Download or read book Son of Siena written by Brian Steven Lavallee and published by Dog Ear Publishing. This book was released on 2009-04 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The eye-openers begin on page 1 of Son of Siena, where Roberto muses, "I could not help but think what the world would be like if I did not help Italy and Germany win World War II." Thus begins the ride of a lifetime-and what a life That life begins and ends in Siena, Italy, and winds through America and Europe at crucial moments of history during both World Wars and their pre- and post- periods, with an influence that spreads throughout the world like tentacles. Yes, those tentacles are ominous but the creature that possesses them is also blessed with great lights that pervade the entire book. Roberto is very much a man of this world, but surrounding him throughout his life are people who are devout, who would have him also take thought of the world to come. Will Roberto do that? What in this world seems more worthy of his attention, and how will he use it to achieve his grand desires? Will he be pleased with the results? In finding the answers to those questions, you will be joining Roberto and a fascinating assortment of supporting characters; and be blissfully exposed to an astonishing array of historical facts that both broaden and deepen a spiritual and intellectual odyssey undertaken by a Son of Siena. Beginning in 1896 Italy, the first half of the story flows through the history and relationships that shape Roberto's life. During these unaltered historic events, the main character eventually accumulates great wealth. After a seminal event changes Roberto fundamentally, he decides Italy needs to be the greatest of the great powers rather than the least. As Roberto begins the building of the Second Roman Empire, he attempts to remain anonymous for the safety of his family. This he believes can be accomplished by becoming Benito Mussolini's muse. Will Roberto be able to handle Mussolini? Will some parts of history not allow themselves to be altered? What will the world look like, and will it appear much different? I am a registered nurse and work in a hospital in Massachusetts. I have bachelors of science degrees in nursing and biology from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. I am married with two children. I was born in Lowell, Massachusetts and was raised in the greater Lowell area. My job is nursing but my passion has always been history. My love of history began in my early teens and has grown since. One thing about history is that it repeats itself because fundamentally most people's motives have not changed. Whether you were a farmer in Mesopotamia or a steel worker in 1930's Germany, the need to eat, clothe yourself, and provide shelter remained paramount. The fascinating thing about people is to what extent they will go to meet those needs; and how their decisions concerning the economic and social structures, military and religious matters are affected. I have studied history for over thirty years. One day in early 2006, I was doing a dressing change on a patient. We were talking about our jobs and mutual interest in books when I mentioned my idea about writing a historic novel. After listening to me, the patient encouraged me to put the story on paper because he believed people would enjoy the book. I thought he was a kind older man, but wondered whether he knew what he was talking about. When I went home that night I googled his name to see what would come up. I was greatly surprised when all sorts of literary prizes and awards were associated with his name. The next night I began writing Son of Siena. I cannot say who the person was because he was a patient of mine, and there are privacy laws involved, though I wish I could.
Download or read book Art as Politics in Late Medieval and Renaissance Siena written by TimothyB. Smith and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-07-05 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Art as Politics in Late Medieval and Renaissance Siena, contributors explore the evolving relationship between image and politics in Siena from the time of the city-state's defeat of Florence at the Battle of Montaperti in 1260 to the end of the Sienese Republic in 1550. Engaging issues of the politicization of art in Sienese painting, sculpture, architecture, and urban design, the volume challenges the still-prevalent myth of Siena's cultural and artistic conservatism after the mid fourteenth century. Clearly establishing uniquely Sienese artistic agendas and vocabulary, these essays broaden our understanding of the intersection of art, politics, and religion in Siena by revisiting its medieval origins and exploring its continuing role in the Renaissance.
