Sandra Toffolo – författare

Printing the Event examines the use of print in the first decades after its invention. It analyzes how in this period print was used not only as a method to reproduce texts but also as a new medium to share news and ideas about current events. Focusing on the German-speaking territories and Italy, the volume aims to shed further light on the initial stages of a medium destined to have a wide-ranging impact on human history.

In Describing the City, Describing the State Sandra Toffolo presents a comprehensive analysis of descriptions of the city of Venice and the Venetian Terraferma in the Renaissance, when the Venetian mainland state was being created. Working with an extensive variety of descriptions, the book demonstrates that no one narrative of Venice prevailed in the early modern European imagination, and that authors continuously adapted geographical descriptions to changing political circumstances. This in turn illustrates the importance of studying geographical representation and early modern state formation together. Moreover, it challenges the long-standing concept of the myth of Venice, by showing that Renaissance observers never saw the city of Venice and the Venetian Terraferma in a monolithic way.