Frances A Yates

The Art Of Memory

  • The Art Of Memory

  • This unique and brilliant book is a history of human knowledge.

    Before the invention of printing, a trained memory was of vital importance. Based on a technique of impressing 'places' and 'images' on the mind, the ancient Greeks created an elaborate memory system which in turn was inherited by the Romans and passed into the European tradition, to be revived, in occult form, during the Renaissance.

    Frances Yates sheds light on Dante’s Divine Comedy, the form of the Shakespearian theatre and the history of ancient architecture; The Art of Memory is an invaluable contribution to aesthetics and psychology, and to the history of philosophy, of science and of literature.

Dame Frances Yates (1899-1981) achieved a world-wide reputation as an historian. Her close association with the Warburg Institute of the University of London began shortly after the Second World War, after the publication of her first two books. She was Reader in the History of the Renaissance there until 1967, when she became an Honorary Fellow. As well as gaining many academic honours, she was awarded the OBE in 1977 and was made DBE, in the same year. Her publications include Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, Theatre of the World, The Rosicrucian Enlightenment, Astraea, Shakespeare's Last Plays and The Valois Tapestries.

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