description: You've read "The Rule of Four", now read about its source..."The Rule of Four" by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason is a runaway international bestseller, topping the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. But the foundation of "The Rule of Four", as all its readers know, is a little-known text from the fifteenth century, the "Hypnerotomachia Poliphili". Lurid, dreamlike, extremely erotic and written in many different languages and codes, the exact meaning of the Hypnerotomachia has eluded scholars for centuries. Now, in this indispensable, concise and thoroughly entertaining book, Professor Joscelyn Godwin, the translator of the first complete English edition of the Hypnerotomachia, guides the reader through its labyrinthine pages and unlocks the secrets and mysteries within Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason's novel. He brings to life the worlds of both the Renaissance reader and the young Princeton undergraduate, setting both in the context of their time and place. Erudite and engaging, "The Real Rule of Four" is the perfect companion piece to "The Rule of Four". ""The Da Vinci Code" for people with brains" - "Independent".
language: English
title: Real Rule of Four
titlecomplete: Real Rule of Four
characters: Leda (mythology), Adonis (mythology), Mars (God), Girolamo Savonarola, Leon Battista Alberti, Polia, Paul Harris, Pope Paul II, Deucalion, Medusa, Odysseus, Maurizio Calvesi, Charlie Freeman, Poliphilo, Logistica (reason), Zoroaster, Eleanor of Aragon, Pythagoras, Thomas Corelli Sullivan, Katie Marchand, Patrick Sullivan (Rule of Four), Plato, Richard Curry, Eleutherylida, Vincent Taft, Giulio Pomponio Leto, Innocent VIII, Ovid (Roman), Christian Rosenkreutz, Piero di Lorenzo de' Medici, Pyrrha, Aldus Manutius, Zeus (god), Bacchus (god), Ceres, Tereus, Priapus, Thelemia (desire), Gil (Preston Gilmore Rankin), Jesus, Francesco Colonna, Pomona (goddess), Lorenzo de' Medici (the Magnificent), Hermes, Diana (goddess), Lucrezia Donati, Psyche (mythology), Philomela, Bill Stein, Cupid, Pope Clement VII, Pope Alexander VI, Jupiter (God), Fortuna (goddess), Desiderius Erasmus, Semele, Venus (goddess), Europa, Dante Alighieri, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola
genres: Literature, Nonfiction, History, Literary Criticism, Books About Books
ratings_count: 102
places: Cytherea
publisher: Arrow Books