Reconsidering the Renaissance.

Culled from the Twenty-First Annual Conference of Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, the thirty-one selected papers which comprise the volume address a variety of subjects related to the study of early modem Europe. True to its title, the articles are dedicated to reconsidering the concept "Renaissance" in all its forms.

The volume is organized in a generally chronological order, addressing various topics of the early and high Italian Renaissance ranging from spas in their sociocultural context, humanism and the history of thought, literature, and art. This is followed by forays to sixteenth-century England and France, before returning to late sixteenth-century Italy with Torquato Tasso. At this point the focus shifts to considerations of rhetoric, poetry and print in the English Renaissance, various aspects of Shakespeare, John Donne, George Herbert, before culminating with a series of papers on Milton.

The generally overlooked subject of "spa culture" in Italy from the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries opens the volume by discussing it in terms of the revival of ancient medical science in Padua and Bologna, as well as its appearance in literary works. In addition to the fact that it chronologically precedes the other papers, D.S. Chamber's "Spas in the Italian Renaissance" also sets the tone for the book by reconsidering what some may consider a marginal topic through an analysis that shows the subject matter to be of great significance since princes and prelates would frequent them, both for reasons of health and deal-making. Furthermore, the author shows how spas reflected the times through their literary depiction which oscillated between a place that promoted physical rejuvenation and licentious abandon.

The next group of essays deals with aspects of philosophical currents in the Italian Renaissance, from humanism to neoplatonism. Paul Oskar Kristeller's "Renaissance Humanism and its Significance" is a broad overview of humanism and its impact on Renaissance culture which examines its debts to classical antiquity and the liberal arts of the Middle Ages, as well as the predominant literary forms in which it was advanced. The reader next encounters studies devoted to Florentine neoplatonism in the context of charges of paganism, and contemporary orthodox religious doctrine and practices.

Aspects of the Neapolitan Renaissance are studied through two articles dealing with the poets Pontano and Chariteo, and Sannazaro and their relation to aspects of their classical and mythological patrimony. There are three articles dedicated to painting: two address Giorgione and one deals with Parmigianino. Giorgione's Tempest is analyzed in terms of its astrological references in relation to Venice's defense of Padua against the League of Cambrai in 1509, and his other works figure in an interpretation of the artist as a leader in sixteenth-century painting innovations by means of his fusion of the traditionally separate genres of portraiture and history painting. In a different light, Parmigianino is looked at from the viewpoint of Petrarchan amatory motifs in his Madonna del Bel piede.

At this point the focus is briefly turned to Polydore Vergil's Anglica historia regarding its providential interpretation of fifteenth-century English history and the influence of Sallust, Tacitus and Suetonius.

The French Renaissance is explored through a series of four articles treating the debate between Erasmus and Dolet regarding Ciceronian rhetoric, the use of the novella genre to recount rape scenes in Marguerite de Navarre's Heptameron, the depiction of Catherine de Medici as idealized queenly prototype, and the effect of Montaigne's initial retreat from society and the psychology of the Essais.

Before returning to England, Torquato Tasso's struggle with the success of Ariosto's innovative use of multiple plots in the Orlando Furioso, despite its flagrant disregard of Aristotle's unity of plot in epic poetry, is the objective of the article by Lawrence F. Rhu.

Thomas Wyatt's rhetorical techniques as an embodiment of his love lyrics, and the attitudes of many Tudor poets toward the printed book are the subjects of two essays which precede a large section on William Shakespeare.

A significant amount of study is dedicated to aspects of Shakespeare, emphasizing his importance and influence in the English Renaissance and beyond. These seven essays explore aspects ranging from the possible symbiotic relationship between the playwright and renowned contemporary actors, the difficulties inherent in the construction of gender and "other" in Twelfth Night, a comparison of the images of the virile/effeminate tyrant in treatises of statecraft and Macbeth and Richard III, patriarchal oppression surrounding Renaissance discourse on witchcraft in Macbeth, the relationship between Measure for Measure and James I's Basilikon Doron in terms of sexual and political control, a survey and critique of feminist criticism and theory of Shakespeare studies, and a critique of the apotheosis of Shakespeare in past and current scholarship in an effort to break the habit of "bardolatry."

John Donne and George Herbert are the objects of study in the following two essays united by a theme of the inner life in terms of the use of "I" and "soul" in the former poet, and related to the latter's grieving over his mother's death in the Memoriae matris Sacrum cycle of poems.

The final five papers, which constitute the second largest section devoted to one figure, explore the works of John Milton. These range from the use of musical monody in his Lycidas, a semiotic analysis of the poet's use of "mercantile" terminology, Bakhtinian analyses revolving around the concept of "dialogism", an overview of previous theoretical interpretations of Milton's works, to a placement of the poet in relation to his contemporaries and the major theological movements and their popular variations regarding the concept of God.

The volume as a whole provides many valuable contributions to the study of such a broad and, at times, ambiguous concept as the Renaissance from varied critical perspectives. In addition to the high caliber of scholarship contained within its pages, there are approximately thirty monochrome reproductions that illustrate the more "visual" themes. One possible drawback to Reconsidering the Renaissance is that perhaps it attempts to stretch too far, leaving, at times, conspicuous gaps. Acknowledging the strong focus on the Italian and particularly the English Renaissance, other developments and geographical areas are not fully developed. Related to the previous observations, there seems no very smooth and coherent transition from one section to another. Nevertheless, the articles collected in this volume are rich in insight into many varied topics and constitute a valuable contribution to Renaissance studies.

ROBERT BURANELLO University of Toronto