At first the book seemed to have a soporific effect, but when the story focused with more detail on the life & historical context of Poggio Bracciolini, it became very interesting ~ with colorful accounts of events & people. Also, it was informative to learn the original tenets of epicurism. For help with names (like the long Italian ones), I recommend the good website, FORVO.com for pronunciations of words from foreign languages. Mr. Greenblatt's concluding pages are very powerful, worthy of rereading.

A great telling of the story of Lucretius' "On the Nature of Things" and the influence it had on thought, philosophy and religion. A difficult and challenging subject presented in a highly readable manner. Loved the sweep of history and the links across time. The Catholic Church does not fare well. This book will make you want to learn more.

Quick read, fun read. Greenblatt's really strong when writing about Poggio Bracciolini and 15th Century Italy. The final two chapters are weak. Interesting that he leaves to the first endnote any discussion of the relative merits of different English translations of the Lucretius poem at the center of the book.

Greenblatt is a skilled storyteller, and somewhat to my surprise, this was a page turner. But that swiftness was also unsatisfying when more detail, analysis, and insight were needed. As such, this is an excellent introduction to the great swaths of history and ideas Greenblatt deals with, an invitation to dig deeper where he hasn't fully done so.

Extremely interesting book, if long winded in Papal politics- though I suppose that is the point. I wonder how different the world would be if the Catholic Church didn't attempt to acquire and hold everything that contradicts it's beliefs? Looking forward to reading Lucretius.

makes you absolutely want to run out and read at least Lucretius if not as well the other Greek and Roman authors, though I would've preferred a style from the writer more reminiscent of these earlier luminaries to tell the story, a disordered jumble of workaday words in inelegant constructions in chapters randomly assorted and carelessly conceived make for a singularly unimpressive introduction to an apparently sublime poet

Throughout history, people have tried to suppress ideas that ran counter to the popular ideologies and philosophies of the day. Sometimes, ideas that were thought to be lost for almost 1500 years are found tucked away in a musty monastery. This is the story on one such set of ideas. In the early 15th century, a newly-unemployed papal secretary went book-hunting in monasteries. He was hunting for books long thought to be lost. What he found contributed to the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. This book hunter found a copy of a copy of a copy of a Latin poem, from decades before Jesus, by Lucretius, which extolled the even older philosophy of the ancient Greek thinker Epicurus. The ideas, told in what is reported to be exquisitely beautiful and sensual Latin, included: evolution, atheism, atomism (the idea that everything is made up of tiny particles called atoms), there is no life after death, and the pursuit of pleasure is the highest good to which people can aspire. In the deeply Christian Europe of the Middle Ages, where punishing oneself and seeking pain to emulate the life and death of Jesus were seen to be the highest virtues, these ideas were dangerously radical. Yet they caught on with thinkers and scientists and contributed to a re-discovery of what the ancients had known and to new discoveries, new technologies, and new ways of thinking about life. Stephen Greenblatt has written an excellent account of the poem, the man who found it again, and the times it which it was written and re-discovered. Part history, part biography, and part philosophy, this book entertains and astounds. It conjures up a remarkable picture of medieval Europe, people living amid the ruins of ancient civilizations and knowing that life used to be better, richer. A Europe on the cusp of a re-birth in the belief that pleasure is admirable, that life here is more important than life in the hereafter.

I loved the idea, historic details, values and language. I enjoyed tremendously the first two hundred pages, but then the rest of the book (the other two hundred pages) was just the repeat of the first part and I wondered why that? Of course it spoiled the overall impression of the book. It is hard to rate this book, potentially it is excellent. The wordiness, redundancies and the weak logic of narrative bring the rating down.

Unlike some readers, I enjoyed the historical background -- especially the emergence of humanism within the Vatican. The later section of the book, where Greenblatt makes his case for the influence of Lucretius, is less convincing.

Disappointing. The core information was interesting, but surprisingly poorly presented. Way too much historical background info about irrelevant people and events. I wanted to read about Lucretius and about his poem; I was willing to read a bit about Poggio Bracciolini. I didn't want to know about Poggio's mistress, his wife, or his children, let alone about Pope John XXIII or whotever