Women and Men in Renaissance Venice: Twelve Essays on Patrician Society
Stanley Chojnacki's distinctive views of the Venetian family have illuminated the gender and family history of Renaissance Italy since the inception of this field in the early 1970s... Unified by a reflective introduction, the collection offers a powerful vision of kinship and marriage in Renaissance Venice.(P. Renée BaernsteinJournal of Modern History)The discussion is detailed and convincing, as is the overall argument that patrician women had greater importance than is recognized by historians who limit themselves to describe Venice as unequivocally patriarchal.(Filippo de VivoThe Historical Journal)An outstanding contribution to European history,Women and Men in Renaissance Venicedeals with every aspect of gender and presents an enormously informative, scholarly, 'reader friendly,' and highly recommended introduction to male/female aspects of Venetian society and culture.(Midwest Book Review)Chojnacki has complete command of the secondary literature and constantly relates the Venetian case study to situations elsewhere. Italianists will find here a wealth of specialized information, while students of other regions can benefit from its broadly comparative aspects. Moreover, Chojnacki deals with every imaginable aspect of gender: this book thus provides a useful introduction to the field as a whole. But this is more than just a good teaching book. Each essay is a fine work of scholarship; taken together, they provide a major contribution to the field.(James S. Grubb, University of Maryland-Baltimore County)