Petrarch and His World | 
pickThe second biography I have read of Petrarch this year. This one is older, from 1964, and by a 1930‘s translator of Petrarch‘s Canzoniere (under the title The Love Rimes of Petrarch). Petrarch led an interesting life and left behind extensive personal writings in the voice of someone who sounds modern and familiar, even exposing their inner insecurities. The first modern man, or at least the earliest one widely identified… 👇👇
Graywacke … or maybe just the first person to come across as relatable. Anyway, the biography is well done, with extensive interesting translated quotes (and lovely illustrations by the author‘s spouse, Alison Mason Kingsbury). It‘s not, however, a the translator‘s critique of the Canzonierre that I was maybe hoping for. 3y
Graywacke Pictured is Kingsbury‘s illustration for Vacluse, Petrarch‘s place of self-isolation near Avignon, where he did an extensive amount of his writing. 3y
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