About the Book
At least since the publication of Burckhardt’s seminal study, the Renaissance has commonly been understood in terms of discontinuities. Seen as a radical departure from the intellectual and cultural norms of the ‘Middle Ages’, it has often been associated with the revival of classical Antiquity and the transformation of the arts, and has been viewed primarily as an Italian phenomenon. In keeping with recent revisionist trends, however, the essays in this volume explore moments of profound intellectual, artistic, and geographical continuity which challenge preconceptions of the Renaissance. Examining themes such as Shakespearian tragedy, Michelangelo’s mythologies, Johannes Tinctoris’ view of music, the advent of printing, Burgundian book collections, and Bohemian ‘renovatio’, this volume casts a revealing new light on the Renaissance.
Contributors include Klára Benešovská, Robert Black, Stephen Bowd, Matteo Burioni, Ingrid Ciulisová, Johannes Grave, Luke Houghton, Robin Kirkpatrick, Alexander Lee, Diotima Liantini, Andrew Pettegree, Rhys W. Roark, Maria Ruvoldt, Jeffrey Chipps Smith, Robin Sowerby, George Steiris, Rob C. Wegman, and Hanno Wijsman.
Table of Contents:
General Introduction, Stephen Bowd
PART I - THE RENAISSANCE AND THE CLASSICAL TRADITION
Introduction: Veteris vestigia flammae? The ‘Rebirths’ of Antiquity, Luke Houghton
The Renaissance and the Middle Ages: Chronologies, Ideologies, Geographies, Robert Black
Shakespeare and the ‘Tragedy’ of the Renaissance, Robin Kirkpatrick
Humanitas Renata, Robin Sowerby
Machiavelli’s Appreciation of Greek Antiquity and the Ideal of ‘Renaissance’, George Steiris
PART II - THE RENAISSANCE AND THE ARTS
Introduction: Seeing is Believing? The Renaissance and the Arts, Alexander Lee
Vasari’s Rinascita: History, Anthropology, or Art Criticism? Matteo Burioni
The State of the Art, Rob C. Wegman
Brunelleschi’s Perspective Panels. Rupture and Continuity in the History of the Image, Johannes Grave
Panofsky: Linear Perspective and Perspectives of Modernity, Rhys W. Roark
Michelangelo’s Mythologies, Maria Ruvoldt
The Byzantine Influence on the Introduction of the Third Dimension and the Formation of Renaissance Art, Diotima Liantini
PART III - A WIDER RENAISSANCE?
Introduction: A Wider Renaissance?, Alexander Lee
Northern Renaissance? Burgundy and Netherlandish Art in Fifteenth-Century Europe, Hanno Wijsman
Forgotten Paths to ‘Another’ Renaissance: Prague and Bohemia, c.1400, Klára Benešovská
A New World of the Mind? Renaissance Self-Perception and the Invention of Printing, Andrew Pettegree
The ‘Invention’ of Dürer as a Renaissance Artist, Jeffrey Chipps Smith
Notes on the History of Renaissance Scholarship in Central Europe: Białostocki, Schlosser and Panofsky, Ingrid Ciulisová
Index
About the Author :
Alexander Lee, Ph.D. (2009) in History, University of Edinburgh, is a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Luxembourg and the University of Warwick. His research concentrates on the interaction between classical philosophy and Christian theology in the thought of Francesco Petrarca.
Pit Péporté, Ph.D. (2008) in History, University of Edinburgh, is a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Luxembourg. With a background in the medieval history of the Low Countries, he has also published in the fields of historiography and collective memory.
Harry Schnitker, Ph.D. (2008) in History, University of Edinburgh, is a research fellow in ecclesiastical history at the Maryvale Institute (Birmingham). His current research is concerned with the role of the veneration of saints in the creation of identities in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
Review :
… each contributor causes the reader to reflect anew on the fundamentals of what it is to study the Renaissance.
Stella Fletcher, Journal of Northern Renaissance, November 2011
