Michelangelo was not at all satisfied with the biography that Giorgio Vasari wrote about him in 1550 for his famous Lives of the Artists. He promptly commissioned his student Ascanio Condivi to create a sort of counter-narrative, which was published three years later. Michelangelo was 79 years old and at the peak of his fame. However, the artist struggled with self-doubt and dark thoughts while tackling titanic tasks such as painting the Sistine Chapel and rebuilding St. Peter's Basilica. What can a person be? This question runs through Michelangelo's works—and Condivi's biography, who was able to interview the artist himself and tells his life story in a detailed yet engaging manner. The last translation of this key text in art history into German dates back nearly a hundred years. Ingeborg Walter has completely retranslated the biography.