Ravelstein

Abe Ravelstein is a brilliant professor at a prominent midwestern university and a man who glories in training the movers and shakers of the political world. He has lived grandly and ferociously -- and much beyond his means. His close friend Chick suggests that he put forth a book of his convictions about the ideas that sustain mankind -- or kill it. Ravelstein does, and -- much to his surprise -- becomes a millionaire.

Ravelstein in turn suggests that Chick write a memoir of him, and during the course of a celebratory trip to Paris the two share thoughts on mortality, philosophy, and history; loves and friends, old and new; and vaudeville routines from the remote past.

The mood turns more somber once they have returned to the midwest and Ravelstein succumbs to AIDS, and Chick himself nearly dies.