Customer Reviews

Fire in the City: Savonarola and the Struggle for the Soul of Renaissance Florence

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I've been a Common Reader for over 40 years and have read literally hundreds of books including many histories and biographies. This is one of the best books I've ever read. Lauro Martines has created an artful, compelling, and illuminating biography of Savonarola that is strongly tied to the political and historical context of Florence, Italy at the close of the 14th century. By establishing the people, events, and issues of the time, Savonarola's life is made incredibly more interesting and compelling than a simple biography often portrays. If you simply think of Savonarola and the infamous bonfire of the vanities, you really need to read this book. Martines clearly demonstrates that this Catholic friar was not the intolerant moralist, but rather a defender of a much broader definition of democracy and a Church critic with more in common with Luther. This biography also illustrates the perils anyone may face when one combines a reformer's zeal with both religion and politics.

If you like history and biography, read this book. It is worth anyone's time and effort.

This is an excellent, well-written book about Savonarola and the Medici era in Florence. It presents the Friar in a different light from the perception of him that I was taught in parochial school. Here we have a deeply religious reformer, who tried to change the government type of a city that had been under the thumb of the Medici family for many years. His sermons attracted huge crowds, but he also acquired many enemies, not only in Florence, but more importantly, in the Roman Curia. Eventually his enemies won out and he and two of his fellow monks were hanged and burned. This is definitely a sympathetic look at a man who, in some ways, foreshadowed Luther and his attempts at Church reform. It's a book well worth reading by everyone.

Fire in the City is another revealed hornet's nest from Martines that picks up the thread where his previous book April Blood left off. As the title suggests, this is not an exclusive biography on Savonarola, the author casts his net wider than that detailing, in a very readable fashion, the political and social settings that were bound in with Savonarola's actions.

With Lorenzo's death, Florence is at the mercy of his vain and incompetent son, Piero de Medici, whose diplomatic bungling with the invading King of France, Charles the VIII, gets him run out of town by the citizens of Florence, creating political alternatives to Medici rule. Into this anxious period of uncertainty, the searing personality of the reforming Dominican Friar, Savonarola, is catapulted.

Martines shows how Savonarola's political instinct was very much in line with the Christian ethos he espoused from the pulpit, preferring a broader based franchise through the Great Council, sustained by a Republic, instead of oligarchic rule by an elite. Salvation meant not just the deliverance by redemption from the power of sin, but also preservation from tyrannical harm. Yet Savonarola's motives were not as subversive or ego driven ('vainglorious') as his inquisitors and future Medici regimes led history to believe.

Martines also shows how Savonarola's prophecies, another contentious quality to his personality used against him by his enemies in Rome and elsewhere, were not far off the mark. The sack of Rome by Christian mercenaries in 1527, twenty-nine years after Savonarola's execution, seemed to vindicate much of Savonarola's visionary utterances. Was that, indeed, the scourge against the Church he claimed Charles the VIII capable of a generation earlier?

Emphasising the importance of this little Dominican Friar from Ferrara who was prepared to take on Pope Alexander VI over issues of simony and moral corruption, reminds us just how much of a precursor he was to Martin Luther. His insistence on a reformed Church was not merely rhetorical either, his own example proved otherwise.

No doubt Savonarola was a force to behold with his lightning bolts of apocalyptic doom. He profoundly affected Michelangelo and Botticelli who heard him speak, but Martines has stained orthodox whitewash with the blood of historical realism, showing us that Savonarola was more vital and complex and his contribution more positive, than that of just a preaching terrorist who infuriated Rome and encouraged the `bonfire of the vanities'.

After reading April Blood and Fire in the City, the enigma of Florence is much better understood. We patiently wait for his next publication, to read again where it will lead.

