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Enhancing the Research on Sophistry in the Renaissance

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Enhancing the Research on Sophistry in the Renaissance Enhancing the Research on Sophistry in the Renaissance Teodoro Katinis Abstract: This contribution introduces the proceedings of The idea of two conferences was shaped on the structure the international conference The Sophistic Renaissance: of my two-year research project that aimed to analyze the Authors, Texts, Interpretations held in Venice on Septem- works of Sperone Speroni degli Alvarotti (Padua 1500– ber 26th, 2016 as part of my Marie Skłodowska-Curie pro- 1588), his re-evaluation of ancient sophistic perspectives and ject Sperone Speroni (1500-1588) and the Rebirth of their legacy in the early modern age. Speroni was one of the Sophistry in the Italian Renaissance at Ca’ Foscari Uni- most important protagonists of the Renaissance debate on versity (2015-2016). This introduction briefly presents the language and logic as well as civil and speculative philoso- status quaestionis and the essays collected herein, dis- phy. Educated as an Aristotelian, he eventually developed a cusses the challenges scholars encounter while exploring distinctive philosophy and was the first to challenge Plato’s the legacy of ancient sophists in early modern culture, and condemnation of sophists. Starting with a focus on Speroni, addresses some promising lines of research for deepening the project proposed an analysis of the 15th-century Latin some aspects of the subject in the future. sources, such as Leonardo Bruni and Marsilio Ficino among others, and the exploration of the debate over sophistry in the Keywords: Sophistry, Latin Renaissance, vernacular Italian 16th-century authors, such as Torquato Tasso, Jacopo Renaissance. Mazzoni, and Gabriele Comanini.3 Considering that Latin lit- erature was the first involved in the rebirth of sophistic tradi- tions, I intended to focus the first conference more on Latin 1. Introduction authors and texts and the second conference more on vernacu- lar literatures. That said, I intended to put no strict boundary The collection of essays we publish in this issue of Phi- between the two kinds of literature, which was clearly the losophical Readings presents the results of the work done spirit of Eric MacPhail’s keynote address (Indiana University by scholars gathered for the conference The Sophistic Bloomington), followed by Lodi Nauta (University of Gron- Renaissance: Authors, Texts, Interpretations, which I or- ingen) – who preferred not to publish his contribution – Leo ganized in Venice. The meeting was held at Ca’ Foscari Catana (University of Copenhagen), and Marco Munarini University in Venice, in the splendid Aula Baratto on (University of Padua). The keynote speaker for the second part September 26, 2016, with the support of the Department of the conference was Marc van der Poel (Radboud Univer- of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage. I intended to orga- sity), followed by Stefano Gulizia (independent scholar), Jorge nize this conference as the closure event of the first year Ledo (University of Basel), and myself with some Closing of my Marie Skłodowska-Curie project Sperone Speroni Remarks. The conference ended with a Discussion Session in (1500-1588) and the Rebirth of Sophistry in the Italian which the following discussants had the role of kindling the Renaissance at Ca’ Foscari University.1 This was meant debate: Eugene Afonasin (Novosibirsk University), Christo- to be the first of two conferences. I scheduled the second pher Celenza (Johns Hopkins University), Glenn Most (SNS one to be held in 2017, at the end of my research project, Pisa), Carlo Natali (Ca’ Foscari University Venice), and Luigi with the aim of summarizing the most important scholarly Perissinotto (Ca’ Foscari University Venice) – who unfortu- results in the exploration of sophistry in the Latin and nately could not attend the Conference. This collection of es- vernacular Renaissance. I also intended to trace the pos- says also includes the contribution of Elisa Bacchi (University siblities of research development in the field over the next of Pisa - Ghent University). years. This second conference was never realized since The main aim of the Conference was to explore the in- my current appointment at Ghent University brought my fluence and diffusion of ancient sophistic traditions in Marie Skłodowska-Curie project to an early end. early-modern Europe, fostering an interdisciplinary dis- According to my knowledge, there has never been a cussion among scholars and enhancing a new network for conference on such a subject. Indeed, although the soph- future interdisciplinary collaboration. The participants ex- ists have been the subject of important international meet- amined the ancient sophists’ legacy, translations and in- ings, none of them have focused on the presence of an- terpretations of their works in a span of time from the be- cient sophists in 15th and 16th-century European literature, ginning of the 15th century to the first