Florence & Tuscany: Recommended Books and Movies

By Rick Steves and Gene Openshaw

To learn more about Florence and Tuscany past and present, check out a few of these books and films. (And see our similar lists for elsewhere in Europe.)

Books: Nonfiction

The Architecture of the Italian Renaissance (Peter Murray, 1969). Heavily illustrated, this classic presents the architectural life of Italy from the 13th through the 16th century.
Brunelleschi's Dome: How a Renaissance Genius Reinvented Architecture (Ross King, 2000). The remarkable story of how the dome of Florence's duomo was designed and built.
The City of Florence (R. W. B. Lewis, 1994). The author's 50-year love affair with Florence started in the chaos of World War II; this book is both a personal biography and an informal history of the city.
Dark Water (Robert Clark, 2008). Florentines race to save seven centuries of human achievement in the face of the city's destructive 1966 floods.
Fortune Is a River (Roger D. Masters, 1998). Two geniuses of the Renaissance — Niccolo Machiavelli and Leonardo da Vinci — conspire to reroute the Arno River (unsuccessfully, thankfully).
The Hills of Tuscany (Ferenc Máté, 1998). After traveling all over the globe, a writer and his wife try to settle down in the Tuscan countryside.
The House of Medici (Christopher Hibbert, 1974). Florence's first family of the Renaissance included power-hungry bankers, merchants, popes, art patrons — and two queens of France.
Italian Renaissance Art (Laurie Schneider Adams, 2001). In this well-written introduction to this pivotal period, Adams focuses on the most important and innovative artists and their best works.
The Lives of the Artists (Giorgio Vasari, 1550). The man who invented the term "Renaissance" offers anecdote-filled biographies of his era's greatest artists, some of whom he knew personally.
Looking at Painting in Florence, A Learner's Handbook (Richard Peterson, 2014). An illustrated interpretive guide to the city's art masterpieces.
Mission Florence: A Scavenger Hunt Adventure (Catherine Aragon, 2017). Young explorers will have hands-on fun undertaking spy-themed challenges while discovering the city.
The Prince (Niccolò Machiavelli, 1532). The original "how-to" for gaining and maintaining political power, still chillingly relevant after 500 years.
A Small Place in Italy (Eric Newby, 1994). A young American couple tries to renovate a Tuscan farmhouse in the late 1960s.
The Stones of Florence (Mary McCarthy, 1956). McCarthy applies wit and keen observation to produce a quirky, impressionistic investigation of Florence and its history.
A Tuscan Childhood (Kinta Beevor, 1993). The daughter of a bohemian painter reminisces about growing up in prewar Tuscany among writers like Aldous Huxley and D. H. Lawrence.
Under the Tuscan Sun (Frances Mayes, 1996). Mayes' bestseller describes living la dolce vita in the Tuscan countryside (and is better than the movie of the same name).

Books: Fiction

The Agony and the Ecstasy (Irving Stone, 1958). This fictional biography of Michelangelo brings to life the great artist's dramatic passions and furies (also a 1965 movie starring Charlton Heston).
Birth of Venus (Sarah Dunant, 2003). Dunant follows the life of a Florentine girl who develops feelings for the boy hired to paint the walls of the family's chapel.
Death in the Mountains: The True Story of a Tuscan Murder (Lisa Clifford, 2008). Clifford explores the region's humble roots as she re-creates life in the countryside before Tuscany became glamorous.
The Decameron (Giovanni Boccaccio, 1348). Boccaccio's collection of 100 hilarious, often bawdy tales is a masterpiece of Italian literature and inspired Chaucer, Keats, and Shakespeare.
Divine Comedy (Dante Alighieri, 1321). Dante's epic poem — a journey through hell, purgatory, and paradise — is one of the world's greatest works of literature.
Galileo's Daughter (Dava Sobel, 1999). Sobel's historical memoir centers on Galileo's correspondence with his oldest daughter and confidante.
The Light in the Piazza (Elizabeth Spencer, 1960). A mother and daughter are intoxicated by the beauty of 1950s Florence (also a 1962 movie and an award-winning Broadway musical).
Murder of a Medici Princess (Caroline P. Murphy, 2008). This historical novel recounts life and death of Isabella de Medici, daughter of the duke who ruled Renaissance Florence and Tuscany.
Romola (George Eliot, 1863). In this historical novel set in Renaissance Florence, Eliot depicts the awakening of a young woman in the time of the Medicis and Savonarola.
A Room with a View (E. M. Forster, 1908). A young Englishwoman visiting Florence finds a socially unsuitable replacement for her snobby fiancé (also a 1985 movie starring Helena Bonham Carter).
The Sixteen Pleasures (Robert Hellenga, 1994). Set during the 1966 floods in Florence, a young student discovers an erotic manuscript banned by the pope and lost for centuries.

Films and TV Shows

The Best of Youth (2003). Beginning in the turbulent 1960s, this award-winning miniseries follows the dramatic ups and downs in the lives of two brothers over four decades.
Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972). Franco Zeffirelli presents a sensitive account of the life of St. Francis of Assisi, including his friendship with St. Clare.
Medici: Godfathers of the Renaissance (2004). This PBS miniseries reveals the good, the bad, and the ugly about Florence's first family.
Tea with Mussolini (1999). Franco Zeffirelli's look at pre-war Florence involves proper English ladies, a rich American Jew, and the son of a local businessman — all caught in the rise of fascism.
Up at the Villa (2000). Based on a W. Somerset Maugham novella, the film follows a wealthy young English woman in 1930s Florence who is brutally confronted by the consequences of her whimsy.
Where Angels Fear to Tread (1991). In this adaptation of an E. M. Forster novel, a rich Edwardian widow impulsively marries a poor Tuscan but dies in childbirth, prompting a custody battle.

Gene Openshaw is the co-author of the Rick Steves Florence & Tuscany guidebook.