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Form and Content in the Development of the Italian Renaissance Ode

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Edward Williamson
Edward Williamson*
Affiliation:
The Johns Hopkins University Baltimore 18, Md.
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Extract

It is generally recognized that during the central third of the sixteenth century there occurred a shift of thought so considerable as to place Ariosto and Tasso in two separate moments of intellectual history. The critical activity of the period was focussed upon the elaboration of Aristotle's Rhetoric and Poetic into a complex system of regulations; its poetic activity was characterized by the emergence of forms patterned on classical models. The most striking of these, because the most divergent from previous forms, is the ode.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 65 , Issue 4 , June 1950 , pp. 550 - 567
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1950

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References

1 Littérature italienne (Paris, 1932), p. 247.

2 Storia delta letteratura ilaliana, vol. ii, 15th ed. (Milan, 1946), c. 16: “Altri si proposera d'arricchire la lirica di nuove forme metriche e si volsero all'imitazione dell'antico. Il Trissino, l'Alamanni e qualche altro vollero riprodurre la testura dell'ode pindarica in certe loro canzoni composte di strofe, antistrofe, ed epodi (o ballate, controballale, e stanze). Più felicemente Bernardo Tasso, cui si devono anche altri esperimenti metrici, tentò—ed ebbe alcuni seguaci—l'ode oraziana nelle sue Odi e ne'suoi Salmi, componendo ogni poesia di brevi strofe rimate e misti di settenari ed endecasillabi e imitando il Venosino anche nei soggetti, nei collegamenti logici delle stanze e nell'uso delle digressioni.”

3 Il Cinquecento (Milan, 1901), p. 192: “Invece, l'imitazione tentata dal Trissino stesso in tre sue canzoni composte di strofe, antistrofe ed epodi, fall! interamente … lo tentò con più sentimento d'arte Luigi Alamanni ne'suoi Inni… chiamando italianamente ballate, controballate e stanze le parti dell'ode pindarica … Meno ardito e più felice (ma gli nocque la languidezza dello stile e del verso) fu Bernardo Tasso nelle 55 Odi ch'egli compose, alla maniera oraziana, di brevi strofe uguali.”

4 Il Cinquecenio, 2nd. ed. (Milan, 1947), p. 507, of Bernardo Tasso: “Cresciuto fra l'al-largarsi del classicismo volgare non osò cimentarsi con Pindaro corne il suo Alamanni, ma fu anch'egli, nel derivare, attivissimo, e mise insieme cinquantacinque odi e trenta salmi di metro approssimativamente oraziano (strofe di cinque versi di endecasillabi e settenar rimati).”

6 “Dello svolgimento dell'ode in Italia”, in Prose di Giosue Carducci (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1933), pp. 1392-93: “E appunto su lo scorcio del secolo decimoquinto vennero a manifes-tarsi come i primi segni di una contaminatio della poesia classica con la medioevale, o più veramente della poesia latina con la toscana. Sarebbe nova e curiosa indagine cercare questo procedimento, massime nella lirica. Come la canzone toscana con i suoi piedi e le volte, con la fronte e la sirima, avrebbe potuto adattarsi e combaciare alla brève agile nervosa strofe melica? come la canzone di Dante e del Petrarca tutta adorazione di spirito avrebbe potuto consonare all'ode che spirava gli ardori di Lesbo, all'elegia suffusa dei vezzi del'etaire liberte? corne la canzone concione del Petrarca avrebbe accolto la sacra cantante processione del coro pindarico? Forse da cotesto costringimento, da cotesto continuato abito d'infingimento, è la lontana origine di quel po' d'innaturale e discorde e sforzato che si sente nel linguaggio della lirica italiana … Con lui [Cariteo] s'incomincia veramente la serie di quelle canzoni, che nelle forme della stanza, come furono finite di fermare dal Petrarca, accolgono una contenenza strana di concetti, di sentimenti, d'imaginazioni, e gli spiriti e le movenze, e, direste, le credenze dell'ode e dell'elegia greca e latina.”

6 C anz. iv, w. 1-10, 56-64.

7 Catullus, Eleg. lxxvi, vv. 1-6, 17-20, 25-26. The parallels are examined at length in Erasmo Pèrcopo, Le Rime di Benedetto Gareth (Naples, 1892), Parte prima, pp. lxxxiii ff., from which the example above is taken.

8 In October 1533 Bernardo Tasso sent Girolamo della Rovere “tre Ode alia Oraziana, alia Oraziana dico, non quanto a'numeri del verso (perché questa nostra lingua non lo supporta). . . .” In the preface to the odes in the 1560 edition he terms them “queste mie ode & hinni fatti ad imitatione de'buoni Poeti Greci, e Latini; non quanto al verso, il quale in questa nostra favella è impossible d'imitare …”

9 E.g., Poliziano, Stanze per la giostra.

10 Trissino, Sofonisba (1515).

11 The term, of course, was used as early as the Elegia di Madonna Fiammelta.

12 Bernardo Bellincioni, Elegie funebri: on the death of Giulio de'Medici (1478); on the death of Francesco Gonzaga (1483). Girolamo Benivieni, Deploratione per la morte di Feo Belcari (1484). The three lamentazioni of Sannazaro also fall within this group.

