Безобразный Ренессанс. Секс, жестокость, разврат в век красоты

by Alexander Lee

Преподаватель Оксфордского университета Александр Ли предлагает по-новому взглянуть на эпоху Ренессанса: как бы ни соблазнительно было считать его эрой культурного возрождения и прогресса, процветания и художественной красоты, достижения Ренессанса всегда существовали параллельно с мрачной, грязной реальностью. Коварные банкиры, алчные политики, похотливые священники, чудовищные эпидемии, жизнь в немыслимой роскоши и разврате - все это было нормой.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Art, Italy, Renaissance, Historical, European History

448 pages, Hardcover

First published September 26, 2013

Reviews

[☘Misericordia☘ ⚡ϟ⚡⛈⚡☁ ❇️❤❣]

Frankly, I am not nearly as impressed with Michelangelo's broken nose as the author seems to be. What's so shocking about it? It's not like artists have to be celibate pacifists to create things. They can but don't have to. Same thing applies to Benvenuto Cellini and Giotto and Leonardo and Pico della Mirandola and the rest of them. They were human and as such were susceptible to pretty much all the vices and weaknesses and making mistakes or enjoying, well, ill-advisable or frownable upon things. And yes, some of them 'occasionally were very unpleasant people'. Anyone can have a bad day or a year (or life, generally).

I have no idea who would have thought to think that Renaissance was a thing of sheer beauty. Quite obviously, it wasn't, since had there been no issues at that time, it wouldn't have been a 'Renaissance' but rather 'an ongoing development of an already advanced society'. Doesn't sound quite as exciting as 'Renaissance', right?

Another thing. Has anyone looked at the problematic areas of our age of modernity or postindustriality or whatever that we're living today? We have issues, even today. And our modern issues are ugly and violent and depraved as well, thank you very much.

I did enjoy the book, other than the above hype-y stuff, since I occasionally love titillating anecdotal tidbits.

[BAM IS BACK!]

The content doesn’t deliver on the title sadly

[Steven Peterson]

Yawn. Believe it or not. The Renaissance had sordid episodes and had a seamy underside. As if this is unusual in human history. To be honest, I was disappointed in what I thought was a rather shallow critique of the period.

The author, early on, noted the import of this book (page 5): "And by the end of the journey [of the book], the Renaissance will not just appear to have been populated by angels and demons; it will never seem the same again." Sorry. I don't see anything that one would not have guessed.

[Christine]

Disclaimer: ARC read via Netgalley.

The popularity of the Renaissance to the modern mind can’t be overstated. Whether it is due to the works of Shakespeare, the romance of star crossed lovers, sweaty men astride horses, certain Showtime series, or the sense of fashion, something about the Renaissance captures the imagination of people.

Of course, there is the art. Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael. They have press everywhere. Even Disney World, so the Renaissance arrived in the modern mythos a long time ago. It isn’t the real Renaissance of course. Everyone’s teeth are prefect, skin isn’t pockmarked (unless the character is a baddy), clothes are clean, hair is flawless, and everyone looks like they go to the gym. It’s not the just the people – the streets are clean of poop and other things, chamber pots aren’t seen, and the food looks great. Everything is grand except for the scheming blackguards.

Intellectually, most people are aware of this fake cleanliness, but even then the average person is convinced that the Renaissance was a high mark, when people rediscovered everything and started the humanist traits that would be fully developed in the American and French Revolution and the various movements of the 20th century.

Perhaps there is a truth to this very. Alexander Lee, however, does people a service by giving the boot to the fairy tale image.

Lee’s look at the ugly side of the Renaissance focuses mostly on Italy, understandable when you think about it. He starts with Michelangelo, who apparently smelled something awful. The presenting of the ugly side of the Renaissance Art World soon becomes an in depth look at various business practices, marriages, issues of se and slavery throughout the Renaissance.

Lee’s discussion of the Underbelly allows the reader to understand the various factors that led to the creation of not only the famous artwork but also the creation of famous literature. It isn’t simply a discussion of the various business practices of the banking families, but also a look at the average day to day life of the nobody, the various risks and dangers of being a woman as well s the various views on marriage. The Renaissance view of homosexual partnership might surprise you.

