Italian Studies

DUECENTO AND TRECENTO II* (EXCLUDING DANTE)

BY] ON A THAN USHER, Lecturer in Italian in the University ofEdinburgh

I. GENERAL Apart from the usual crop ofFestschrifts, retrospective collections of essays and reprintings, two trends seem worthy of interest: a growing realization that religious works hold vast promise for the literary historian, and a willingness to approach the linguistic realities of the period in fresh ways. Branca's Festschrift of monumental proportions (only exceeded by the bulk of his own contributions over the years), Miscellanea di studi in onore di Vittore Branca, F, Olschki, came out too late in the year to be seen by me, but vol. I, Dal medioevo al Petrarca, xii + 492 pp., is likely to have attracted some solid contributors. Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio: Studies in the Italian 'Trecento' in Honor of Charles S. Singleton, ed. by A. S. Bernardo and L. Pellegrini, Binghamton, State Univ. ofN.York, contains a heartfelt essay by G. Petrocchi, 'Metodi di lettura degli scritti ascetici trecenteschi', pp. 354-66, which argues that such mystical/ascetic literature is a fertile field for present-day researchers to deepen the relationship which brings together experi• ence and its expression, and the motions of the spirit and their language. Pietro Boitani (ed.), Chaucer and the Italian Trecento, CUP, xii+3I3pp., includes an elegant essay on 'Chaucer's Italy', pp. 8g-I I 3, though readers less centred on Chaucer and more interested in the Trecento might do as well to go straight to John Larner, Italy in the Age of Dante and Petrarch, London, I98o; ib. E. Giaccherini, 'Chaucer and the Italian Trecento: a Bibliography', pp. 297-304, a useful survey; see also pp. 47I below. Another Chaucerian scholar with Italian interests, Derek Brewer, has contri• buted an introduction 'Medieval European Literature' to Ford, Medieval Lit., pp. 4I-84, which includes a brief treatment of the early development of Italian literature. O'Donoghue, The Courtly Love Tradition, contains a section on the Stilnovisti, pp. 258-g8, with texts and translations and a rather uninformative introduction. N. Sapegno's classic Trecento has been republished in a revised edition, Mi, Vallardi, I982, 626pp., the revision being the work of

* Mr Usher joined the Year's Work team comparatively recently and is in no way responsible for the fact that this section failed to appear in volumes 43 and 44· Users of the work will be grateful to him for having succeeded nevertheless in covering a considerable number of items published in Ig8I and rg82. [G.P.] Italian Studies A. Balduino. Other examples of rebirth are the collections of already published articles by G. Martellotti, Dante e Boccaccio e altri scrittori dall'Umanesimo al Rinascimento, F, Olschki, 504 pp., and G. Nencioni, Tra grammatica e retorica. Da Dante a Pirandello, Turin, Einaudi, viii+ 305 pp. R. Russell, Generi poetici medioevali, Naples, Napoletana, I982 (I983), 209pp., has the virtue of containing a modest leaven of novelties: 'Senso, nonsenso e controsenso nella frottola', pp. I 4 7-6 I, reviewsjrottole under four headings: gnomic, political, autobiographi• cal, and descriptive, and perceives that the commonly-held view that .frottole are disjointed and lack logical sequence is mistaken. B. Guthmiiller, Ovidio Metamorphoseos Vulgare. Formen und Funktionen der volkssprachlichen Wiedergabe klassischer Dichtung in der italienischen Renaiss• ance, Boppard a. Rhein, Boldt, I98I, 3 I 2 pp., despite its title, gives a useful review ofOvidian presences in Brunetto, Guittone, Stilnovisti, Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, Guido da Pisa. K. Krautter, Die Renaissance der Bukolik in.der lateinischen Literatur des XIV. Jahrhunderts: von Dante bis Petrarca, Munich, Fink, deals with the links between Giovanni del Virgilio and Dante, Mussato and Petrarch, and also between Boccaccio and Checco di Meletto: the approach tends towards the semiotic, and is particularly stimulating on Petrarch. Still on the survival of the classics, F. Ferrucci, 'Mito classico e mito cristiano nella letteratura italiana', YIS, 5: I 6o-9 I, deals in a fairly unoriginal way with Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio and their role as mediators between two cultures. An interesting insight into medieval culture is given by E. Esposito, 'Les formes d'hospitalite dans le roman courtois', Romania, I03, I982: I97-234, where the elaborate ritual of courtesy to Guests is traced back to the Regula ofSt Bernard: E.'s codification of gestures would be a useful guide for scholars of the cantari, romanzi and early prose fiction. On romance, see D. Delcorno Branca, 'Il cavaliere dalle armi incantate: circolazione di un modello narrativo arturiano', GSLI, I 59, I982: 353-82, which scru• pulously traces the fortune of the Lasancis episode through to Ariosto. On the recuperation of the characteristics of oral expression, D. Marcheschi, lngiurie, improperi, contumelie ecc. Saggio di lingua parlata del Trecento cavato dai libri criminali di Lucca per opera di Salvatore Bongi, Lucca, Pacini, the spirit of Vidocq! A similar methodology is employed, though in (superficially) more august circumstances in A. Varvaro, 'Dallo scritto al parlato: la predica di fra' Simone del Pozzo (I 392) ', MedRom, 8: 32 I -3 7. The evidence comes from a trial for 'fellonia'. Aids for approaching medieval texts are gradually becom• ing more numerous. D' Arco Silvio A valle, Programma per un omofonario automatico della poesia italiana delle origini, F, Accademia della Crusca, I 98 I, is a preparatory study laying down some of the principles for the much-awaited Concordanze. G. Colussi (ed.), *Glossario degli antichi