Giordano Bruno & the Embassy Affair - Hardcover

Bossy, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300049935 ISBN 13: 9780300049930

Publisher: Yale University Press, 1991

Synopsis

This book tells a true detective story set mainly in Elizabethan London during the years of cold war just before the Armada of 1588. The mystery is the identity of a spy working in a foreign embassy to frustrate Catholic conspiracy and propaganda aimed at the overthrow of Queen Elizabeth and her government. The suspects in the case are the inmates of the house, an old building in the warren of streets and gardens between Fleet Street and the Thames. These include the ambassador, a Frenchman, his wife and daughter, his secretary, his clerk and his priest, the tutor, the chef, the butler, and the concierge. They also include a runaway friar, the Neapolitan philosopher, poet and comedian Giordano Burno. Others in the cast are Queen Elizabeth, her formidable secretary of state Sir Francis Walsingham, and King Henri III of France; poets, courtiers and scholars; statesment, conspirators, go-betweens and stool-pigeons. When not in London, the action takes place in Paris and Oxford; a good deal of it happens on the river Thames. The hero or villian, who calls himself Fagot, does his work most effectively, is not found out, and disappears. In the first part of the book these events are narrated. In the second the spy is identified and his story put together.

About this title

Review:

"Bossy combines meticulous research with a lively style and guides the reader.. to some startling conclusions." -- Andrew Roberts, Sunday Telegraph

"Bossy opens up a startling new angle on certain secret operations of the mid-1580s ... A triumph of close historical focus." -- Charles Nicholl, London Review of Books

"Bossy's creative, thoroughly researched and engaging work emulates the investigative style of the best detective fiction." -- Deborah E. Harkness, Sixteenth Century Journal

"Mr. Bossy's erudition is so great, his virtuosity in handling it so enviable, the story he tells so fascinating." -- H. R. Trevor-Roper, New York Review of Books

"Read the book. It is, quite simply, brilliant." -- Susan Brigden, Country Life

"This book is a detective story told by a masterly historian." -- Diarmaid MacCulloch, New Statesman & Society

About the Author:

John Bossy is emeritus professor of history at the University of York.

About this edition

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 0300049935
• ISBN 13: 9780300049930
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 316