This is a must read for anyone planning a vacation to Florence, or for those wanting to experience the place and time without the expense, as Martines reaches far beyond the story of a single man and into Renassiance Florence. Readers will find this gripping and complex historical drama impossible to put down. "April Blood" (the Pazzi conspiracy against the Medici) sets the stage for this great book, and Martines combines expert scholarship with dramatic narrative skill in both works.

It is not often that a leading scholar writes a popular history in his field of study. Such is Professor Martines's latest endeavor. Martines knows all there is to know about Florence in the second half of the 15th century. And his subject, Girolamo Savonarola, could not be a more colorful character. The problem is that this study does justice to neither of his audiences--the casual reader (see. several of the reviews posted above) nor historians of the period.

This said, the book is a solid study. The story is not only one of interest, but by and large Martines tells it well. He knows all there is to know about the subject, he gets the facts right, and keeps the narrative going. He has a firm grasp of the cast of characters, the politics, the social situation, and the relevant scholarly literature--original and secondary sources. More importantly, Martines is determined to explain the events.

As usual, however, Martines has trouble with the English language (see "April Blood" for example). Much of the text reads as though a poor translation from a foreign language. All the more reason his publisher should have provided him with a good editor, which they clearly did not. Sentences at a time simply do not make sense. And his word choice occasionally leaves his meaning opaque. Relatedly, the choice of illustrations is quixotic--few have anything at all to do with his narrative, while meaningful depictions, such as of Savonarola himself, the monastery of S. Marco, the plaque embedded in the Piazza della Signoria marking the spot of Savonarola's demise, etc. are ignored.

What particularly makes this study valuable is not the `story'--there is little original here, but in Martines's interpretation of the events. A revisionist at heart, Martines breaks from most of his contemporary historians in his sensitivity to Savonarola and his actions. It is indeed interesting to see such a learned contemporary scholar defend the maniacal rants of such a fire-breathing rabble-rouser. It's not only fun, but makes us all step back and reconsider our own prejudices in dealing with the period. He deserves accolades for this. But it is also true, that Martines bends the truth at times to make his point. For example, in excusing Savonarola's abhorrent actions, Martines stresses the beneficial political influence Savonarola had on the history of the Florentine government. In his vision, Florence had a century-old citizen republic which the Medicis kidnapped in the 1430s, subverting it from its pure form into the bastardized oligarchy which Savonarola helped overthrow in the 1490s, redirecting the city-state to its original, more beneficial origins. This is simply not true. Martines surely knows the long history of Florence coming out of the 13th century. All of the evils he sees as 15th century malevolence in Florentine politics were rampant throughout the previous two centuries: raucous political divisions (first the Guelfs and the Ghibelines, then the Blacks and the Whites), social unrest (the Ciampi Revolt, amongst others), the political ascension of wealthy and /or aristocratic families, the killing of rivals, the exile of entire families, confiscation of property, huge fines, etc. There was nothing new in the Medici handbag of power, they were simply better at it for a longer period of time than their predecessors.

One further quibble: Martines, or rather the publisher, offers no textual citations--footnotes or endnotes--in the main body of the book. Instead they indulge in what is becoming all too popular today, even from publishers as prestigious as Oxford University Press. There are `Notes" at the end of the text, separated into chapters, the specifics of which reflect back to specific words buried somewhere in the text. It's a mess trying to figure this out.

Murder of a Medici Princess piqued my interest in Renaissance Italy. I selected this book because the jacket of this book says it "reads like a novel"... but it didn't. It's a tough read. If you don't have any background in this era, I recommend trying something else. The author says the book is for the general public. He also says it is not a biography, but a rendering of Florence at the time through the impact of Savonarola.

I'm a general reader, I had 3 main problems in reading this book: 1) the text goes back and forth in time, 2) the absence of verbal links that could provide clarity and 3) some of the major players and events are cameos.

As example of a layman's problem, on p. 80 the discussion "six bean" rule danced around the idea that a bean was a vote. Maybe the meaning of "vote" should have been obvious (it is clearly stated about 100 pages ahead) but with all the text devoted to "bean" on p. 80, I thought I was missing something bigger.