It is to Lee’s credit that when he moves away from Italy, it is in part to look at the effects of the Renaissance where the Europeans are the strangers. It isn’t just a look at what the “discovers” did to the native, but also how art and literature portrayed such discoveries. There is a look at the Jewish residents and their treatment, something that points forward to the Holocaust.

This book does what Lee intended it to – to make the Renaissance into a reality as opposed to a Hollywood myth.


Crossposted at Booklikes.

[Melody]

Ugh. His premise is weak- how many of you didn't realize there was sex, greed, and depravity in the the Renaissance going in? I don't think I learned anything except how deep some of Lee's bigotry runs. Frankly, I was looking for seamy, titillating stories- not judgy Pecksniffian anecdotes.

Here's where he lost me. He was trying to paint a picture of what homosexuality was like. And he conflated it with pedophilia in a way that is extreme EVEN considering the cultural man/boy love thing going on then. His most detailed example of how homosexuality carried penalties was of a pedophile who sexually abused two young boys and had his house burned down because of it, and he equated that with the sexual relationships grown men were having with 20-somethings. Also, only persons with penises practiced homosex, there were zero examples, discussions, or allusions to lesbians.

[Kate]

omg horses! shitting! in teh very streets! I HAVE TOTALLY CHANGED MY STARRY-EYED PICTURING OF THE RENAISSANCE NOW gee thx Alexander Lee!

[Sud666]

Dr. Lee pulls off a small miracle. He has written a book that is at once scholarly and deeply researched, while still being very enjoyable to read. In this book he takes us on a tour of the Renaissance world of the Italian city-states, with a notable emphasis on Florence. Using many of the famous pieces of art from that time, Dr. Lee dispels the myth that the Renaissance was simply a time of high-minded ideals and beautiful art. He shows us a world of sex, scandal and suffering. The great city-states of the time were filled with depravity and inequality. You will get to travel down cramped, dirty streets filled with prostitutes, murderers, robbers and perverted clergy. From the elite banking families of the Medici to the powerful Papal families of the Borgias, we are introduced to a world of seduction, shady backroom deals and conspiracies of every shade. Using the art of the age he shows us the famous people of the time, including famous condottieri (mercenaries), super-rich merchant bankers, political figures and other luminaries of the age. Yet, instead of merely showing the famous artists as just brilliant superhumans, Dr. Lee shows them to be normal people with superb talents. They were just as likely to do things we normally would not associate with these brilliant minds. Just people like anyone else, albeit superbly talented. This book shows a side of the Renaissance as it is rarely shown. From anti-semitic preachers, to corrupt Lords and horribly greedy financiers- these were the people who financed the great works of art we associate with the time. This is a great book for anyone interested in this period or the art of this time. It shows who the patrons of the arts were and what the motivation of the artists were. Using 40 classic painting, Dr. Lee shows us a great view of what is in the art many of us are so familiar with. A well written and superbly researched history.
So why only three stars? It has to do with the inherent bias the author displays. This is a product of his background- obviously a younger man with degrees from Cambridge and Edinburgh and now a lecturer at Oxford, the author suffers from the "ivory tower" complex that is very endemic to the elite academic world. This is a person who has always been in the presence of similarly brilliant academicians and has little understanding of the real world, per se. His judgements on certain things mirror the same bias and prejudiced of the super-liberal Ivy League professors here in the US. For example Dr. Lee seems to find it inexplicable that Condottieri were harsh, often brutal men. Really? War is a harsh business and only the strong survive and only the strongest ever reach the heights of power and fame as some of his historical figures. They did not achieve this fame by attending elite finishing schools and spending their days giving lectures, but rather by bashing in skulls, rape, pillage, plunder, etc. An example is when he seems to conflate the famous Captain Montefeltro's injury and subsequent "surgery" with a morbid penchant for of paranoia and a character that was overly afraid of assassinations and conspiracies. What do I mean? When young Montefeltro had his right eye popped out during a joust, finding his peripheral vision to be destroyed he had the surgeon hack out the bridge of his nose so that he could see. This is not because of paranoia or fear of assassins, Dr. Lee, but rather because it is REALLY hard to survive hand to hand combat with NO peripheral vision. Something, one only knows if one has been in ACTUAL combat versus reading about it in a book. I often find similar views held by many of my peers that I encountered during my graduate and post-grad studies- liberal types who had always been in academics who had NO concept of actual combat and thus sitting comfortably ensconced in their safe, academic worlds they pass judgement on things they only vestigially understand. I, personally, feel a historian ought to render the facts and explanations but reserve moralistic views to their own personal beliefs and not expect others to see the world their way. Morality is a uniquely individual thing-beware the man or woman that speaks of general morals. It's not real. So Dr. Lee please keep your personal ideologies to yourself and not expect everyone to hold similar views. The world is what the world is-the historian should tell you about the world and let you decide the right or wrong of it based on YOUR individual morality.

