The Mystical Dimension of Michelangelo‟S Writings
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The Mystical Dimension of Michelangelo‟s Writings by Sarah Rolfe Prodan A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Italian Studies University of Toronto © Copyright by Sarah Rolfe Prodan 2011 The Mystical Dimension of Michelangelo‟s Writings Sarah Rolfe Prodan PhD in Italian Studies Department of Italian Studies University of Toronto 2011 Abstract This dissertation examines the spiritual poetry of Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) in light of three distinct but related contexts: Italian Evangelism of the Catholic Reformation, the Italian lauda tradition, and Renaissance Augustinianism. After reviewing the reception and critical history of Michelangelo‟s poetry, chapter one presents the anthropological approach of the present study as an effective means of illuminating the poet‟s spiritual verses by considering what they may have meant – collectively and individually – to the poet himself. Chapter two analyzes Michelangelo‟s lyrics inspired by Vittoria Colonna with respect to the Spirituali of the Ecclesia viterbiensis in general and to the Beneficio di Cristo and personal letters of Vittoria Colonna in particular. It shows that the portrayal of Vittoria Colonna in this poetry as an instrument of grace effecting Michelangelo‟s spiritual refashioning, rebirth, and renewal reflects a theology of the Holy Spirit that was dear to the Italian Evangelical community and central to their self-perception. The third chapter presents the Italian lauda tradition and its mystical verses addressing Christ and the Holy Spirit as an inspiration for Michelangelo who, in a later spiritual sonnet, borrowed directly from one of Lorenzo de‟ Medici‟s laude. This chapter shows how Michelangelo‟s verse is informed by a long, popular Christian tradition in the vernacular. ii The discussion in chapter four centres on Dante‟s Commedia and on the Augustinian allegoreses that permeate Landino‟s Comento to the grand epic. These two works, it is argued, constitute sources as important as Petrarch‟s Canzoniere for Michelangelo‟s Augustinian vision of a mystico-moral ascent through conversion. This dissertation concludes that for Michelangelo poetry became an instrument of spiritual devotion. His mystical verses reveal a Catholic intellectual versant in Italian rhetoric of the Catholic Reformation and a poet inspired by Paul, Augustine, and the Italian lauda tradition. iii Table of Contents Abstract _________________________________________________________________ii Table of Contents _________________________________________________________ iii Introduction _____________________________________________________________ 1 Chapter 1 The Critical History of Michelangelo‟s Rime and Spiritual Poetry___________ 5 1.1 Michelangelo and Poetry ________________________________________________ 5 1.2 Poetic Activity ________________________________________________________ 6 1.3 The Poetic Corpus _____________________________________________________ 10 1.3.1 Michelangelo and Petrarchism ____________________________________ 11 1.3.2 Michelangelo as a Religious Writer ________________________________ 13 1.4 Critical History _______________________________________________________ 14 1.5 Philological and Early Critical History of the Rime ___________________________ 16 1.5.1 Sixteenth Century ______________________________________________ 16 1.5.2 Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries ______________________________ 20 1.5.3 Nineteenth Century _____________________________________________ 22 1.6 Critical History of the Rime in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries __________ 23 1.6.1 The Long Quest for Objectivity ___________________________________ 23 1.6.2 Personal Diary vs. Literature in the Autobiographical Mode _____________ 26 1.7 Michelangelo‟s Approach to Composing Poetry and its Implications _____________ 31 1.8 Michelangelo and the Mystical ___________________________________________ 35 1.9 Conclusion ___________________________________________________________ 42 Chapter 2 Michelangelo, the „Spirituali,‟ and Italian Evangelism ___________________ 43 2.1 Introduction __________________________________________________________ 43 2.2 The „Spirituali‟ and Catholic Reform in Italy ________________________________ 46 2.3 Michelangelo and the „Spirituali‟ _________________________________________ 50 2.4 The Beneficio di Cristo _________________________________________________ 55 2.4.1 Soteriology and Justification in Italy of the Reformation ________________ 55 2.4.2 The Text of the Beneficio ________________________________________ 57 2.5 Michelangelo, Vittoria Colonna, and the Holy Spirit: A Sacred Trinity?