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Book ID: CBB931177181

Renaissance Fun: The Machines behind the Scenes (2021)

Philip Steadman (Author)

UCL Press
Publication date: 2021
Language: English

URI: https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/R/bo127902689.html

ISBN: 9781787359161

Publication Date: 2021
Physical Details: 418

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An amusing account of the technology of Renaissance entertainment and the ancient influences that inspired it. Renaissance Fun is about the technology of entertainment in the forms of stage machinery, theatrical special effects, gardens, fountains, automata, and self-playing musical instruments from the Renaissance. How did the machines behind these shows work? How exactly were chariots filled with singers let down onto the stage? How were flaming dragons made to fly across the sky? How were seas created on stage? How did mechanical birds imitate real birdsong? What was “artificial music,” three centuries before Edison and the phonograph? How could pipe organs be driven and made to play themselves by waterpower alone? And who were the architects, engineers, and craftsmen who created these wonders? While this book is offered as entertainment in itself, it also offers a more serious scholarly argument centered on the enormous influence of Vitruvius and Hero, two ancient writers who composed on the subject.

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Reviewed By

Review Alison Calhoun (2022) Review of "Renaissance Fun: The Machines behind the Scenes". Early Science and Medicine: A Journal for the Study of Science, Technology and Medicine in the Pre-modern Period (pp. 299-302). unapi

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