The Bookseller of Florence

Vespasiano da Bisticci and the Manuscripts that Illuminated the Renaissance

The Bookseller of Florence
Ross King
RRP:
NZ$ 30.00
Our Price:
NZ$ 24.00
Paperback
h198 x 129mm - 352pg
7 Apr 2022 UK
International import eta 7-19 days
9781784709372
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9781784742652 UK Hardback

A gripping story of ancient wisdom, new technology and ' the king of the world' s booksellers' , set in Renaissance FlorenceIn the mid-1400s, Vespasiano da Bisticci' s bookshop in Florence was said to contain all the wisdom of the world. Vespasiano and his team of scribes and illuminators produced exquisite manuscripts for popes and princes across Europe, rediscovering and disseminating some of the most significant texts from classical antiquity. At his shop, the most formidable minds of the city would gather to debate these old ideas of revolutionary power. But in 1476 a new technology arrived in Florence. The convent of San Jacopo di Ripoli, a community of Dominican nuns on the other side of the city, acquired a printing press from a bankrupt German printer. Before long, with the enterprising nuns working tirelessly as typesetters, the Ripoli Press began printing a series of books and pamphlets that triggered an explosion of ideas in politics, philosophy and religion. In The Bookseller of Florence Ross King, the internationally bestselling author of Brunelleschi' s Dome and Michelangelo and the Pope' s Ceiling, uncovers the story of a local battle that would have far-reaching consequences. The wave of radical thinking unleashed by printed books would alter the course of history, fuelling the Renaissance and the Reformation, and paving the way for the Enlightenment - and modernity as we know it today.
A brilliant narrative that seamlessly weaves together intellectual debate, technological exploration and the excitement of new ways of thinking about ethics, politics and human capability as they evolved in one of the liveliest cultural environments in European history. It conveys a rare sense of immersion in the daily sights and sounds (and even smells) of fifteenth-century Italy -- Rowan Williams The Bookseller of Florence does for books what Ross King did for the art of Brunelleschi, Leonardo and Michelangelo: it conjures a vivid, lost world of manuscripts and learning. Written with an exquisite touch and enviable flair, King has written a book in defence of the pursuit of knowledge that' s needed today more than ever -- Jerry Brotton, author of A History of the World in Twelve Maps In the mid-fifteenth-century it must have seemed as if all the wisdom of the world was distilled into a single street in Florence. In this deft, sparkling book, Ross King reanimates the Street of Booksellers and the life of its most fascinating figure: Vespasiano da Bisticci -- Peter Moore, author of Endeavour: The Ship and the Attitude that Changed the World A beautifully constructed work of popular scholarship, at once celebratory and elegiac. Ross King skilfully illuminates the career, interests and connections of a fifteenth-century maker of manuscript books, and in the process paints a compelling picture of Florence in the age of the Medici, and of the fascinating, fractured world of the European Renaissance, in the decades witnessing the final fall of the Byzantine Empire and the fateful appearance of the new technology of print -- Peter Marshall, author of Heretics and Believers: A History of the English Reformation Magnificent . . . King' s meticulous research provides an immersive reading experience as he expertly weaves the political intrigue of families vying for power and currying favour with the pope into a riveting intellectual history covering the evolution of books, Renaissance Italy, classical philosophy and literature, and the invention of the printing press. A profoundly engaging study of a time when books were considered essential to a meaningful life, and knowledge and wisdom were cherished as ends in themselves -- Bill Kelly * Booklist *
Ross King is a renowned expert in the Italian Renaissance. He is the author of numerous bestselling and acclaimed books include Brunelleschi' s Dome, Michelangelo and the Pope' s Ceiling, Leonardo and the Last Supper and Mad Enchantment- Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies. His love of Renaissance Florence, which he has been studying, writing and lecturing about for over twenty years, made Vespasiano' s long-forgotten story - never written about before - an irresistible next subject. He lives just outside Oxford.
Status: No local stock, title imported to order
ISBN-13: 9781784709372
Published: 7 Apr 2022
Published In: United Kingdom
Imprint: Vintage
Publisher: Vintage Publishing
Format: Paperback
Height: 198mm
Width: 129mm
Spine: 30mm
Weight: 350g
Pages: 352

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