A novel by Daisaku Ikeda set in Hiroshima.“An indomitable spirit, capable of enduring any adversity.” This phrase kept echoing in her mind. Life is full of unhappiness and pain. When we experience a setback, we can sometimes be overwhelmed by despair. But that suffering is the material with which we build our existence. One can blame fate and resign oneself to defeat, or one can resume living aiming for happiness – it all depends on having or not having “an indomitable spirit, capable of enduring any adversity.”  

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The novel opens with the Jubilee of 1900 in Rome, at the height of the dispute between the Vatican and the Italian State over the temporal power of the Church. This context is intertwined with the social demands of the era, animated by a Christian socialism that Caine himself was steeped in. Davide Rossi is a Left-wing deputy who fights for the people and opposes a corrupt prime minister, who will try to prevent the culmination of the love story between Rossi and Donna Roma Volonna. Caine spent a long time in Rome, visiting every place depicted in the novel; his descriptions of Regina Coeli, the Vatican and its ceremonies, the city's fashionable places and its squares teeming with ordinary people, convey the atmosphere of the time. The book is imbued with a religious sense of life and the characters, even the most abject ones, are described compassionately, like a true investigator of the human soul. Reading this text more than a century after its release, one cannot help but be struck by the author's visionary ability: he foresaw for Italy, albeit in terms of "fictional politics", the dictatorship, the abdication of the monarchy, and the birth of the Republic, forty years in advance. Thomas Henry Hall Caine (1853-1931) wrote about fifteen novels, veritable best-sellers, which earned him the title of "Sir" in 1917. The Manxman of 1894 is the most well-known of his works, thanks to A. Hitchcock's film adaptation in 1929. The Christian (1897) was the first book to sell a million copies in England. Pietro Mascagni set the theatrical version of The Eternal City to music in 1902.

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A novel by Daisaku Ikeda on the theme of friendship.333 BC. Alexander the Great, on his conquest of the East, contracts a severe illness. No one among the wise men in his retinue can find a cure to save him from death. But in the nocturnal quiet of the camp, as the disease slowly consumes his body, a tormenting doubt tears at his soul. Is the potion prepared for him by Philip, his loyal childhood friend and personal physician, a medicine or a poison? As swift as the wind, sent by one of his generals, a messenger on horseback arrives to deliver the letter containing the answer: Philip is a traitor. The young and invincible king will thus have to wonder whether to trust the messenger and disown his lifelong friend, or bring the cup to his lips and risk his life. The classical world meets Buddhist teachings and offers Master Ikeda the opportunity to celebrate, in a compelling and precious book, the value of loyalty and friendship. True friendship is not based on calculation. Gold and wealth cannot buy it. It makes us better: it brings out our qualities, helps us make others happy, and while we strive to do so, it gives us joy. Therefore, a friend is like a second self; in friendship two people become one, and a bond of this kind can be defined as life itself.

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