This book would not exist without the faithful exhortations of my agent, Marco Vigevani, and Michele Fusilli and Paolo Zaninoni, the nonfiction editor and editorial director, respectively, at Garzanti. I want to express to them here my sincere gratitude.
I’d also like to thank my friend and fellow Latinist Beppe Pezzini (now Lecturer in Latin at the University of St. Andrews), a critical source of inspiration to me when in the autumn of 2014, at Oxford, I began thinking about the structure of this book. I think fondly of our post-lunch conversations at the café in Magdalen College, with an open and collaborative spirit, and not without the guileless contribution of nature, clouds, ponds, ducks, even a ferret.
Special thanks to Nicolas Moureaux, my eternal companion in conversation and happiness.