Selected Letters

Deanna Shemek’s translation of 830 letters of Isabella d’Este does not disappoint. She has selected letters that demonstrate the variety of Isabella’s interests and document a life that was both long and extraordinarily dramatic. We see the marchioness evolve intellectually, politically and culturally, against the backdrop of a volatile political climate and a rapidly changing diplomatic scene, to become a shrewd political actor and an ever more discerning patron of the arts. Shemek has produced an epistolary voice for her subject that is a welljudged amalgam of dignified formality and colloquial ease. The translation captures just how well the marchioness communicated with a very large cast of correspondents and for a huge range of purposes. This collection provides rare insight into the social, cultural, and political world of the Italian Renaissance — as seen through one powerful woman’s eyes.

Carolyn James
Associate Professor of Italian Studies, Monash University

"Deanna Shemek’s translation of 830 letters of Isabella d’Este does not disappoint. She has selected letters that demonstrate the variety of Isabella’s interests and document a life that was both long and extraordinarily dramatic. We see the marchioness evolve intellectually, politically and culturally, against the backdrop of a volatile political climate and a rapidly changing diplomatic scene, to become a shrewd political actor and an ever more discerning patron of the arts. Shemek has produced an epistolary voice for her subject that is a welljudged amalgam of dignified formality and colloquial ease. The translation captures just how well the marchioness communicated with a very large cast of correspondents and for a huge range of purposes. This collection provides rare insight into the social, cultural, and political world of the Italian Renaissance — as seen through one powerful woman’s eyes."
  ~Carolyn James, Monash University