The past four decades have seen an explosion in research regarding seventeenth-century opera. In addition to investigations of extant scores and librettos, scholars have dealt with the associated areas of dance and scenery, as well as newer disciplines such as studies of patronage, gender, and semiotics. While most of the essays in the volume pertain to Italian opera, others concern opera production in France, England, Spain and the Germanic countries.

First published in 1964, Renaissance & Seventeenth - Century Studies contains essays which fall into two groups. The first four are concerned with problems of metaphor and style and the second group of essays are, in general, concerned with Machiavelli and Machiavellism and Andrew Marvell.

Historians and art historians provide a critique of existing methodologies and an interdisciplinary inquiry into seventeenth-century Dutch art and culture.