What is Love? The Amorous Discourse from Dante to Ferrante

Catalog description

Talking about love was the main reason humans ever began to speak in the first place. From the moment words were invented, they have been used to interpret and describe, in verse and prose, this powerful and mysterious force, in an attempt to interpret and describe our very selves. Lyric poetry was specifically designed for that, but even when telling stories about war, adventure, or the meaning of life and death, as well as when narrating comic or tragic events, countless writers have often endeavored to answer the question: What is love? By combining close readings of texts with a study of their literary, cultural, and historical context, and by paying attention to individual innovations as well as one's dialogue with tradition (a gendered tradition, that nonetheless stimulates fluid and even queer responses from the Renaissance forward), we will discover Dante's love, a means of damnation or salvation; Petrarch's love, which is sinful distraction, the source of poetry, and a path to glory; Boccaccio's love, so sensual and yet so deeply rooted in the human soul as to cause the greatest joy or the deepest despair; Ariosto's love, a dangerous force that can drive people to madness in a world where, after all, everyone is somehow in love and therefore partly (and delightfully) crazy; Machiavelli's love, which can sharpen one's wits and bring with it great achievements, unless it clouds one's judgement and leads to failure; Aretino's love, so unabashedly physical and graphically explicit as to cause scandal and amazement all over Europe. We will also look at how love is described by Veronica Gambara, Vittoria Colonna, Gaspara Stampa and other women poets of the Renaissance who renewed the lyrical code from within, giving new meanings to old words. We will also listen to the various kinds of love put to music in operas from Don Giovanni to Traviata and Bohème, and we…