[Gaele]

There is a curious propensity of humans, back to the dawn of time, to appreciate beautiful things. There is a certain beauty in antiquities from cave paintings at Lascaux to the hieroglyphs of Egypt, even incorporating newer forms from street and graffiti artists. While much of the earlier forms were also communicating or signifying important messages in the imagery, their decorative appeal is not to be missed. But one can also think in terms of this imagery being a contrast to the realities of life: bleak, barren, violent, or smelly, the art can provide a lasting visual for generations, where often the reality is long forgotten.

When people today hear Renaissance, they often think of Michaelangelo, DaVinci, Botticelli and the other masters so prized today. Alexander Lee has presented a work that is ostensibly based in fact, but his lack of clear premise, a penchant for poor application of today’s beliefs and approaches to situations some 500 years earlier, and an inability to convincingly present his information in a way that proves his premise made this a difficult read. Complex and nuanced situations are reduced to trivialities with vague and often conflicting pieces of “fact’ twisted to suit his own premise, which loses in both bite and believability as the story continues.

What is most striking about Lee’s story is his tone: which felt to me very condescending. This is not a ‘for pleasure’ read for many, people drawn to this title would already understand the ‘realities’ of the Renaissance era: plague, disease, superstition, religious overreach, power struggles, political unrest and poverty that was rampant in most of the population. As a matter of curiosity and some gobsmacking overreach, the Medicis and Borgias are somewhat familiar to many with their devious manipulations for power. Unfortunately, Lee brought forth no new information, and when there was a nugget of interest his poor use of extrapolation and inability to find a clear link to his premise served only to show his lack of belief in his premise.

I had great hopes for this story, and can only wonder where the editors were to challenge some of the glaring inconsistencies and wandering prose that did nothing for reader’s understanding of the story, and did not serve the author’s intent, however muddled that may be. I expected a far more academic tone, with some new information that encouraged my reading elsewhere for more information, but I got a clearly unfocused 448 pages with spates of pedantic conclusion, conflicting arguments to prove the same premise and slovenly bordering on sloppy research.

I received an eBook copy of the title from the publisher via Edelweiss for purpose of honest review. I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.

[Jo Walton]

I can't disagree with the conclusion -- that things on the Renaissance were far from perfect but at least beautiful things were being produced, whereas now we still have power imbalances and injustice without even getting the art.

This isn't a bad book, but there wasn't much in it that was new or surprising for me -- it might be a good introduction. It tends to focus on a work of art and bring together information about the creator and the time and place of creation, sometimes forcing the narrative back to the artwork. I don't know how anyone could read anything about the Renaissance without running into sex, greed & etc, so I don't see how Lee expected this to be shocking. Meh.

(But I am totally on for a new Renaissance. Any time.)

[Keli]

I didn't get very far in this book before putting it down. I was hoping for either an exploration of the paradoxical nature of renaissance art and the corrupt and brutal politics or a gleeful look at some of the lurid lives of the famous people at the time. However, the author spent the entire first chapter trying to convince me that the Renaissance was full of brutality, hypocrisy and and depravity. I already know that. It's not a secret. In fact, that's why I picked up the book. I would think that most people who pick up this book would already know that. Maybe the book god better when it moved from generalities later in the book, I just didn't get that far. I just felt that the author was a prig and decided to read something else.

