The Swerve

How the World Became Modern

By: Stephen Greenblatt

Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini

Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's summary

Pulitzer Prize, General Nonfiction, 2012

National Book Award, Nonfiction, 2012

Renowned historian Stephen Greenblatt’s works shoot to the top of the New York Times best-seller list. With The Swerve, Greenblatt transports listeners to the dawn of the Renaissance and chronicles the life of an intrepid book lover who rescued the Roman philosophical text On the Nature of Things from certain oblivion.

Nearly six hundred years ago, a short, genial, cannily alert man in his late 30s took a very old manuscript off a library shelf, saw with excitement what he had discovered, and ordered that it be copied. That book was the last surviving manuscript of an ancient Roman philosophical epic by Lucretius—a beautiful poem containing the most dangerous ideas: that the universe functioned without the aid of gods, that religious fear was damaging to human life, and that matter was made up of very small particles in eternal motion, colliding and swerving in new directions.

The copying and translation of this ancient book—the greatest discovery of the greatest book-hunter of his age—fueled the Renaissance, inspiring artists such as Botticelli and thinkers such as Giordano Bruno; shaped the thought of Galileo and Freud, Darwin and Einstein; and had a revolutionary influence on writers such as Montaigne and Shakespeare, and even Thomas Jefferson.

©2011 Stephen Greenblatt (P)2011 Recorded Books, LLC

Critic reviews

"More wonderfully illuminating Renaissance history from a master scholar and historian." ( Kirkus Reviews)

"In this gloriously learned page-turner, both biography and intellectual history, Harvard Shakespearean scholar Greenblatt turns his attention to the front end of the Renaissance as the origin of Western culture's foundation: the free questioning of truth." ( Publishers Weekly)

“Pleasure may or may not be the true end of life, but for book lovers, few experiences can match the intellectual-aesthetic enjoyment delivered by a well-wrought book. In the world of serious nonfiction, Stephen Greenblatt is a pleasure maker without peer.” ( Newsday)

Beautiful

Such an eloquent and lovely read. Full of fascinating history and thoughtful insights on perceptions of our existence. There are two books that I believe everyone should read before their death; this is one of them.

Good Book for the Brainy

Any additional comments?

If you like "intellectual" books, you'll probably love this. It's a great book for anyone interested in ancient cultures, European history, the Catholic Church, and old books. The writing is good, the narrator is good, and the story is interesting.

The core of science, math, and our society.

This Swerve is at the core of so much of our existence. If you've contemplated religion and philosophy, you've been unknowingly influenced by this material. Fascinating history revealing so many of the Christian lies built into Western culture.

Astounding!

My second full reading. This author is incredibly erudite, inquisitive, organized and communicative. I suspect I shall read this at least twice more and shall still not have extracted half of this book's wisdom.

An amazing book

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Anybody who is interested in the history of ideas should read this book.

What about Edoardo Ballerini’s performance did you like?

His reading is dignified and his Italian pronumciation is impeccable.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

It filled me with admiration for Greenblatt's research, and I was amazed by the progression of history from Greece to Rome to Christianity that I never learned in school. This is an important take on European history.

Exceptional

One of the best books I have read this year. Fully recommend it! ground breaking

The Swerve is fascinating for History Buffs

Greenblatt artfully weaves the personal story of Pogo the book hunter with Epicurean philosophy and Lucretius's discovered text. For anyone curious about the history of ideas, church censorship and practices, and the people who kept intellectualism flourishing despite adversity, The Swerve is riveting.

One of the very best historical fiction books I have read and reread

I absolutely love this book. The story helps bring to life an era, a political system, and ways of thinking, and being in the world in completely accessible, yet deep and complex ways. The idea that modern thought was shaped through sheer tenacity of an individual seeking lost knowledge from a bygone era, is mind blowing.

I’m just tryin to swerve

Now I feel like a book hunter
Some very interesting history here
Give it a listen

Superb Cultural History

There is little not to like in both the book and the narration. It is a fascinating look into renaissance humanism, church politics and a very old poem that threatened both. The rediscovery of Lucretius’s On the Nature of Things had a powerful impact on European society but Greenblatt cleverly and beautifully focuses on its rediscovery in the early 15th century. He also spends a chapter doing a close reading of the poem. I found the narration perfectly attuned to the material. Highly recommended.