A vital acquisition for anyone who studies the Renaissance and seeks the true role of the Medici in the history of Florence.
A fascinating warts-and-all history of the rise and fall of the Medici.
Hollingsworth (The Borgias: History’s Most Notorious Dynasty, 2011, etc.) effectively debunks the myths surrounding this legendary family, from the first moneylenders who moved into Florence in the 13th century through the end of the dynasty in 1737. Throughout the centuries, the author amply shows, the Medici lied, cheated, inveigled, and sweet-talked their way into absolute diplomatic and political power. They built up their banking business through the generations, and it became the basis for the family wealth. The Medicis understood the power of local politics and used their money to control it until Florence was no longer a republic but rather a dictatorship. Some of the best elements of this eye-opening book are the casts of characters and their relationships, which begin each chapter. Since so many Medici shared the same first name, these lists are extremely helpful in keeping the players straight. Equally illuminating are the dozens of illustrations. A major event in the family’s history occurred in 1420, when Giovanni di Bicci relinquished control of the bank to his sons, Cosimo and Lorenzo, who, despite his later appellation of “Magnificent,” was an inexperienced playboy who lacked political acumen. His blatant embezzling, plus the decline of the economy, gave rise to the attacks of Savonarola on the materialism and corruption of his administration. Hollingsworth also points out that Florence was not the only important city during the Renaissance; Milan, Rome, Venice, Naples, and Mantua were also significant. Florence certainly profited from the architects, artists, and writers of the period, but the Medici’s use of those artists was for the greater glory of Medici, not Florence. The true builder, Cosimo I, came to power in 1544 and became the first Grand Duke of Tuscany. He grew the economy and city and laid the foundation for the persisting perception of Medici greatness.
A vital acquisition for anyone who studies the Renaissance and seeks the true role of the Medici in the history of Florence.Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-68177-648-4
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Pegasus
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
For Howard Zinn, long-time civil rights and anti-war activist, history and ideology have a lot in common. Since he thinks that everything is in someone's interest, the historian—Zinn posits—has to figure out whose interests he or she is defining/defending/reconstructing (hence one of his previous books, The Politics of History). Zinn has no doubts about where he stands in this "people's history": "it is a history disrespectful of governments and respectful of people's movements of resistance." So what we get here, instead of the usual survey of wars, presidents, and institutions, is a survey of the usual rebellions, strikes, and protest movements. Zinn starts out by depicting the arrival of Columbus in North America from the standpoint of the Indians (which amounts to their standpoint as constructed from the observations of the Europeans); and, after easily establishing the cultural disharmony that ensued, he goes on to the importation of slaves into the colonies. Add the laborers and indentured servants that followed, plus women and later immigrants, and you have Zinn's amorphous constituency. To hear Zinn tell it, all anyone did in America at any time was to oppress or be oppressed; and so he obscures as much as his hated mainstream historical foes do—only in Zinn's case there is that absurd presumption that virtually everything that came to pass was the work of ruling-class planning: this amounts to one great indictment for conspiracy. Despite surface similarities, this is not a social history, since we get no sense of the fabric of life. Instead of negating the one-sided histories he detests, Zinn has merely reversed the image; the distortion remains.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1979
ISBN: 0061965588
Page Count: 772
Publisher: Harper & Row
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1979
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.
Rootin’-tootin’ history of the dry-gulchers, horn-swogglers, and outright killers who populated the Wild West’s wildest city in the late 19th century.
The stories of Wyatt Earp and company, the shootout at the O.K. Corral, and Geronimo and the Apache Wars are all well known. Clavin, who has written books on Dodge City and Wild Bill Hickok, delivers a solid narrative that usefully links significant events—making allies of white enemies, for instance, in facing down the Apache threat, rustling from Mexico, and other ethnically charged circumstances. The author is a touch revisionist, in the modern fashion, in noting that the Earps and Clantons weren’t as bloodthirsty as popular culture has made them out to be. For example, Wyatt and Bat Masterson “took the ‘peace’ in peace officer literally and knew that the way to tame the notorious town was not to outkill the bad guys but to intimidate them, sometimes with the help of a gun barrel to the skull.” Indeed, while some of the Clantons and some of the Earps died violently, most—Wyatt, Bat, Doc Holliday—died of cancer and other ailments, if only a few of old age. Clavin complicates the story by reminding readers that the Earps weren’t really the law in Tombstone and sometimes fell on the other side of the line and that the ordinary citizens of Tombstone and other famed Western venues valued order and peace and weren’t particularly keen on gunfighters and their mischief. Still, updating the old notion that the Earp myth is the American Iliad, the author is at his best when he delineates those fraught spasms of violence. “It is never a good sign for law-abiding citizens,” he writes at one high point, “to see Johnny Ringo rush into town, both him and his horse all in a lather.” Indeed not, even if Ringo wound up killing himself and law-abiding Tombstone faded into obscurity when the silver played out.
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.Pub Date: April 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21458-4
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
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