The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry

First issued in collected form in 1873, this book of essays treats Italian and related art as a history of temperament and style. Pater writes on the early French story of Amis and Amile, Pico della Mirandola, Botticelli, Luca della Robbia, Michelangelo's poetry, Leonardo, the school of Giorgione, Joachim du Bellay, and Winckelmann. A preface and a conclusion argue that the critic's task is to know one's impression precisely and that life is a brief interval best spent in intense aesthetic experience. The pieces are criticism, not a narrative history of the period and not a guidebook to museums.

Bound in blue buckram, cover blocked with a gilt design. Gold slipcase.