1—
The Burlesque Sonnet Tradition in Italy

Comic-Realistic Poets of the Thirteenth to Early Fourteenth Century

The burlesque sonnet was born and took its first steps among a fairly numerous series of poets living in Tuscany during the late thirteenth to early fourteenth century. Although varying in individual style, tone, and subject matter, they certainly form a distinctive group or genre when compared to their contemporaries, who were involved in serious, sublime verse. Commonly referred to as "comic-realistic" poets, theirs is not the exalted world of beauty and lofty sentiments, but an ironic one of caricature and raucous laughter. It is material life reduced to the basics where philosophical and moral concerns are swept aside in the search for the immediate gratification of elementary instincts. These poets sing an earthy existence, full of coarse and passionate inclinations, in a highly expressive, colorful, and colloquial—often regional—vernacular. This is in direct and, of course, deliberate contrast to the refined and sweet language used by their serious colleagues engaged in the newly discovered dolce stile .

Their style is often erroneously called "spontaneous," but their work is no more spontaneous than serious poetry since their words are chosen just as carefully to produce the desired effect. In fact, theirs is above all a poetry of comic effect, designed to surprise, shock, and at times provoke laughter. The language they use is often devastatingly concrete. The parts of the body are described graphically, as are the bodily functions normally omitted from polite conversation and poetry. At the

same time, their language can also be highly euphemistic, as in the use of sexual metaphors.

The life this verse describes can be wretched. The poets complain of constant misfortune and privations. Petty rivalries and political setbacks blossom into blasphemous invective and satirical portraits done in a trivial and insulting spirit. Other works sing the praises of a free-wheeling life. The exaltation of wine, women, and play is never far from these poets, and their verse can assume the cadences of a rollicking barroom song.

These early burlesque sonnets can be melancholic or gay, ironically cutting or explosively irreverant, lighthearted, or sarcastic. Their emotional and tonal range is wide. What underlies them all, however, is an ever-present spirit of humorous burla . This is the stuff they are made of.

The first Tuscan sonneteers gradually lead to the Italian Renaissance, at which point the burlesque sonnet takes on new shadings of meaning. Nevertheless, the characteristics displayed by these initiators of the genre are ever-present, to a degree, in the burlesque sonnet as it develops through the Italian—and subsequently Spanish—Renaissance and Baroque periods.

As it is not the purpose of this book to make an exhaustive study of all Italian burlesque sonneteers, the number of poets treated is limited to those who made original and direction-setting contributions to the genre. Through them the progress and development of the burlesque sonnet tradition is traced from its beginnings up to the point at which it enters Spain.

The new poetic form of the sonnet was an artistic invention, although popular in source, of a circle of poets at the Sicilian court of Frederick II.^[1] Thirty-one sonnets remain which date from 1220 to 1250; these were written by the royal notary and lawyer Giacomo da Lentino, the imperial chancellor Piero delle Vigne, Jacopo Mostacci, and others. Twenty-five of the sonnets are attributed to Giacomo, the leader of the literary group and recognized as the most likely originator of the sonnet.^[2] These early poems were divided into hendecasyllabic octave and sestet with a sense pause dividing the two. The corresponding rhyme schemes were ABABABAB and CDECDE (the majority) or

CDCDCD. It is generally accepted that Giacomo borrowed the octave from the eight-line Sicilian strambotto, a popular folk song; the sestet was apparently sheer inspiration.^[3] In content, the Frederician sonnets derive from the Provençal love tradition of fin'amors ; several are tensons.

Thus the sonnet was born at one of the thirteenth century's most brilliant, intellectual, and literary Italian courts. When cultural and linguistic primacy passed to Tuscany in the second half of the same century, Guittone d'Arezzo, Guido Guinizelli, and Guido Cavalcanti embraced the sonnet. Guittone was the first to use the crossed rhyme scheme ABBAABBA in the octave; this was subsequently adopted as the standard by Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio.

But the love sonnet was not the only poetic genre to flourish in late-thirteenth-century Tuscany. Practically hand-in-hand with it we have the emergence of another: the burlesque sonnet. The Florentine Rustico di Filippo, "il Barbuto," (1230 [1240?]–300?) was the father of the burlesque sonnet.^[4] Taking its inspiration from the hurly-burly of Florentine street life, his burlesque verse was new and unique in its faithful rendition of surrounding reality, done in a mocking and colloquial tone. His originality would garner Rustico the honorific of "geniale rimatore " among his contemporaries in the lively and colorful capital of late-thirteenth-century Tuscany.

