Inventing the Renaissance: The Myth of a Golden Age

Books like this are complicated for me. I really, really love them; I desperately want more of them; I wish they were written differently. Historiography, especially the conceptual stuff (what do we think about when we think about X? Why do we think that way? Where does that idea come from, and is it from history, or just books and TV?) really fascinate me. History is a bunch of symbols which we reinterpret every generation, and what we think of a period, a date, an event, is shaped by where we are now... and the last bit of big media frenzy over that period. It's fascinating, and it's much more vivid and vivacious than a point-by-point summary of what dates certain events took place. History is more than truth or lies, accuracy or inaccuracy. It's the conversations we have, and what we think is worth including in those conversations.

But, because these books are so conceptual, they tend to be kind of low on information. There's a lot to think about in this book, and a lot to learn. There's also a lot of fluff.

I get it. Palmer is writing in a really informal style, because she doesn't want to be an ivory tower academic who writes in a purposefully arch style to confuse and alienate plebs. As a pleb (I sure don't have a four year degree), I appreciate it. But there's always the risk of talking down to people, or implicitly signaling who is supposed to be reading your books. Palmer mostly avoids that, but there were a few moments that really made me groan. I do not need references to Firefly and Army of Darkness in my history book; I do not need the rib-elbowing understanding that we're all nerds here, ehh? Ehhh? We're the right kind of nerds, bookish chortlers who go squee and watch Doctor Who. Please, talk up to me, I bought your book.

Palmer also seems to be concerned I won't get her point, so she repeats it over and over, sometimes multiple times a chapter. I assume this is because she's an educator; she really really really wants to make sure I get the point. SPQR, SPQF! Historians in Greenland! Battle pope and warrior pope! These little references, and the concepts attached to them, show up in almost every chapter, which is a good rhetorical device! But maybe in a shorter book, with fewer chapters. Especially since I felt a few other concepts went under-explained. I wanted more about the contrasting tyranny of republicanism in Florence, the way art bolstered legitimacy, and the morals of peace that got referenced a few times. I wanted to know more about Machiavelli, who has four chapters dedicated to him but only shows up in two of them. I did not need the basics of moral philosophy explained to me the second time, or the third, or the... tenths. The first time was nice, though.

I guess what I'm saying is that this book is a little disorganized, and it chases its own tail a bit. I find this to be the case in a lot of ‘out of the box' educational materials, which assume that if you're excited enough, you'll just get it! Because learning is easy for everyone, and we don't need to worry about the accessibility of information. Because most educators– and, I assume, students at better and more prestigious colleges– don't have learning disabilities, there doesn't tend to be a lot of emphasis placed on making information organized and easy to digest when it's taught in an unconventional way.

I'm not saying the book had to be in chronological order– I found it quite refreshing that it wasn't– but I wish more time had been spent connecting the ideas that each chapter had, building on the previous thesis to bolster the next, rather than reiterating information without a ton of analysis. It's a book, so if I missed what dentology was, I could have gone back and reread. By the 14th time it was explained, I was fully tuning out, struggling to understand what bigger point the chapter was actually trying to make because it had gotten so lost in the weeds.

I'm not sure someone without a learning disability will have these problems? But I did and it's my review, so.

All in all, however, I consider this book a triumph. I've never found the Italian Renaissance very interesting, mostly because it's spoken about with such bejeweled reverence. I don't like romanticized history populated by buxom wax figures dressed in crushed velvet; it's boring. Ada Palmer successfully makes these people real, makes me care about their lives, makes me want to know more. Isn't that the goal of every educator?