In Forgers and Critics, Anthony Grafton provides a wide-ranging exploration of the links between forgery and scholarship. Labeling forgery the 鈥渃riminal sibling鈥� of criticism, Grafton describes a panorama of remarkable individuals鈥攆orgers from classical Greece through the recent past鈥攚ho produced a variety of splendid triumphs of learning and style, as well as the scholarly detectives who honed the tools of scholarship in attempts to unmask these skillful fakers. In the process, Grafton discloses the extent, the coherence, and the historical interest of two significant and tightly intertwined strands in the Western intellectual tradition.
Anthony Grafton is the Henry Putnam University Professor of History at Princeton University. His many books include What was History? and Bring Out Your Dead.
鈥淕rafton makes clear that the master forger must also be . . . a scholar . . . as knowledgeable as those whom he is trying to fool. . . . This elegant monograph ranges from Porphyry through Isaac Casaubon . . . on to Scaliger, Chatterton and others, though its focus remains the transmission of classical texts. Or, rather, pseudo-classical texts.鈥濃��Washington Post
鈥淔orgery is the pornography of erudition; and鈥攃ombining scandal, deception, and betrayal with tales of virtuoso detective work鈥攊t has long exercised romantic attraction for historians, providing illicit pleasures (when it has not provoked scholarly outrage). To this fascinating and controversial aspect of the history of scholarship Grafton鈥檚 book is a learned, insightful, and most entertaining introduction.鈥濃�擠onald R. Kelley, Renaissance Quarterly
鈥淎 good read. . . . Grafton鈥檚 principal theme is the symbiotic relationship between forgers and critics, and the spur provided by the efforts of each to the development of new skills and techniques by the other. . . . Grafton鈥檚 notes, as always, are superb . . . providing lesser mortals with plenty of new and essential material for study.鈥濃�擩ulia Haig Gaisser, Bryn Mawr Classical Review