part of the 17th cen- which is paradoxical when one considers that the ancient tury, and crossing paths with philosophical traditions such sophists were reborn in this period - a time when other as Platonism and Neo-Platonism, as well as major turns in ancient traditions, such as Platonism, Aristotelianism and European history, such as the Reformation and Counter- Skepticism, encountered great fortune as well.2 Reformation. I believe the results published in this collec- tion of essays are an important contribution towards fill- Ghent University Philosophical Readings XI.2 (2019), pp. 58-62. Ghent, Belgium DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.2555133 email: [email protected] ENHANCING THE RESEARCH ON SOPHISTRY IN THE RENAISSANCE ing the gap in international scholarship and enhancing re- and we can count on several studies.6 Indeed, as it results search in the field. also from these proceedings, the rebirth of sophistry and the debate over it seems to be particularly vivid and rich in the Italian environment, so that we can expect further 2. A brief status quaestionis discoveries on Italian authors and texts. Important achievements have been reached also for the Spanish lit- The scholarship on ancient sophists in the Renaissance is erature thanks to Merkl’s studies on the reception of Pro- relatively recent and, before presenting the papers in these tagoras of Abdera, through Marsilio Ficino’s translations proceedings, it might be useful to recall the studies that and commentaries on Plato, in Miguel de Cervantes.7 But have focused on this subject or have been relevant for the we still lack explorations of other vernacular contexts. development of current and future studies. Several scholars have warned not to consider sophis- One could be tempted to include the study or the so- try as a uniform movement, or, in other words, they have phistic legacy in the contiguous field of the history of suggested working on each specific sophist respecting his rhetoric, but this would be misleading for our understand- identity and the specificities of his work and thought. ing of the specificity of the transmission and reinterpreta- Since the 19th century, thanks to tools like the collection tion of the sophists and their works throughout the West- of sophistic fragments published by Diels and Kranz, this ern tradition, a specificity that Eric MacPhail’s pioneering is not a difficult task anymore, and although we can still monograph The Sophistic Renaissance (which clearly in- recognize some general common aspects in the authors of spired this conference title) preserved very well. The first both the First and Second Sophistic (as the two major pe- feature of the sophists is that they not only use speech as a riods of the ancient sophistry are called) we also can means of persuasion, but they also imply powerful phi- clearly see the specificity of each source. For the authors losophical approaches which are definitely rejected by the of the Renaissance that was not an easy task, since some two main streams of Western tradition (i.e. Platonism and of their major sources for knowledge of the sophists, i.e. Aristotelianism), but embraced and used by other alterna- Plato and Aristotle, tend to identify the nature of sophistry tive philosophies (i.e. Skepticism). (or the sophist as a kind, for example in Plato’s Sophist) MacPhail’s book, published in 2011, has been the only rather than the specificity of each sophist. I think the Hy- extended study available on the rebirth of sophistry in dra, as a metaphor of sophistry, as it is presented in early-modern European literature with a focus on Latin Plato’s dialogue Euthydemus (297c–d), expresses quite authors, in particular the humanists and Erasmus, and well this ambivalent identity of sophistry, which is one of French literature, in particular Montaigne and Rabelais. the reasons why I chose Antonio del Pollaiolo’s painting Without summarizing MacPhail’s well-known mono- Hercules and the Hydra (c. 1475) as the icon of our con- graph, it is worth recalling that it not only collects and ference: sophists are many different individuals who share discusses the fortune of ancient sources in the Renais- important features, for example the use of rhetoric as a sance, but also explores their reinterpretation in new powerful mean of persuasion, but also keep their own forms not always immediately recognizable, for example identity, which allows us, for example, to call both Pro- the use of rhetoric to destroy rhetoric in Michel de Mon- tagoras of Abdera and Gorgias of Leontini ‘sophists’ but taigne’s Essays, which is a topos that goes back to the with a full awareness of their deep differences. It is not conflict between Socrates and the sophists in Plato’s dia- my intention to deepen this aspect of the subject, which is logues. In other terms, MacPhail’s study adopts an his- a task for specialists of ancient sophistic literature consid- torical approach, but also suggests research directions ered by itself and before its impact on the Renaissance from a theoretical perspective.
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