[Jenny]

I believe Alexander Lee achieved something with this work that many historians dream of doing; combining excellent scholarship with readability. Though this book jumped around a bit from time period to time period, it was an incredibly factual and detail-oriented look into the world of Renaissance Italy. Was it as ugly as the title implies? Maybe not. But this was still a wonderful window into the past. Lee separates the book into three parts; Renaissance artist, Renaissance patron, and Renaissance world. I believe this was a great way to understand the day to day lives of men such as Michelangelo against those who paid for their work, like the Medici.

[Richard]

By no means an academic work. Lee's entire work is a straw man argument for which he provides no counter argument apart from "modern historians" and the random reference to Burckhardt who has been dead for almost 200 years. This work is a collection of ideas which were relevant to the field in the 50's, but in a more palatable presentation. Works as designed, intended to be a pop history book which gives the reader a few bits of interesting trivia for their next book club meeting.

[Jennifer]

Gave up after just a few chapters. Disorganized and selective historical presentation.

[Al Bità]

In his introduction Lee mentions his concerns that the emphasis by some historians and others on “the beauty and elegance of the art and literature of the Renaissance” has made many “succumb to the temptation of viewing it as a period of cultural rebirth and artistic beauty during which men and women were impossibly civilised and sophisticated”, that this view has become widespread, and that this tends to make us overlook and forget about the uglier side of the period.

For Lee, it becomes important for us to understand that “the achievements of the Renaissance coexisted with dark,dirty, and even diabolical realities” (his list includes atrocities committed by corrupt bankers, greedy politicians, sex-crazed priests, religious conflict, rampant disease, and living lives of extravagant excess). This book is Lee’s attempt to redress this imbalance.

If you agree with Lee’s concerns then you might find this work instructive and even useful. Certainly, his writing is very accessible, and is not a chore to read. There is a part of me which agrees with the general statement that any historical writing which is all sweetness and light should raise red flags as a warning that there may be more to the story. On the other hand, where equal emphasis is given to all aspects of a situation, it may be that the writing will become bland and unexciting: it depends on the effect one might wish to present to a reader.

As I read through this work I could not help but feel that Lee’s concerns seemed a bit “off” — that the term “ugly” began to split up into different kinds of meaning: distasteful; unpleasant; immoral; hypocritical; dangerous; evil; and so on. What these have to do with the art and literature of the Renaissance is problematic, and for me the connection continually slips away into comparative insignificance.

Lee selects the period from 1300–1550 CE as an appropriate time for what historians have called the Renaissance in Europe — fair enough — but European history during this 250 year period covers quite a lot of ground. It includes such events as the Bubonic Plague; the Hundred Years’ War between England and France; the Avignon Papacy and the Great Schism for the Roman Catholics; papal and political entanglement; the discovery of the Americas; the Slave Trade; the Spanish Inquisition; rampant antisemitism, anti-witchcraft and homophobia; peasant uprisings and other anti-authoritarian activities indicative of major social upheavals on a number of fronts; and the Protestant Reformation, among others. Anyone familiar with this history will no doubt have had some idea about many of these situations; they will not need to be reminded of the many “ugly” elements they embody.

While Lee briefly covers some of these events, he prefers to limit his concerns not with all of them in general, but with the situation in the Italian peninsula, with Florence in particular, and also with Rome and a few other cities. Even so, while the items and details Lee presents are accurate enough, their relationship to what he calls “ugly” is more ambiguous and unclear. I suspect he relies on more modern concepts of what may be ugly and what may be not.

The Renaissance was certainly a period of cultural rebirth and artistic beauty, but while it might also be true that some of the people involved were learning to become more civilised and sophisticated in a number of areas, that does not necessarily mean that everyone was. Lee wants us to believe that there were both angels and demons during this period — but one could say that about any historical period. I believe such a simple dichotomy is wrong and misleading. Human beings live, adapt and react as best they can within their specific political, religious, social, economic and cultural environments. Those generations living during the Renaissance were neither angels nor demons: they were just being human.

