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Wilson, Lauren (2021) CONVERSING WITH ANTIQUITY: LANGUAGE, GENDER AND SELF-PRESENTATION IN THE CINQUECENTO DIALOGUE. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.

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Abstract

This thesis explores the use of the classically-derived dialogue genre in the territory now called Italy in the sixteenth century, specifically considering each dialogue as an act of classical reception. In this, it aims to problematise a tendency in scholarly literature on Cinquecento dialogues to categorise post-classical works by their presumed classical model, as well as considering questions of how and why Cinquecento writers used the classical dialogue genre and the evocation of the classical world more broadly to achieve their aims in producing literary works.

Using a theoretical framework based principally on comparative literature and new historicist methodologies, the thesis begins with a study tracing the reception of the Phaedrus in dialogues from both antiquity (Cicero’s De Oratore, Lucian’s Hermotimus) and the early modern period (Baldassare Castiglione’s Il Libro del Cortegiano (1528), Pietro Aretino’s Ragionamenti (1534, 1536)). It then continues with three further chapters, each discussing a broad theme related to identity: language, self-presentation, and gender.

In the language chapter, the genre’s use in the cultural questione della lingua debate will be considered, focusing on Pietro Bembo’s influential Le Prose della Volgar Lingua (1525), but also evaluating opinions of Bembo and his contribution in both Castiglione and in Paolo Giovio’s Dialogus de Viris et Foeminis Aetate Nostra (1527), two dialogues published shortly after the first edition of the Prose.

This is followed by a chapter on self-presentation, which discusses the limitations of authorial control and the potential for exploiting these in the paratextual apparatus of a text in relation to Il Cortegiano and Tullia d’Aragona’s Dialogo della Infinità di Amore (1547). It also compares the self-presentation of Bembo in his Prose with his earlier self-presentation in his Neo-Latin dialogue, De Aetna (1496).

The final chapter, on gender, explores questions relating to women in dialogue, summarising the participation of women in classical dialogues and assessing the portrayal of women in three early modern examples: Pietro Bembo’s Gli Asolani (1505), Agnolo Firenzuola’s Dialogo delle Bellezze delle Donne (1541) and Tullia d’Aragona’s Dialogo della Infinità di Amore.

The thesis shows that receptions of dialogue are complex and layered, illustrating the intertextuality prized during the period and demonstrating the ways in which the history and generic possibilities of this ancient form were exploited by Renaissance writers.

Item Type:	Thesis (University of Nottingham only) (PhD)
Supervisors:	Lovatt, Helen Knight, Sarah
Keywords:	Cinquecento dialogues, questione della lingua, querelle des femmes, cinquecento, Renaissance, classical reception, Plato, Cicero
Subjects:	D History - General and Old World > DG Italy P Language and literature > PA Classical philology P Language and literature > PQ Romance literatures > PQ4001 Italian literature
Faculties/Schools:	UK Campuses > Faculty of Arts > School of Humanities
Item ID:	66554
Depositing User:	Wilson, Lauren
Date Deposited:	16 Jan 2024 16:14
Last Modified:	16 Jan 2024 16:14
URI:	https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/66554

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