Running like a fault line through the peak of his success, however, is Eliade's painful awareness of his physical decline--failing vision, arthritic hands, and continual fatigue. Again and again he repeats how little time he has to finish the projects he is working on--his autobiography, the third and fourth volumes of his History of Religious Ideas, and the duties associated with his editorship of the Encyclopedia of Religion. He poignantly recounts the sharpest blow: the disorganization and eventual destruction by fire of his personal library.

Within the scope of Journal IV Eliade and his world go to ruin. What does not decline is the vivid and persistent voice of Eliade the writer, an unbreaking voice that--with death only months away--plans a reply to critics, plots out an article, and ruminates on characters to people another novella.