Pastoral Drama in Early Modern Italy: The Making of a New Genre
Lisa Sampson
Italian Perspectives 15•5 September 2006
- ‘Handsomely produced (a tribute to its publishers and copy-editor), meticulously researched, agreeably written,with copious notes, a generous bibliography, and English translationsof all the original quotations, it is packed full with fascinating and thought-provoking information.’ — Eric Haywood, Modern Language Review 103.4, October 2008, 1138 (full text online)
- ‘Vanno complimentati, infine, anche gli editori di Legenda (la fruttuosa collaborazione tra Maney Publishing e la Modern Humanities Research Association) che hanno curato questa pubblicazione impeccabile, e che hanno dato ampio spazio — scelta felice — ai citati originali in italiano (provveduti sempre di una traduzione inglese della stessa studiosa). In aggiunta alle note concise poste alla fine di ogni capitolo, la bibliografia e l’indice generale che concludono il libro costituiranno un utile strumento di consultazione ai molti studenti e ricercatori che troveranno una ricchissima fonte d’informazioni preziose (dalla descrizione meticolosa delle innumerevoli opere individuali, al contesto sociale, culturale e politico sempre ottimamente documentato) in questa monografia, la quale combina una chiarezza di argomentazione con un’analisi sfaccettata di un fenomeno significativo — se non proprio determinante — nel campo culturale della prima epoca moderna.’ — Rolien Scheffer, Italian Studies 64.2, Autumn 2009
Boccaccio and the Book: Production and Reading in Italy 1340-1520
Rhiannon Daniels
Italian Perspectives 19•17 July 2009
- ‘This descriptive study provides many details that will benefit any scholar interested in the reception of Boccaccio’s works before the transformations they undergo in the later Cinquecento.’ — Martin Eisner, Renaissance Quarterly 63.2, 2010, 545-46
- ‘Original and highly detailed... Chapter 1 could usefully be recommended to students of the history of the book in Italy for the clarity with which it presents all of the aspects that need to be considered in a discussion of readership, reception, production, and paratext, in both manuscripts and printed books... A significant contribution to the history of the book in Italy.’ — Jane Everson, Modern Language Review 106.2, April 2011, 564-66 (full text online)
- ‘This book is a valuable and stimulating contribution to the reception history of Boccaccio. Particularly interesting is the way that Daniels looks at manuscripts and printed editions that have not been given their due, and the reader will constantly come across intriguing details.’ — K. P. Clarke, Medium Aevum 74, 2010
Caravaggio in Film and Literature: Popular Culture's Appropriation of a Baroque Genius
Laura Rorato
Italian Perspectives 30•1 November 2014
Renaissance Vegetarianism: The Philosophical Afterlives of Porphyry’s On Abstinence
Cecilia Muratori
Italian Perspectives 46•28 September 2020
- ‘The meticulously researched study of the generation and Renaissance receptions of Porphyry's On Abstinence in Cecilia Muratori's Renaissance Vegetarianism is well worth attention from Romanticists, alongside the Early Modern scholars, Classicists, and Animal Studies scholars that will comprise its main audience... Literal and figurative translations of ethical, philosophical, and dietary ideas upon vegetarianism and veganism connect ancient and Early Modern thought in Muratori's admirable study, with glimpses of Thomas Taylor and Shelley suggesting the future of Porphyry's reception in the Romantic period.’ — Amanda Blake Davis, The Coleridge Bulletin 57, Summer 2021, 141-46
- ‘Muratori’s work provides us not only with an overview of philosophical thinking on vegetarianism from ancient authors to their reception by Renaissance but also with interesting keys to understand the issues that worried intellectuals of those times. Her analysis gives the main clues of the reception of Porphyry’s work and shows how crucial it was for the evolution of vegetarian thinking that is still strongly present in our days. The rigor of the research and the excellent way the contents are presented with a simple but accurate drafting make this work accessible and fascinating for scholars as well for curious readers.’ — Monica Durán Mañas, Mediterranea 7, 2022 (full text online)
- ‘The most celebrated work on animals to emerge from ancient philosophy, Porphyry’s On Abstinence from Killing Animals, argues at length against the Stoics that animals have reason or “inner logos,” in part on the basis of their behavior but also on the basis of the claim that some animals can understand and produce language, or “outer logos.” And this was one of those texts that really was recovered and read avidly in the Renaissance. Just how avidly, and with what consequences, is shown by Cecilia Muratori’s Renaissance Vegetarianism, a wide-ranging, fascinating, and frequently entertaining survey of ideas about animals in this period.’ — Peter Adamson, Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie Published online, 2023 (full text online)
