Clement VI: The Pontificate and Ideas of an Avignon Pope.

There is an inevitable tendency to think of the Avignon popes collectively, and to distinguish their particular characteristics only occasionally. Any attempt to infer something about an individual pope's personality has normally been based on the events during his pontificate, such as controversies in which he was involved, or the bulls which he issued. One of the great merits of Diana Wood's Clement VI: The Pontificate and Ideas of an Avignon Pope (Cambridge: U.P., 1989; pp. xviii + 255. |pounds~27.50), and one wonders if other scholars might emulate it with advantage, is that she begins from the inside, from Clement's own writings, particularly his sermons, to see what he …