Friends and Foes of the Poet Laureate was a conference held in December 2004 in Leiden, the Netherlands where earlier versions of these 13 papers were delivered. Historians of literature and art examine how Italian poet and humanist Petrarch (1304-74) impacted his readers, contemporary and posthumous, in his own 14th century and in 16th-century Germany, Italy, France, and the Low Countries. Only names are indexed. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)