Download or read book A Month in Siena written by Hisham Matar and published by Random House. This book was released on 2019-10-22 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Return comes a profoundly moving contemplation of the relationship between art and life. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST AND EVENING STANDARD After finishing his powerful memoir The Return, Hisham Matar, seeking solace and pleasure, traveled to Siena, Italy. Always finding comfort and clarity in great art, Matar immersed himself in eight significant works from the Sienese School of painting, which flourished from the thirteenth to the fifteenth centuries. Artists he had admired throughout his life, including Duccio and Ambrogio Lorenzetti, evoke earlier engagements he’d had with works by Caravaggio and Poussin, and the personal experiences that surrounded those moments. Including beautiful full-color reproductions of the artworks, A Month in Siena is about what occurred between Matar, those paintings, and the city. That month would be an extraordinary period in the writer’s life: an exploration of how art can console and disturb in equal measure, as well as an intimate encounter with a city and its inhabitants. This is a gorgeous meditation on how centuries-old art can illuminate our own inner landscape—current relationships, long-lasting love, grief, intimacy, and solitude—and shed further light on the present world around us. Praise for A Month in Siena “As exquisitely structured as The Return, driven by desire, yearning, loss, illuminated by the kindness of strangers. A Month in Siena is a triumph.”—Peter Carey
Download or read book Siena written by Jane Tylus and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2015-05-15 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Siena: City of Secrets" is a charming, intimate portrait of this most secretive of cities, often overlooked by travelers to Italy. Part cultural history and intellectual memoir, part travelogue and guide book, Tylus writes with a novelist s flair, taking the reader on a quest of discovery through the well- and not-so-well-travelled roads and alleys of the ancient city. Today, Siena can appear on the surface standoffish, a bit static, and very old-fashioned, especially when compared to its larger, flashier cousins Roma and Firenze. But first impressions wear away as we learn from Tylus that Siena was, over the long view, an innovator among the cities of Italy: the first to pave its streets and main plaza (1298), the first to publicly fund its university (1321), the first to employ the promissory note (1720), the first to ban automobile traffic from its city center (1965), and much else. We also hear about Siena s great artistic and architectural past, hidden behind centuries of over painting and rebuilding, and about its resident apocryphal and not-so-apocryphal Saints. And about the distinctive characters of its different neighborhoods ( contrade ), exemplified in the highly competitive horserace that takes place annually in the city and that serves as both a dividing and a uniting force for the Sienese. Throughout we are guided by the assuring voice of a seasoned scholar with a gift for spinning a good story and with an eye for the telling detail, whether we are traveling Siena s modern highways or digging through ancient Etruscan tombs; or shadowing the path walked by medieval pilgrims; or tracking the city s financial history from its beginnings as the once-great center for commerce in the sixteenth century to its near collapse in January 2013; or celebrating literary giants Dante and Calvino or giants of the arena, Siena s Series A soccer team. A useful and entertaining guide for students of Italian culture (Tylus has written discursive, reader-friendly endnotes and included a full bibliography in the back matter), the book will also appeal to the traveler and tourist (virtual or otherwise) interested in learning more about this ancient, mysterious, reclusive citydespite itself."
Download or read book Reading the Middle Ages Volume II written by Barbara H. Rosenwein and published by University of Toronto Press. This book was released on 2018-05-03 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The third edition of Reading the Middle Ages retains the strengths of previous editions—thematic and geographical diversity, clear and informative introductions, and close integration with A Short History of the Middle Ages—and adds significant new materials, especially on the Byzantine and Islamic worlds and the Mediterranean region. This volume spans the period c.900 to c.1500. The stunning "Reading through Looking" color insert, which showcases medieval artifacts, has been expanded to include essays on weapons and warfare by medievalist Riccardo Cristiani. New maps, timelines, and genealogies aid readers in following knotty but revealing sources. On the History Matters website (www.utphistorymatters.com), students have access to hundreds of Questions for Reflection.
Download or read book Son of the Alhambra written by Erika Spivakovsky and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 1971-01-01 with total page 477 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Last of the Spanish Renaissance men, Diego Hurtado de Mendoza (1504–1575) was a master of the humanist disciplines as well as an active diplomat whose correspondence provides insight into the workings of power politics in the first post-Machiavellian decades. This account of Mendoza's diplomatic career is a living commentary on the mid-sixteenth century, the time of the Spanish Inquisition and the Reformation, with its upheavals in the European balance of power. Mendoza served as ambassador of Charles V to Venice and Rome and as governor of Siena. His political life complements the reign of the Emperor whose ambition was to become a universal monarch. An interesting contradiction in Mendoza's thought—his humanist theories versus personal ambition—prevented him from successful implemention of tyrannical imperial policies. His role in the government of the Holy Roman Empire shows how the exertion of imperialist power, humanist ethics notwithstanding, inevitably entails corruption, hypocrisy, greed, and imbalance in the one who tries to wield this power. Gifted to the point of universal genius, Mendoza was perhaps the foremost representative of the splendid but little-known epoch of Spanish humanism, the era between the death of Queen Isabel (1504) and the abdication of her grandson Charles V (1556). Spain's short-lived Renaissance came to an abrupt end with the accession of Philip II and the almost simultaneous onset of the Counter Reformation. To this changed Spain, under monolithic thought control now exacted and enforced by monarch and Inquisition, Mendoza returned to live the last third of his life, mostly in obscurity, and in the last few years in royal disgrace. Based on primary sources, this first biography of Mendoza in English also examines the relevance of some of Don Diego's disputed literary works to the legend that grew up around him as a spokesman for latent unorthodox opinion.
