Reading Lucretius in the Renaissance

“The great atomist poet has finally attracted the attention that students of modern culture should have given him long ago. Seeing so much new and innovative work on offer, readers with questions about Lucretius in the Renaissance will take Ada Palmer’s book as the new standard: Reading Lucretius is our best guide to a thinker whose ideas lit the flames of modernity.”—Brian Copenhaver, University of California, Los Angeles

“This is a brilliant scholarly work that is deeply relevant to today. In exploring the influence of Lucretius on the Renaissance, Ada Palmer shows how the modern world became open to the ramifications of mechanical science. More broadly, her book is a fascinating look at how ideas ripple and spread.”—Walter Isaacson