[Liam Ostermann]

What a yawn - the Renaissance was not full of people talking about refined and abstruse topics but lots of polit6ics, battles, blood, guts and pretty horrible things - well what is new about that. Did anyone think that the renaissance was a time of lovely gentle aesthetes? Honestly the author has created a paper dragon of beliefs to demolish to provide a reason for his book. It is all bogus - there is nothing new here - it is insulting that such tripe can be published and promoted. There are many great books about the renaissance - go search them out and avoid this trash like the plague.

[Hannah Schumacher]

I liked the depth this explored for why the wealthy patrons of the Renaissance supported all of the amazing religious art that the period created and how they used it for their own propaganda.

This one also had some new revelatory details for me on how the Europeans felt about other regions/people. Like - think about ALL of the art produced in this age of curiosity and enlightenment, and notice how there is NO art depicting people/things from the Americas. They literally couldn’t care less from an intellectual standpoint and it led to their complete disregard of these cultures.

[Elze De]

Interessant boek als je meer wilt weten over het leven tijdens de renaissance. Met name in florance. Waarbij je vooral leert hoe de rijken hun geld en macht veroverde. En hoe er gedacht werd over de onderklassen en niet christelijke volken. Heb hierdoor een nog beter beeld van deze tijdsperiode gekregen.

[Raluca Daniela]

3.5/5 The title verges on clickbait (readbait?), but the content was pretty interesting, albeit quite dry at times.

[Milan]

Veoma interesantna knjiga o životu u Italiji za vreme renesanse. Ova knjiga mi je bila zanimljiva ne samo zbog opisa gradova država u kojima su ljudi masovno umirali od kuge, gde je silovanje žena i devojčica bilo pravilo, a ne izuzetak, i u kojima su vladali rasizam, antisemitizam i ksenofobija, što je nešto što smo svi već znali, već i zbog odnosa prema umetnosti.

Imućni ljudi koristili su slikarstvo, vajarstvo i arhitekturu kako bi ne samo proveli što manje vremena u Čistilištu već i kako bi se dodvorili drugim moćnicima i postali još bogatiji. Kada kažem imućni ljudi, ne mislim samo na bankare, lihvare i trgovce već i na nemilosrdne vođe plaćeničkih družina i sveštenike. Svi oni su, angažovanjem Botičelija, Vazarija, Mikelanđela i ostalih „nindža kornjača”, želeli da se predstave u boljem svetlu, pokažu svoju moć, ali i ostvare ambicije i napreduju na društvenoj lestvici.

Ako su, recimo, želeli da se dodvore Medičiјima, tražili su od slikara da Kozima ili Lorenca na freskama postavi bliže Bogorodici, dok bi za sebe „rentirali” neko skromnije mesto, ali i dalje dovoljno blizu Božije Majke ili Hrista.

Nikada više na te kapele, freske, skulpture i slike neću gledati istim očima.

Kroz rad Mikelanđela Buonarotija na Davidu i Sikstinskoj kapeli možemo otkriti kako su živeli obični ljudi i neobični umetnici, ali i kakvi su bili odnosi između umetnika, mecena i bogataša. Završna poglavlja bave se položajem plaćeničkih družina, Jevreja i tamnoputih stanovnika afričkog kontinenta u renesansnoj Italiji, kao i posledicama velikih geografskih otkrića na dešavanja na Apeninskom poluostrvu tog doba.

Zanimljiva naučno popularna knjiga. See less

[Maud Van Keulen]

I liked this book so much! My next city trip is booked to.... Florence!

[James S.]

How can a book about crime and sex during the Renaissance be dull? Somehow this author managed it.

[David]

This book has a huge scholarly apparatus and is full of interesting information about various aspects of Renaissance art and society in Italy. It was fine to listen to. However, I have several quarrels with it.

First, if it has a theme it's the rather banal one that notwithstanding producing lots of great art, the Renaissance in Italy was full of lust, greed, violence, and gluttony. Hardly a surprise, that.

Second, there was no organizing principle, neither chronological nor analytical. It seemed a collection of essays that could have been free-standing articles, with only the conceit that each reflected an aspect of Renaissance sinfulness.