13 E.g., “L'oscuro suo sentier la notte avea”, stanzas 1-10 of which correspond to verses 17-42 of Tibullus' elegy iii, 4.

14 The term satire had been used by Sansovino in editing the poems of Vinciguerra, but the content shows them more properly to be sermoni; the author had not given them any title.

16 Pèrcopo, op. cit., pp. cclxxxviii, ff. .

16 Tasso claimed that his epithalamium presented to the Duke of Mantua in Feb., 1532 was the first inltalian. Portioli, Leltere inédite di B.T. (Mantua, 1871),no. 2.

17 Latin odes had been composed during the middle ages. Max Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatim des Miltelalters, Part iii (Munich, 1931), gives five sapphic odes of Peter Damian (p. 74) and sapphic and alcaic odes by Rupert von Deutz (p. 132). A. Harnack, Texte und Untersuchungen, iii, vii (Berlin, 1892), comments on the early Christian odes. K. Vietor, Geschichte der deutschen Ode (Munich, 1923), p. 7, believes that the word ode was lost in the Latin countries until 1140, when it was reintroduced by Honorius Augustodensis.

18 Benedicti Lampridii nec non Io. Bap. Amalthei carmina (Venice: Giolito, 1550), edited by Ludovico Dolce. The odœ meiropindaricœ, which Dolce's preface terms “le ode de M. Lampridio da lui tessute secondo I'ordine e la maniera serbata da Pindaro”, include praises of Cremona, Francesco Sforza, Bembo, Lascaris, Matteo Giberti, Vittoria Colonna, and Henry VIII. The evidence for Lampridio's priority is a passage in Gian Matteo Tos-cani, Peplus Italics (Paris, 1578), p. 56: “Cremona Lampridium nostri saeculi miraculum edidit, qui quod Horatius stultae temeritatis esse existimavit tentare, sibi proclive ad-modum esse declaravit, Pindari imitationem, quem felicissime Latinis est versibus aemula-tus …” and a passage in F. Arisi, Cremona literata (Parma, 1792), ii, 95: “Benedictus Lampridius … in imitando Pindaro Graecorum lyricorum corypheo contra Horatii sententiam lib. 4, ode 2, Icarium nihil habuit praeter volatus sublimitatem. Primus enim Thebanos modos in Latium induxit; primus Pindaricis numeris latinas aures assuefecit; … rigidus poetarum censor Gyraldus, qui durus in aliorum commendatione de Lampridio scriberenon dubitavit: ‘B. Lampridius Cremonensis non Epigrammatum modo, sed Lyricos versus facit, quibus in primis Pindarum cum inventione, turn phrasi aemulari nititur …‘ ” P. de Nolhac, Ronsard et l'humanisme (Paris, 1921), pp. 45-50, accepted the evidence as estabhshing Lampridio's priority.

19 First chorus, stanzas i and ii: AbcAbccddEeFF; stanza iii: ABbcBAaccDEEDdrrGG. Second chorus, stanzas i, ii, iv, and v: abcabccdeeDfF; stanzas iii and vi: abbcbaaccdee-dfgfg. Third chorus perfectly regular. Fourth chorus, stanzas I and ii: ABbcBAaccDEeDdFF; stanza iii: ABCBACCDECDFGGFFHH. All are without commiato.

20 “Quella virtù che del bel vostro velo”, stanzas I, ii, iv, and v: AbcAbccDEEDdEeDD; stanzas iii and vi: ABABACCDEEFF. “Per quella strada ove il piacer mi scorge”, stanzas i, ii, iv, and v: ABCABCCDEEDDFF; stanzas iii and vi: ABbCBAaccDEeDFF. “Al cardinale Ridolfi” is composed of endecasillabi sciolti; stanzas I, ii, iv, and v contain 13 verses; stanzas iii and vi contain 14. All are without commiato.

21 Divisione iv, “De lo accordare le stanze.”

22 First hymn, stanzas I, ii: abcbaccdeeddff; stanza iii: abcabccddee. Second hymn, stanzas I, ii: abcbaccdeeedff; stanza iii: abcbaccdd. Third and eighth hymns, stanzas I, ii: abcabccdeedd; stanza iii: abcabccdd. Fourth and fifth hymns, stanzas i, i: abcabccdeedf-ghgfhii; stanza iii: abcabccdeedffgg. Sixth hymn, stanzas i, ii, iii: abcabccdeeDfF. Seventh hymn, stanzas I, ii: abcbaccdeedfdff; stanza iii: abcbaccdeedeff.

