Zoom

Timaeus in Paradise: Metaphors and Beauty from Plato to Dante and Beyond

Name: Timaeus in Paradise: Metaphors and Beauty from Plato to Dante and Beyond
Brand: Princeton University Press
SKU: 9780691276144
Price: 45.00 USD
Availability: InStock

$45.00

Hurry Up! Only 2 Left in Stock!

Out of stock >

Guarantee safe & Secure checkout

Availability: Only few left!

Contributors:

Piero Boitani

Publisher:

Princeton University Press

Binding:

Hardcover

Book Category:

Literary Criticism, Philosophy

Book Subcategory:

Ancient and Classical, Aesthetics, Individual Philosophers

Shipping & Return +

The product is eligible for a complimentary return within 30 days from the date of purchase. Furthermore, individual items are shipped within 24 hours of receiving the order.

Rating and Reviews +

Specifications +

Release Date:

11/25/2025

ISBN 13:

9780691276144

Weight:

1.65 lbs

Size:

9.30 x 6.40 x 1.40 inches

Pages:

408

Mint Condition +

product description

Description

Tracing the influence and impact of Plato's Timaeus--and its major themes, creation and beauty--through the centuries

More than two thousand years after it was written, Plato's Timaeus continues to fascinate and intrigue its readers. In Timaeus in Paradise, Piero Boitani traces the abiding legacy of the Timaeus, mapping an intellectual journey that begins with Plato and extends to Dante and beyond. In a series of short, lyrical chapters, Boitani sketches a lineage that includes Proclus, Boethius, the Hebrew and Christian Bibles, John Scotus Eriugena and Thomas Aquinas. Focusing on Plato's metaphorical language--which Dante considered comparable to that of the Bible--and the beauty of its images, Boitani shows that these images penetrate deep into European culture, inspiring the anonymous author of the treatise on the Sublime as well as the mystical writings of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite.

Plato's account of the creation of the cosmos in the Timaeus supplants Hesiod's myths and Parmenides's theories--and was described by Johannes Kepler as the best gloss ever on the first chapter of Genesis. Boitani finds its echoes everywhere, from the sculptures of Chartres Cathedral and the frescoes of the Anagni Crypt to the paintings of Raphael and Michelangelo. He connects the beauty defined in the Timaeus to the beauties of the Hebrew Bible and to the lilies of the field invoked by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. Bringing together philosophy, theology, mysticism, poetry, sculpture and painting, Boitani charts Europe's intellectual history--a history of ideas and images--by capturing the enduring reverberations of Plato's summa. Illustrations accompanying the text cover more than two thousand years of iconography.

About the Author
Piero Boitani is Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature at the Sapienza University of Rome. A Fellow of the British Academy, of the Accademia dei Lincei and of the Medieval Academy of America, he received the Balzan Prize for Comparative Literature in 2016. General Editor of the Greek and Latin Writers series of the Fondazione Lorenzo Valla, he is the author of Anagnorisis: Scenes and Themes of Recognition and Revelation in Western Literature, Il grande racconto dei classici, Plato's Poem and other books of criticism and poetry.

Timaeus in Paradise: Metaphors and Beauty from Plato to Dante and Beyond

Customer Reviews

Description

Recently Viewed Products

Recently viewed products

Secure Payment

Online Offers

Quick Refunds

Curated Items