Beloved Son Felix: Coming of Age in the Renaissance

In 1552, at the age of sixteen, Felix Platter left his home in Basel, Switzerland, and journeyed 370 miles to Montpelier, in the south of France. There he spent the next five years studying to become a physician. It was an extraordinary education—and not only in medicine. A Protestant in a Catholic kingdom, Felix witnessed blood-chilling executions and engaged in secret religious discussions with his landlord, a Marrano Jew. He also learned to play the lute, tasted olive oil for the first time, and had his first swim in the sea. He flirted and danced (and once got his spur tangled in a lady’s skirt), he fled from highway robbers, saw John Calvin preach, survived an outbreak of the bubonic plague, joined in a massive, orange-throwing food fight, acquired a dog, and spent one Christmas Eve alone and afraid of the dark.

Most astonishing of all, he wrote it down. 

The notes that Felix Platter kept on his day-to-day life are unique in European history. A century before the novel was invented, The Diaries of Felix Platter capture the texture of Renaissance life and youth from the inside. As Stephen Greenblatt observes in his awestruck introduction, “Keeping diaries and writing autobiographies did not become a widespread practice until the mid-seventeenth century. But it is not merely the relative paucity of such documents from earlier periods that makes Platter’s journal so unusual. It is its vividness, intimacy, candor, and charm that confer upon it an altogether rare and revealing character.”

“In recalling the scenes of his youth, he did something extraordinary: he set aside his years of experience and knowledge of the world, and recovered what it felt like to be a naïve, untested teenager venturing out into unfamiliar and often dangerous territory . . . The result reflects rare gifts of inexhaustible curiosity, sharp intelligence, and a canny eye for detail.”

—Stephen Greenblatt, from the Foreword

“This book gives a rare glimpse into the life of a teenage medical student in 16th century France. His diaries detail his interest in anatomy (leading to some grave-robbing), his navigating the complicated religious landscape, and his day-to-day relationship with friends, plus meeting girls. He comes through as intelligent, observant and kind – a wonderful guide to a chaotic and frightening time period.”

—Suzanne Morgan, Politics & Prose (Washington, DC)

“Beloved Son Felix: Coming of Age in the Renaissance compiles Felix’s meticulous documentation of some five years of his life in the sixteenth century as a medical student, Protestant, and capital-P Person in a country marred by religious persecution and plague . . . This gorgeous reissue from McNally Editions features illustrations from Platter’s own diaries along with woodcuts by the Swiss-German artist Jost Amman . . . Felix’s keen eye for beauty keeps one teetering between the sublime and the gruesome . . . Felix renders his surroundings with pointillistic pleasure.”

—Luke Gair, The Sewanee Review, Staff Picks

“As delightful to the ordinary reader as it is useful to the social historian . . . A translation which perfectly captures the freshness and character of the original.” 

—C. V. Wedgwood, Sunday Times

“A lively glimpse of a slice of sixteenth-century European life . . . The work does give some nice insight into life in those times, as well as Platter’s character. He plays the lute, goes to dances, and is perhaps a bit of a dandy . . . Beloved Son Felix [offers] a nice and quite far-ranging slice and tour of life in those times . . . It all makes a fun (and sometimes grisly) tour of the times.”

—Michael Orthofer, The Complete Review

“An excellent English translation . . . the well-chosen illustrations, which include a number of drawings by Jennett and two portraits of Platter, add to its attractiveness.” 

—W. T. Stearn, British Journal for the History of Science

“One of the earliest travel diaries of its kind and surely one of the most truthful. It is also one of the most interesting, its only fault being that it is too short. It has now been admirably translated into English in its entirety.”

—Geoffrey Keynes, Journal of the Royal Society of Arts

“An honest diary gives a vivid picture of contemporary life. This book is such a record . . . His plain narrative delineates the cruel customs of the time.” 

—Zachary Cope, British Medical Journal

Felix Platter (1536– 1614) was a Swiss anatomist and professor of medicine and a pioneer in the field that would become neuroscience.

Stephen Greenblatt is an American literary historian and author. He has served as the John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University since 2000. His books include Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare and The Swerve: How the World Became Modern.

Seán Jennett (1912–1981) was a poet, typographer, production manager, editor, and travel writer. The author of three volumes of poetry, he also wrote guides to many cities and regions around the world, as well as The Making of Books, which stood for years as the definitive work on printing, binding, and book design, going through numerous editions.

Beloved Son Felix: Coming of Age in the Renaissance • ISBN: 9781961341685

Pub: Mar 3, 2026 • $19.00 • McNALLY EDITIONS no. 49

Paperback with flaps • 5” x 8.5” • 192 pages

eBook ISBN: 9781961341692

UK Pub: Apr 16, 2026 • UK Price: £13.99