Renaissances

The Italian Renaissance retains its extraordinary hold on the historical imagination. What began as arediscoveryy of the culture and values of the ancient world came to invent our notion of the 'Middle Ages' and continues to pose sharp and searching questions as to what we regard as the beginning of the 'modern' era. However, what was 'the Italian Renaissance'? Was there a singlephenomenonn that affected the entire peninsula and had meaning for all or even most of its people from the age of the painter Giotto in the fourteenth century to that of the astronomer Galileo in the seventeenth? This richly illustrated book stresses the plurality of the 'cultures of Italy' and the diversity of the Italian Renaissance: the enormously varied forms of cultural achievement and the different circumstances that prevailed in various contexts, both urban and courtly. Richard Mckenney examines why the great revival did not touch the whole of Italy or the majority of its people and argues that, while the wonder and joy of classical rebirth remained vivid, there was also a dimension of anxiety, especially in the challenge that ancient cultures posed to Christian belief. Mackenney also maintains that, in an Italian context, the triumph of artistic and literary diversity and the tragedy of political disunity went hand in hand. Covering art, literature, and music, and providing an exploration of the political and social contexts, this is an essential guide to one of the most fascinating periods of Italian history.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.