reviews on this site and elsewhere, including the paperback edition itself, I simply did not care about the characters, their fates or the book's presentation of ideas any more.
So, with a sigh, pass this one up and go read all the other excellent books you have waiting. If you want a historical mystery pick up this author's "An Instance of the Fingerpost" again.
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