- ‘To add to the many merits of Muratori’s accomplishment, the book includes a bibliography that is comprehensive as well as carefully selected. The index of names and subjects is thorough and extremely helpful. The many philosophical discussions never read stiltedly and are always recounted in a thought-provoking and engaging style. Above all, this tour de force on the history of vegetarianism makes the reader reflect on a central question that remains unanswered to this day: can a being that is sentient and rational be legitimately consumed and turned into food?’ — E. Giada Capasso, Modern Language Review 118.3, July 2023, 403-05 (full text online)
Staging the Soul: Allegorical Drama as Spiritual Practice in Baroque Italy
Eugenio Refini
Italian Perspectives 48•22 January 2023
Venetian Inscriptions: Vernacular Writing for Public Display in Medieval and Renaissance Venice
Ronnie Ferguson
Italian Perspectives 50•26 July 2021
- ‘The rigorous standards of the author’s nearly decade-long project will certainly satisfy professional historians, but lay readers too will find themselves thoroughly engaged by the manner in which he uses each inscription vividly to evoke multiple aspects of Venice’s social, religious, cultural and political life, as well as the characters of some remarkable individuals.’ — Roderick Conway Morris, Times Literary Supplement 21 January 2022
- ‘A short review cannot do justice to the rich array of insights and ideas that thread through this fascinating book, nor can it reflect the dedication and time that were needed to compile the catalogue. Ranging from the familiar to the seemingly unnoticed, these inscriptions add myriad fragments to the enormous jigsaw of the townscape of late medieval and Renaissance Venice.’ — Deborah Howard, Burlington Magazine 165, February 2023, 207-08
- ‘The Italian Perspectives series, founded by Zygmunt Barański and Laura Lepschy in 1998, reaches its half-century in impressive fashion with this outstanding work of scholarship... As well as making a major contribution to epigraphy, the volume includes a wealth of information on the urban fabric, society, culture, and language that will make it an invaluable resource for Venetian Studies during the transition from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance.’ — Brian Richardson, Modern Language Review 118.2, 2023, 258-60 (full text online)
Classical Comedy 1508-1786: A Legacy from Italy and France
Richard Andrews
Italian Perspectives 55•20 October 2022
- ‘An encyclopedic contribution to the history of comedy, with a particular focus on the transformation of comedy in Paris, where the greatest playwrights preserved the genre’s positive vision and harnessed the vitality of the Italian “Arte” to create their more serious comedies of character... The “Analyses” section is particularly valuable. It is divided between technical questions and plot or character issues, and the technical discussions, informed by Andrews extraordinary knowledge and deep understanding of how comedy works, are outstanding.’ — 552-54, Annali d'Italianistica 2023, 41, Laurie Shepard
Standing at the Crossroads: Stories of Doubt in Renaissance Italy
Marco Faini
Italian Perspectives 58•22 April 2023
The Epic Rhetoric of Tasso: Theory and Practice
Maggie Günsberg
Legenda (General Series) •1 May 1998
- ‘Günsberg examines her material with great accuracy... deals with important aspects of Tasso's thought and poetical practice in a meticulous way, and can be useful both for readers attached to traditional rhetorical categories and for those with an interest in more recent critical developments.’ — Laura Benedetti, Italian Studies LIV, 1999, 177-8
- ‘An attractive and interesting volume that provides a useful addition to the comparatively thin recent output of Tasso scholarship in this country.’ — Peter Brand, Modern Language Review 95.3, 2000, 857-8 (full text online)
Poetics, Performance and Politics in French and Italian Renaissance Comedy
Lucy Rayfield
Transcript 18•23 February 2022
- ‘[Rayfield] provides in-depth socio-cultural and cross-cultural context. She has contributed an unusual study of the very small world of French humanist comedy, stimulatingly expanding it both from the inside and from the outside, schoolboys, polygraphs, and printers brushing elbows with French royals and wealthy Florentines.’ — Corinne Noirot, H-France 23 (May 2023), no. 86
Language and Style in a Renaissance Epic: Berni's Corrections to Boiardo's 'Orlando Innamorato'
H. F. Woodhouse
MHRA Texts and Dissertations 17•1 January 1982
Luigi Tansillo and Lyric Poetry in Sixteenth-Century Naples
Erika Milburn
MHRA Texts and Dissertations 57•1 January 2003