First published in 1513, this handbook of political strategy and guile invented the phrase "the means justifies the end", a byword for political skulduggery.
Peter Bondanella Book order (chronological)
Peter Bondanella was a distinguished professor specializing in Italian literature, comparative literature, and film studies. His work delved into a profound understanding of Italian culture and arts, with a particular emphasis on cinema. He left a significant legacy in academia.
Decameron
- 848 pages
- 30 hours of reading
Boccaccio's Decameron recasts the storytelling heritage of the ancient and medieval worlds into perennial forms that inspired writers from Chaucer and Shakespeare down to our own day.
A biography of Federico Fellini that shows how his exuberant imagination has been shaped by popular culture, literature, and his encounter with the ideas of C G Jung, especially Jungian dream interpretation. It links his mature accomplishments to his first employment as a cartoonist, gagman, and sketch-artist during the Fascist era.
World's Classics: The Lives of the Artists
A New Translation by Julia Conaway Bondanella and Peter Bondanella
- 612 pages
- 22 hours of reading
These biographies of the great quattrocento artists have long been considered among the most important of contemporary sources on Italian Renaissance art. Vasari, who invented the term "Renaissance," was the first to outline the influential theory of Renaissance art that traces a progression through Giotto, Brunelleschi, and finally the titanic figures of Michaelangelo, Da Vinci, and Raphael. This new translation, specially commisioned for the World's Classics series, contains thirty-six of the most important lives and is fully annotated.