Download or read book Reclaiming Catherine of Siena written by Jane Tylus and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2009-04 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Catherine of Siena (1347–1380) wrote almost four hundred epistles in her lifetime, effectively insinuating herself into the literary, political, and theological debates of her day. At the same time, as the daughter of a Sienese dyer, Catherine had no formal education, and her accomplishments were considered miracles rather than the work of her own hand. As a result, she has been largely excluded from accounts of the development of European humanism and the language and literature of Italy. Reclaiming Catherine ofSiena makes the case for considering Catherine alongside literary giants such as Dante and Petrarch, as it underscores Catherine's commitment to using the vernacular to manifest Christ's message—and her own. Jane Tylus charts here the contested struggles of scholars over the centuries to situate Catherine in the history of Italian culture in early modernity. But she mainly focuses on Catherine’s works, calling attention to the interplay between orality and textuality in the letters and demonstrating why it was so important for Catherine to envision herself as a writer. Tylus argues for a reevalution of Catherine as not just a medieval saint, but one of the major figures at the birth of the Italian literary canon.
Download or read book Letters of Catherine Benincasa written by Catherine Benincasa and published by Legare Street Press. This book was released on 2022-10-27 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Download or read book A History of Siena written by Mario Ascheri and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-08-08 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A History of Siena provides a concise and up-to-date biography of the city, from its ancient and medieval development up to the present day, and makes Siena’s history, culture, and traditions accessible to anyone studying or visiting the city. Well informed by archival research and recent scholarship on medieval Siena and the Italian city-states, this book places Siena’s development in its larger context, both temporally and geographically. In the process, this book offers new interpretations of Siena’s artistic, political, and economic development, highlighting in particular the role of pilgrimage, banking, and class conflict. The second half of the book provides an important analysis of the historical development of Siena’s nobility, its unique system of neighborhood associations (contrade) and the race of the Palio, as well as an overview of the rise and fall of Siena’s troubled bank, the Monte dei Paschi. This book is accessible to undergraduates and tourists, while also offering plenty of new insights for graduate students and scholars of all periods of Sienese history.
Download or read book The Cathedral Builders written by Leader Scott and published by London : Sampson Low, Marston and Company. This book was released on 1899 with total page 630 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Sterling written by Jan Boles Noble and published by Page Publishing Inc. This book was released on 2018-10-16 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Siena Madison announces that she will spend an entire week of her highly rated daytime television show revealing the history of her family—and all its secrets—she begins to doubt the wisdom of having allowed her beloved grandmother, Savanna, to convince her to do it. Savanna had grown up in the shadow of the Connor mansion where her mother had served as the housekeeper and cook and her father had been the overseer of the large poultry ranch in East Texas. The summer Loran Connor came home from his freshman year away at college, he saw a different girl than the little black companion he had grown up with. By summer’s end, the young people were in love; and the night before Loran’s return to college, they gave each other that physical gift that can only be given once. When circumstances make it impossible for Savanna to remain in the only home she has ever known, she is forced to make a life for herself that produces great success and wealth. In a chance encounter, Savanna and Loran are brought together, and she is free at last to reveal her long-kept secret. A love that endured through years of absence is rekindled, and lives are changed as they learn to look at the hearts of people rather than the color of skin.
Download or read book Official Catalogue of the World s Columbian Exposition 1893 written by and published by . This book was released on 1893 with total page 1072 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Spink Son s Monthly Numismatic Circular written by and published by . This book was released on 1908 with total page 790 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Garrisoning the Borderlands of Medieval Siena written by Anabel Thomas and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-12-05 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through a close study of local demographies and topographies, this study considers patterns of piety, charity and patronage, and by extension, the development of art and architecture in Siena's southern contado during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Garrisoning the Borderlands of Medieval Siena describes Sant'Angelo in Colle as a designated 'castello di frontiera' under the Sienese Government of the Nine (1287-1355), against the background of Siena's military and economic buoyancy during the early fourteenth century. At the same time, mining thoroughly the Tax Record of 1320 and the Boundary Registration of 1318 and presenting a large number of individual records that have not been published before-including wills, tenancy agreements, land exchange and sharecropping contracts-the author constructs a portrait of the people, buildings and surrounding countryside of Sant'Angelo in Colle. Finally, adopting the methodological approach of first considering patterns of ownership of land and property in the context of identifying potential patrons of art, the study considers patterns of piety and charity established in the early fourteenth-century village and the extent to which these affected the development of the urban fabric and the embellishment of key buildings in medieval Sant'Angelo in Colle.
Download or read book Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years written by British Museum. Department of Manuscripts and published by . This book was released on 1875 with total page 960 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Daughter of Siena written by Marina Fiorato and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2011-05-10 with total page 412 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the wards of the city of Siena in 1729 Tuscany prepare for an annual horse race where rivalries run high, young Pia Tolomei nurtures a secret, forbidden love for a rider of an opposing ward.
Download or read book A Biographical and Critical Dictionary of Painters Engravers Sculptors and Architects from Ancient to Modern Times written by Shearjashub Spooner and published by . This book was released on 1853 with total page 1274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