Third, the author retrojects 21st Century shibboleths into the era in a rather silly way. He lambastes the ethnocentrism of the era from a contemporary multi culti perspective, but cuts his subjects none of the slack he thinks they should have cut their Jews, Muslims, Africans, usw. In effect, he demands cultural and historical relativism of his 500-years-ago subjects, but offers them none.

In particular, his treatment of what he anachronistically call "anti-Semitism" views it with alarm, but makes no reference to Jewish behavior, or to simple ethnic competition. Classic "lachrymose history" in lieu of analysis.

In short, a flawed but frequently interesting and scholarly work.

[Val]

I loved how Alexander Lee organized the Ugly Renaissance to tell the story of the rise of merchant bankers, like the Medici, condottiere, and Catholic Popes to then discuss the impact their greed and repulsive behavior had on the renaissance arts and the world at large. Closing by highlighting the antisemitism, Islamophobia, and anti-Black and anti-aboriginal attitude of the era was crucial, but it made the book frustrating to finish, as a Black American reader. I definitely want to learn more about the free Black Italians (looking at you Alessandro de Medici). Lastly, this book opened my eyes to the “push” factor the Ottoman Empire had on the development of the age of discovery and the rise of the Transatlantic Slave Trade… I always knew of the “pull” factor of monetary greed, but that was a nice addition to my understanding of the historical context of the age of “discovery”.

[Alexandra Townsend]

7/10. The title is misleading and while the book is interesting I think the author goes over the same things again and again in the chapters making the book longer to what it could be...
Throughout the book you get a good insight as how Renaissance Italy was politically, culturally and economically, but you get nearly nothing related to marginalised communities or woman of the time, which was very disappointing. The author excuses himself saying women were just not important enough to write about them, I think he was just not interested enough. You get some chapters about religion and racial differences but otherwise the 80% of the book is about rich, powerful men and how good and bad they were and how they shaped Italy at the time.

[CC]

Unquestionably a good writer , he provides an accessible vehicle for you to enter the renaissance with. At the beginning he admits that his methodology of filling in the blanks is to enhance immersion, okay, sure, I can forgive some historicism. But the anachronism by which he treats history is telling of his inability to grasp the history of the evolution of consciousness; these people participated differently than you and I. His inability to grasp this is telling , as are his platitudes a confession of his character; a standard by which he judges others.
The platitudes take such presumptuous twists and turns that his vehicle shakes me of. He doesn't fully commit to the ugly side of renaissance either, it's not completely incoherent but there is much left unsaid and more generalised

5/10

[Muaz Jalil]

Interesting book to say the least. The key argument is that Renaissance too often has been portrayed as a period of high humanistic ideals, filled with god like humans; reality, as author argues , is very different with an ugly side. But the author for first 40 percent focuses on Michaelangelo and then the Medicis much like heroworship version of Renaissance, which the author criticizes. Later on it picks and we get to explore other aspects but it is still a collection of biographies rather than a sociological or anthropological analysts of Renaissance.

Few things that stood out:

1. Renaissance inequality, excessive wealth, juxtaposition of high culture with poverty reminds me very much of modern world

2. In Renaissance= religion was priority and it was glorified by art...."art business" as justification for rich people

Modern time = science priority and it is glorified by tech...."science business space and gizmo" as justification for mega rich. Explains Bezos Musk and Branson preoccupation with space travel when world is suffering from pandemic, malaria and basic poverty.

3. The level of anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, racism during Renaissance was insane. It seems previous scholarship was more objective. I guess Renaissance was also a good time for 'fake news'

[Colin]

I picked this one up at my local library. While I am not sure why Lee considers it a major revelation that people in the past behaved badly - the depravity of the Renaissance was certainly taught when I was in school - it is an excellent tome on the subject, even if there are no revelations that should shock the reasonably educated reader. Good, solid scholarship/

[Lulu (the library leopard)]

i got the DIRT on the renaissance now

[Jim Swike]

Returned by Kindle. Provides a complete picture of the Renaissance, as the title suggests. Great resource for research and or a term paper. Enjoy!

[Hayley]

The subject matter of this was interesting but at times it felt like the author was doing his best to make it boring.