Francesco Panigarola was so skilled a preacher that his admirers called him ‘the Apelles of God’ (after the ancient Greek artist famous for his lifelike paintings) for his ability to use words to make his audience ‘see’. Born into a wealthy Milanese family, Panigarola had originally been destined for a career in law, but a spiritual crisis after two friends died in student riots, prompted his entry into the Franciscan order. He quickly distinguished himself by his preaching and came to the attention of Pope Pius v, who dispatched him to Paris for further study and to preach against the heretics. (In a sermon in the royal chapel he celebrated the Saint Bartholomew's Day massacre as a divine blessing.) On his return to Italy prelates and princes, including even Pope Gregory xiii, competed for his services, until Carlo Borromeo, Milan's reforming archbishop, was able to secure them, a collaboration that lasted until Borromeo's death (Panigarola preached his funeral sermon). In 1587, thanks to the patronage of the duke of Savoy, the preacher was able to demonstrate his own reforming zeal (and battle Waldensian heretics) as the bishop of Asti. Shortly after a third pope, Sixtus v, required not only Panigarola's skills as an orator but also his knowledge of France. Sent to Paris as part of Cardinal Caetani's mission to support the Catholic League, Panigarola's preaching stiffened Leaguer resolve during Henry iv’s devastating siege of that city.

In addition to this life of action, Panigarola was also a theoretician who sought to teach preachers that same art of sacred oratory that he himself had so successfully mastered. It is this aspect of his life that makes up the bulk of Utzima Benzi's study. Panigarola's 1,300-page Il Predicatore (1609), published posthumously, was ostensibly a commentary on Demetrius of Phalerum's On style but, as Benzi successfully shows, was in reality an attempt to ‘give Italy a stylistic theory in the vernacular language, which took into account the real problems posed by Italian customs and the requirements of modern preaching’ (p. 155). Benzi's detailed study shows how Panigarola defended the teaching of oratory against charges of artificiality and superfluity that are deeply imbedded in Christianity itself. It also reveals the originality of Panigarola's conception of the Italian vernacular: preachers did not need to return to the ‘pure’ Florentine language of the Golden Age of Dante and Petrarch, but employ a purified and noble present-day diction. Above all, Benzi uncovers Panigarola's eclecticism. Il Predicatore offers a mélange of the classical, the patristic (notably, a reliance on Augustine), the medieval (the use of the exemplum story) and the contemporary (his frequent citations of his teacher, Cornelio Musso). Versatility and variety were at the heart of Panigarola's vision of preaching. Far from offering a prescriptive model to be followed in all circumstances, Il Predicatore offered a resource from which preachers could draw. In subsequent chapters Benzi demonstrates the sizeable skill set that Panigarola's disciples were encouraged to develop and employ, from memetic techniques to the practice of enargeia (presenting the audience with powerful and vivid images).

Benzi's learned biography of Panigarola, in short, makes a valuable contribution to the study of sacred oratory in the Counter-Reformation era, a field already dominated by French scholarship. It certainly deserves to take its place alongside the important work of Marc Fumaroli and Christian Mouchel.