Flamel and the philosopher stone. Yes, also a portion of title of the first Harry Potter, whoever has that precious elixir will remain forever young; or, yes, maybe as it happened to mr Flamel, he wouldn't die. Or not with great simplicity. Or after a lot of centuries, who knows?
Mr. Flamel was an eclectic character and his house still exists in Paris.
You see, in that peculiar historical moment when Flamel was born on Sept 28 1330, people of culture didn't just know a lot on a field of knowledge: they knew a lot in the most diversified human fields. Alchemy, chemistry, astronomy, astrology, magic, art, science, occultism, literature.
Mr. Flamel married with Perenelle, was a man of profound culture, he loved writing, he copied many books. One day he received a strange book written in an unknown language. Mr and mrs Flamel because of it left Paris and started to traveling in the entire Continent trying to understand in what kind of language that book was written for deciphering it.
Once returned home they appeared young and happy, healthy and incredibly wealthy. No one discovered the reason of all that richness donated also to a lot of people by the couple. Flamel lived a long life. Legend wants that one day he died, but when people opened his coffin and the one of his wife (yes once it sounded a sport practiced a lot) people didn't find any body. Were that macabre curious people maybe arrived later? Not the first ones looking at that graves and that bodies brought somewhere else for who knows what purpose? We don't know: legend wants that Nicholas Flamel is still alive and somewhere in the world, he remains the only human being custodian of the mystery of Immortality.
Some good readings for you! about this character.
Years and years ago I bought through a wonderful Irish online bookstore (I am still missing it, Greg, if you read my words) two books that I would want to suggest to all of you, written by Michael Scott:
The Alchemyst 
and The Magician 
. If you know Michael Scott, you know that he wrote enchanting books about Irish folklore and in particular these three books Irish Folk & Fairy Tales, Irish Myths & Legends (I have this one as well) and Irish Ghosts & Hauntings, real classics of Irish literature.
I know that there are more books of these series but you can start with these two.
It will be a fascinating trip with immortal and legendary people who made the culture of our modern world.
Dr.John Dee, another man of great culture, please read the book written by Peter Ackroyd about him, will want to try to steal the book that mr.Flamel received once.
The adventure will see involved two twins. They will try to save the world. Why? Because entering in possess of a precious secret like the one of eternal life, would mean for the entire world a big damage.
In the second book, another excellent helper of mr.Dee will be Niccolò Machiavelli...
Happy reading everyone!
Anna Maria Polidori
photo credit of the pic of Scott: official site of Michael Scott
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