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Basilio Bessarione: Lo spirito greco e l'occidente. By Giuseppe L. Coluccia. [Accademia delleArti del Disegno, Monografie 15.] (Florence: Casa Editrice Leo S. Olschki. 2009. Pp. xxx, 444. euro50,00 paperback. ISBN 978-8-822-25925-7.)
Perhaps because of his eccentricity, the Hellenizing, likely pagan Platonist Gemistus Pletho (c. 1355-1452) has received plenty of attention from scholars, including works by François Masai, Christopher Montague Woodhouse, and Brigitte Tambrun-Krasker. But it is a different situation for Gemistus's most celebrated and influential disciple: Cardinal Basilio Bessarion (c. 140272), who, although a strong defender of the Greek tradition and Platonic philosophy, maintained his loyalty to the Catholic Church. For many years, the only real monograph about Bessarion was the classic study Kardinal Bessarion als Theologe, Humanist und Staatsmann by Ludwig...