___________ 66 2.5.1 Gift-Giving and Justification by Grace Through Faith __________________ 67 2.5.2 Art, Grace and Divine Refashioning ________________________________ 75 2.5.3 Ascent on Borrowed Wings: Michelangelo, Vittoria, and Dante __________ 82 iv 2.5.4 Colonna, the Holy Spirit and Salvific Intercession ____________________ 93 2.6 Michelangelo, Christ and the Redemption of the Cross ________________________ 97 2.7 Conclusion ___________________________________________________________ 103 Chapter 3 Michelangelo, Lorenzo de‟ Medici and Italian Mystical Verse _____________ 105 3.1 Introduction __________________________________________________________ 105 3.2 Rethinking Michelangelo‟s Sources _______________________________________ 106 3.3 Michelangelo Buonarroti and Lorenzo de‟ Medici as Poets of Love ______________ 109 3.4 Lorenzo il Magnifico and the Lauda _______________________________________ 126 3.5 Lorenzo, Michelangelo and the Florentine Lauda Tradition _____________________ 130 3.6 Christ and the Holy Spirit in Christian Mysticism ____________________________ 140 3.7 The Italian Mystical Lauda and the Galletti Prints ____________________________ 150 3.8 The Italian Mystical Lauda in Non-Galletti Prints ____________________________ 163 3.9 Conclusion ___________________________________________________________ 174 Chapter 4 Michelangelo, Augustine and the Mystico-Moral Ascent _________________ 177 4.1 Introduction __________________________________________________________ 177 4.2 Michelangelo and Augustine _____________________________________________ 178 4.3 Augustine‟s Spirituality and the Mystico-Moral Ascent ________________________ 181 4.4 An Important Precursor: Dante‟s Augustinian Eschatology _____________________ 186 4.5 Michelangelo and Dante ________________________________________________ 189 4.6 “Il mare e ‟l monte e ‟l foco colla spada”: Michelangelo‟s Augustinian Pilgrimage?__ 191 4.7 “Il mare”: The Vicissitudes of Disordered Love ______________________________ 197 4.8 Landino‟s Augustinian Allegoresis: Hell as Habit ____________________________ 205 4.9 Landino‟s Charon and Minos: An Allegory of Free Will, Choice and Volition _____ 215 4.10 Michelangelo‟s Last Judgement and Landino‟s Augustinian Allegoresis _________ 219 4.11 Michelangelo and the Cavalieri Period: Between Grace and Non-Grace _________ 223 4.12 “Il monte”: Accidia and the Mind‟s Presumption to Flight ____________________ 223 4.13 “Il foco colla spada”: Colonna, Grace, and Divine Refashioning _______________ 237 4.14 The Final Years: Christ and the Gift of Understanding _______________________ 241 4.15 Michelangelo, Petrarch and the “navigatio ad patriam” : A Point of Difference ____ 245 4.16 Conclusion _________________________________________________________ 252 Conclusion _____________________________________________________________ 254 Works Cited ____________________________________________________________ 258 v 1 Introduction Over the course of its critical history, Michelangelo‟s lyrical production has undergone a variety of diverse critical readings. Approaches have ranged from biographical and historical, through formalist and aesthetic, to gendered and psychoanalytic readings all with varying results and degrees of success. Despite the rich contributions made by these diverse critical methodologies, Michelangelo‟s poetry remains mysterious and resistant to totalizing qualifiers. This is especially true of his “spiritual” or “religious” verses. On the one hand, Michelangelo‟s verses are so personally expressive and apparently genuine that an autobiographical approach seems most appropriate. Yet, on the other hand, Michelangelo clearly engaged in poetic composition as an intellectual exercise as well as a medium of personal reflection. He elaborated “concepts.” These constitute a primary characteristic of his verse, including some of his spiritual poetry. The intellectual depth of Michelangelo‟s lyric production has inspired many attempts to identify the currents of thought that inform them, but because the philosophical and theological elements of his lyrical corpus are so ambiguous, the compositions themselves promise failure to anyone intent on categorizing them as an instance or expression of a given ideology. The fact that we do not know Michelangelo‟s intentions when, in 1542-46, he set about revising a selection of his lyrics only complicates matters further. Formalist analyses have furnished insight into the mechanics of Michelangelo‟s poetry.Yet, given the intimate tone and personal expressiveness of the verses, analyses that focus exclusively on their formal features emerge somehow incomplete. In short, a new approach is required: one that can accommodate the biographical, philosophical and formal aspects of Michelangelo‟s spiritual verse, while, at the same time, illuminating at least