The Real Rule of Four: The Unauthorized Guide to The New York Times #1 Bestseller

The Real Rule of Four: The Unauthorized Guide to The New York Times #1 Bestseller
by Joscelyn Godwin

The Real Rule of Four: The Unauthorized Guide to The New York Times #1 Bestseller
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Book Summary Information

Author: Joscelyn Godwin
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2005-11-01
ISBN: 1932857087
Number of pages: 208
Publisher: The Disinformation Company

Book Reviews of The Real Rule of Four: The Unauthorized Guide to The New York Times #1 Bestseller

Book Review: A Magnificent Guide
Summary: 5 Stars

Any best-seller nowadays can be expected to generate a side industry of books, films, computer games, plastic toys and so on, trying to capitalize on the success of the original. It would be a great mistake, however, to dismiss Joscelyn Godwin's magnificent guide as just a spin-off from the success of the Rule of Four. For one thing, its author not only follows but also preceded the novel, because as author of the only modern English translation of Francesco Colonna's Hypnerotomachia Poliphili he provided the best source of knowledge of the inspiration for the Rule of Four available to people who don't read mediaeval Italian.

It would have been easy, and perhaps tempting, for a scholar of Godwin's knowledge and ability to be patronizing about the Rule of Four, concentrating on correcting its errors and misinterpretations and on displaying his own superior understanding of the Hypnerotomachia, but Godwin does not do that. On the contrary, his attitude to the novel is thoroughly generous and positive. He starts by assuring us that the Hypnerotomachia is a real book, not a fictional invention of Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason, explains its importance in the history of typography and erotic literature, and describes what it is all about. He goes on to analyse the structure -- unusually complex for a popular novel -- of the Rule of Four, and to examine the evidence for the identity of the real author of the Hypnerotomachia. In this his conclusion is different from that reached in the Rule of Four, but he does not dismiss other possibilities as absurd. He describes the historical context in which the Hypnerotomachia was written, including the famous "bonfire of the vanities" of Savonarola. Finally he analyses what the Hypnerotomachia is really all about, and explains all the literary, historical and geographical name-dropping that occurs in the Rule of Four.

All in all, this is an indispensable guide, written by an outstanding expert, for anyone interested in reading the Rule of Four in more than the most superficial way.

Summary of The Real Rule of Four: The Unauthorized Guide to The New York Times #1 Bestseller

Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason's The Rule of Four is already a bookselling phenomenon. The Ivy League super-achievers drew upon an authentic 1499 Renaissance text to create their thriller about two Princeton undergraduates who try to unravel the mysteries of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (pronounced "HIP-ne-RO-to-MA-kia PO-li-FEE-li").

The Hypnerotomachia Poliphiliis an erotic, pagan epic, written in a private language peppered with words taken from Latin and Greek and decorated with Egyptian hieroglyphs. It was not translated into English for 500 years, until 1999, when Joscelyn Godwin finally achieved that near-impossible task.

In The Real Rule of Four, Professor Godwin carefully investigates each aspect of the history of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili and its use in The Rule of Four, including:

What is the Hypnerotomachia?
Who wrote the Hypnerotomachia? (A central theme of The Rule of Four)
What does the Hypnerotomachia mean?
Places and people in The Rule of Four
Glossary of names and terms in The Rule of Four

Lavishly illustrated with reproductions of the many beautiful woodcuts in the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, a fold-out color map and photographs of the featured locations at Princeton University, The Real Rule of Four is an indispensable guide to the many fans of Caldwell and Thomason's best-selling novel.

Joscelyn Godwin was a scholar of Magdalene College, Cambridge, and holds a PhD from Cornell University. Since 1971 he has taught at Colgate University, where he is a professor of music. In 1999 Godwin published the first complete English translation of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, called "a masterpiece of clarity and scholarship" by Andrew Graham-Dixon in the London Daily Telegraph. Godwin's other books include Harmonies of Heaven and Earth, Music and the Occult, Arktos: The Polar Myth, The Theosophical Enlightenment and The Pagan Dream of the Renaissance.

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