23 Cf. Ciacco dell'Anguillaja, Canzone a dialogo; Rinaldo d'Aquino, “Giammai non mi conforto”; Brunetto Latini, II Tesoretto.

24 Within the strophe there is an occasional over-riding of the custom of separating the sirma from the fronte by a pause of sense.

25 The whole series is dedicated to Francis I. Hymns i and n celebrate Francis; hymn iii celebrates Marguerite of Navarre; hymns iv and v celebrate Megollo Larcara; hymns vi and vii celebrate Batina Larcara Spinola in her ancestor Megollo; hymn viii celebrates poetry œre perennius as a memorial of Francis.

26 Invocations of the muses were a commonplace of previous poetry, and even the reference to Pindar is not a complete novelty. Cf. C. Manilij Rhalli, In nuptiis Charitei: “Vorrei essere Pindaro et Orfeo,/ Per cantar, come debbo …”

27 H. Hauvette, Luigi Alamanni, Sa vie et son œuvre (Paris, 1903). To this exhaustive study of Alamanni I am indebted for many of the insights exploited in the text above, and I ask that this general acknowledgment stand in lieu of repetitious references to a work which will already be familiar to the student of renaissance poetics.

28 “Dal core mi vene”, Monaci, Crestomazia (1912), p. 47.

29 “Mortte, perché m'ai fatta sì gran guerra”, Monaci, p. 92.

30 By many scholars, e.g. Monaci, the discordi are simply called canzoni.

31 B. Morsolin, Giangiorgio Trissino, 2nd ed. (Florence, 1894), p. 473.

32 Alcune Odi d'Orazio volgarizzate nel cinquecento (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1880), pp. 127 ff.

33 The last stanza has only four verses aBba, but it is clear that the final hendecasyllable has been omitted through printer's error. Hauvette, op. cit., p. 232 n., suggests something like “Viver con te vorrei, con te morire.” The date of Alamanni's translation cannot be fixed; it was first published in Libro V delle Rime di Luigi Alamanni (Venice, 1555), p. 476. The particular interest of this translation lies in its. close approximation of verse pattern to the five line stanza devised by Bernardo Tasso, although, so far as is known, neither author was aware of the other's experiments.

34 A. Gaspary, Storia della letteratura italiana, tr. Rossi, 2nd ed., vol. II, pt. ii (Turin, 1901), p. 139.

35 U. Bosco, “Bernardo Tasso”, Encic. ital., xxxiii (Rome: Trecani, 1937).

36 P. L. Ginguené, Histoire littéraire d'Italie (Paris, 1824),v, 61.

37 H. Hauvette, supra, p. 550.

38 (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1940), p. 6.

39 These annotations have not been published. The volume in which they occur is owned by the John Hay Library of Brown University.

40 Alfred Einstein, The Italian Madrigal (Princeton, 1949), I, 90.

41 Ibid., p. 91.

42 Ibid., p. 92. The whole of this poem is set out by Einstein in vol. iii, no. 8.

43 On Jan. 27, 1549, Barbato wrote Tasso, “Within a few days I will send you seven of my Odes, which I have already done, following, and perhaps the first, in your footsteps.” Among these followers, Fiamma and Amalteo are individualized by their desire to spiritualize the ode: I. Sanesi, “Per la storia dell'ode”, Miscellanea di studî critici edita in onore di Arturo Graf (Bergamo: Instit. ital. d'arti grafiche, 1903), p. 603. This essay contains an interesting study of two imitations of one of Tasso's odes. Because Tasso was generally considered by his contemporaries to be the deviser of the Italian ode, the Valgrisi edition of Horace was dedicated to him. Late in the century may be found among the lyrics dear to the new music an idyllic ode, “O felice bifolco” : S. Ferrari, Biblioteca della letteratura popo-lare, (Florence, 1882), p. 161. In 1556, among the Rime di Diversi, Libro vii (Venice), pp. 165 ff., Ferrante Carafa published under the name of odes two attempted simulations of the asclepiadean and the iambic; but the poems are not, properly speaking, lyric, and are certainly not Horatian.

44 Only a part of Del Bene's 97 odes have been published. The date of their composition is not known, but by his own account he was “anchora fanciuletto” in 1530: C. Couderc, “Les poésies d'un florentin à la cour de France au xvie siècle”, xvii Gsli 1891, p. 1. The

45 So slight a modification as changing the rime of the volta and rivolta from deed to dede, as in the canzone for Alfonso I d'Este, leaves the members of the Petrarchan form intact.

46 Op. cit., p. 1409. 47Op. cit., p. 1412.

48 Rime (Rome: Zanetti, 1611).

49 The close relation between music and the ode at all times prior to 1750 must be constantly borne in mind when considering the latter.

60 The formalistic definition of the classical imitations of the period results in their separation from the movement to which they belong. They are nowhere mentioned, for example, in Arturo Graf, “Petrarchismo e Antipetrarchismo”, Attraverso il cinguecento, 2nd ed. (Turin, 1916).