Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Marcello Simonetta

Marcello Simonetta is the author of The Montefeltro Conspiracy: A Renaissance Mystery Decoded.

Simonetta received his doctorate in Renaissance Studies from Yale. He has been featured on The History Channel, and in 2007 he curated an exhibition on Federico da Montefeltro’s library at the Morgan Library & Museum.

Last week I asked him what he was reading. His reply:
I have just read Alan Bennett's The Uncommon Reader, a delightful, short masterpiece about the pleasures and dangers of reading. The uncommon main character is none other than the Queen of England, who gets entangled in the intoxicating habit of book-tasting at the risk of compromising her own status. Surrounded by philistine prime ministers and dutiful clerks, by the end she convinces even the most unsympathetic reader that literature is the necessary cure against soulless politics.
Read an excerpt from The Montefeltro Conspiracy, and learn more about the book at the publisher's website.

--Marshal Zeringue