Another example is that after two pages describing the pageantry and "sweet signing" of Charles VIII's entry into Florence, we learn that the residents were only "grinning and bearing it" because they were "on the brink of cataclysm". Then we learn that 2 days before (the sequence problem), 500 people met and the dominant theme was the hatred for Pietro Medici (not about the entry of Charles). When you don't have a background here, the meeting, the festivities and the "cataclysm" are hard to reconcile. You go back to reread it, but the link isn't there. Many pages later, even after reading of Charles as a liberator (which doesn't reconcile with "grin and bear") and then Savonarola as a saving the city from the French army (which doesn't reconcile with liberator), you see what might have been meant by cataclysm.

I felt there was a lot more to tell. Since this is the story of Florence, and not a biography of Savonarola, some major players should not be reduced to cameos. For instance, what became of Charles VIII? The author says that the ill feeling towards Florence throughout Italy stems from their embrace of him... but he basically disappears from the text. The Medici's are frequently cited when a string is pulled, they are obviously major players, but where are they? How are they holding on to their fortune and influencing events? What of Savonarola's youth group? (It sounds like Mao's cultural revolution.) How did this large group meet? Did they convince people to surrender their "vanities" or did they take them?

The author is obviously knowledgeable and has assembled a lot of information. I recommend this book for those who know something about the period, but not the "general reader".

I had read enough about Savonarola to have a vague idea as to what he was about, but this book gave me a very different perspective. Savonarola was much more complicated, and less a mad man than I had thought. The destuction of the "vanities", which was the most lamentable of all his actions from our perspective, is better understood after reading this book. Obviously, the value of the destroyed art in Savanarola's context is quite different than it is in ours, and Mr Martines made the point very well. It is a great read, full of history, and I enjoyed it very much.

This wonderful book is about many fires: the bonfires of the vanities, the ordeal by fire that never occurred, the fire that consumed the bodies of Savonarola and two other friars, and the white-hot passion of religious zeal that engulfed the monastery of San Marco and the whole of Florence in the last years of the 15th century. With so much going on, the reader is grateful to Dr. Martines for keeping the strands--personal, political, religious--separate so that the way each works on the other is clear. The final chapter of conclusion brings together all the strands so that the reader comes away understanding the larger picture. Some reviewers felt at sea in the book, and I sometimes did, too. Now that I have read the conclusion, I think it could also serve as a concise introduction to the book as well for those with less grounding in that period. Don't miss this book, since even from events of 500 years ago we can see many lessons for our own time; so many issues we face today were grappled with (or avoided) back in those times as well.

This is a book about the politics of Renaissance Florence, not a book about religion or theology. The title tells you that, and that's what Martines delivers. Martines makes it plain that he is not interested in Savonarola's theology or in religion generally, except as far as it affects politics. It is a book that will help you understand Florence.

The book is thoroughly researched using documents in the original languages and is well written.

For those readers who want to study the religious aspects of Savonarola's thought and life I recommnend the collection of Savonarola's sermons and other documents also available here on Amazon by putting his name in as a search term.

Some of the reviews here seem to criticize Martines for not writing the book about Savonarola that they wanted to read.

For example, there is a controversy among Italian historians about whether Savonarola was a proto-Protestant, a forerunner of Martin Luther. That is the kind of question that does not interest Martines and that's fine. It's his book, and well worth reading.

Lauro Martines develops this history of Florence and Savonarola with wonderfully lucid logic both of fact and time and place. It is incredibly readable and develops a sense of having been on the streets, in the times. Absolutely brilliantly researched and presented. I wanted to know about the man, Savonarola, the man of high ideals, and to learn how it could be that his life ended so ingloriously. I was totally satisfied with this book and I recommend it highly. Some of the facts shocked me to the point of having to close the book for a moment but LM took great care to avoid sensationalism and the shock factor was in the fact itself.