The 12 page introduction gives a good historical background overview. Brief, but good biographies of the authors are given. A center section has photos of paintings, sculptures and architecture of the time.

This Anthology has writings by English authors. Although the writings are annotated, I found it impossible to read many of them. They were supposedly witty and full of biting satire, but I missed the point. This book is probably meant to be a text for a post graduate level course in English Literature. It is probably not for browsers like me with degrees in life science. I was interested in the differences between the English and French writers of the period. It would be difficult to find writings by many of the fairly obscure English authors included in this book.