"'Joscelyn Godwin, whose translation is a masterpiece of clarity and scholarship, has achieved something truly remarkable with this beautiful edition. It is unquestionably one of the publishing events not just of the year but of the century' - Andrew Graham-Dixon, The Daily Telegraph; 'A mammoth task of inestimable value, carried out with learning, elegance and wit' - International Herald Tribune; 'An extraordinary and exceptional book' - The Architects' Journal; 'Adds a fresh dimension to our understanding of the Renaissance' - The Times; 'Joscelyn Godwin has proven that a desiccated rose can not only live again, but may also, with the help of fantasy, grow vivid as never before' - The New York Review of Books; 'Should undoubtedly find a place in every serious English-speaking academic library' - The Art Book"

Joscelyn Godwin is Professor of Music at Colgate University, New York, and has made a considerable contribution to intellectual history through his books on the 17th-century occult philosophers Robert Fludd and Athansius Kircher, on the history of Theosophy, on the spiritual dimension of music and most recently The Pagan Dream of the Renaissance.