“To Have Done with Judgment?” Yourcenar’s Hadrian and the Crime Against Life*

Is it possible “to have done with judgment”? This might be a question pondered by victim–offender mediators. The essay at hand explores and contrasts three Nietzschean images of non-judgmentalism, i.e. Friedrich Nietzsche’s, Gilles Deleuze’s, and Marguerite Yourcenar’s. The original model, Nietzsche’s, might perhaps be termed the vital art of Dionysian affirmation. The second, Deleuze’s: the machinic art of rhizomatic deterritorialization. The third, Yourcenar’s (or Hadrian’s): the stoic art of interstitial imperialism. The focus in this essay is, in particular, on one of Yourcenar’s novels, Mémoires d’Hadrien. Conclusions are drawn with regard to the theory and practice of victim-offender mediation.