Rome, 1630: The Horizon of the Early Baroque, Followed by Five Essays on Seventeenth-Century Art (The French List) Hardcover – November 14, 2020

What a luxury to have Rome's art treasures, churches and museums, at one's fingertips! What a privilege to be able to discover, enjoy and probe these landscapes of meaning at one's leisure, in the safe stillness of one's own home... Yves Bonnefoy is the ultimate private guide, and Hoyt Rogers is the ultimate private tutor, on a journey of pure refinement and insight into our shared history and humanity. Without the expense of air travel, without the fatigue and vexations, I find myself transported magically to the streets, fragrant pine trees, fountains and breeze-filled hills of our collective cultural cradle. Every step brings new surprises, gasps of delight and unexpected riches. This rare volume is a wonderful way to celebrate what we all hold dear, namely equality, fraternity and democracy: we are, all of us, without exception, the heirs of a princely patrimony. But perhaps we needed Bonnefoy and Rogers to take us by the hand and show us that we, too, are invited to the king's feast..

Yves Bonnefoy’s Rome,1630 is a marvel and a triumph, in this lucid English version by Hoyt Rogers. Together with the five further essays on seventeenth-century art which accompany the main text, this work complements the aesthetic meditation of The Arrière-Pays, which I translated for Seagull some years ago. In that book, Bonnefoy concentrates on the Italian Renaissance, whereas here he focuses on the Roman Baroque. Along the way, he pays particular attention to two foreigners then active in the Eternal City, Adam Elsheimer and Nicolas Poussin. For those who were struck, as I was, by the poet's evocation in The Arrière-Pays of the 'stormy immediacy, the non-conceptual' aspect of Poussin's blue 'for which our whole consciousness craves', Rome,1630 takes us a long way in satisfying that craving, while also establishing Bonnefoy as an original and erudite art historian. For those who like their cultural icons and artefacts to be reinvested with a metaphysical immediacy and urgency, then you need look no further than these trenchantly written and sumptuously illustrated pages. In his wide-ranging afterword, Rogers discusses the poet’s lifelong fascination with both painters. This is a beautiful volume, of fine quality and pleasantly compact despite its length; rarely has an art book been so comfortable to read. I find the reproductions of remarkably high quality. I have re-entered with joy that great 'hustle and bustle at St Peter’s' in 1630.

In this book, with many illustrations, Bonnefoy discusses Baroque art in great depth. An expert translation by Rogers, with a helpful essay at the end.