Rustico's fifty-eight extant sonnets fall into two categories: love poems and burlesque-realistic-political poems. The love poetry is more often than not quite conventional; however, as Federici has pointed out, at times Rustico sheds conventional formulas and expressions to concern himself with the expression of "real" feelings.^[5] This movement toward an animated depiction of real life is also the basis for the success of his burlesque verse. In it a spirit of acute observation and mordant caricature produces brief but piercing sketches of Florentine life.

Rustico's best-known sonnet is "Messer Messerin" (Appendix 1)—a caricature of Albizzo (Messerino) di Caponsacchi, a member of contemporary Florentine nobility.^[6] The poet creates a bizarre combination of bird, beast, and man, and is merciless in the enumeration of this triform monstrosity's defects. The

coup de grace is the concluding tercet where Rustico admits that God created this curious creature in an idle moment in order to display His talents.

The alternating rhyme of the quatrains, combined with the anaphoric "che" and "ed," provide a rolling rhythm that propels the reader or listener along smartly to the conclusion. Lacking the sense pause that often clearly divided early sonnets into octave and sestet, the poem is, instead, an accumulation of highly descriptive images composed around one single subject. This accumulative structure will prove to be typical of the burlesque sonnet. The poet's purpose is often a prodigal display of wit through the creation of novel imagery.

Here Rustico proves himself to be a skillful pioneer in accommodating the age-old literary vituperium to a new, highly sophisticated, and demanding mold. In terms of the language used, this becomes an interweaving of the crude and the sublime. The latter is, of course, used ironically. All Rustico's burlesque sonnets feature the parodic use of courtly language. In this poem, words and expressions such as "sembia," "piagente cera," and "savere" clearly emerge from the Occitanic tradition.

In addition to parodying courtly language, this sonnet also satirizes the bestiary simile adopted from the Provençal tradition by Tuscan poets.^[7] In such verse human (generally favorable) qualities are compared to those found in animals. Rustico parodies this by stretching the simile beyond its limit to create a "strana cosa," neither beast nor human, but instead a fantastic hybrid.

"Messer Messerin" is typical of Rustico's burlesque sonnets that constitute mocking caricatures of contemporary Florentines. Alongside messer Messerin parade ser Laíno (sonnet IX; numbering follows Massèra), a man who surpasses in obesity any other "che fossa o sia o possa essere al mondo [who was, is, or could be in the world]"; the libidinous pervert messer Iacopo (sonnet III), who the poet calls "comare"; slothful, malodorous, and repugnant men and women; gluttons and misers; and bores and boors.

Unfortunately, many allusions in Rustico's work are lost to us today (an inevitable problem with much burlesque verse). His poetry is firmly rooted in a city and its circumstances, to which

we now have only limited access. Nevertheless, the characters can at times be universal, as the miles gloriosus of "Una bestiuola ho vista molto fèra" (Appendix 2). The silly tin soldier, with his posturing, outlandish armor, grimacing, and snorting, is reduced to a ridiculous figure popular in European literature. The entire poem is an extension and development of the oxymoron established in the first verse: a bestiuola, an insignificant little beast, who is at the same time molto fèra . The comparison of the soldier to a lion is another bestiary simile that parodies the standard measure of human bravery.

Other sonnets are not quite so innocently mischievous, however, and range from the piquant to the openly obscene. In sonnet XI (Appendix 3) the sly, quick-witted wife of the cuckold Aldobrandino tries to convince her husband that she has not deceived him. Pay no attention to wagging tongues, she tells him, and return the doublet left behind in their bed to its owner—their neighbor, and her lover, Pilletto. After all, Pilletto was a fine and courteous young man who had simply acted as an "amorevole vicino." And besides, as she ambiguously says in the final verse, he did nothing to cause her pain. In other words, the affair was pleasurable and she has no regrets. Out of the wife's wry protestations Rustico creates a vivid scene between the cheeky spouse and her simple-minded husband.

This poem uses ironic ambiguity, rather than the mocking caricature that characterizes "Messer Messerin" and "Una bestiuola," to make fun of Aldobrandino. Especially successful is the wife's description of the "loving neighbor" who will not return again since he now knows what Aldobrandino desires. In other words, he is both aware of the husband's wishes that he stay away, and "knows," in the sexual sense, the neighboring object of desire. Such irony and ambiguity is present in the most accomplished burlesque verse and is an important differentiating factor between burlesque and invectious satire.

"Aldobrandino" is not simply a burla of a betrayed husband; it is ultimately a burla of the poetic tradition of courtly love. By adopting courtly expressions such as "egli è tanto cortese fante e fino" and "il tuo volere" to veil a crude tale of marital infidelity, the poet parodies the Provençals' exquisite sublimation of physical love. In addition, the vulgar affair satirizes the tradi-

tion of courtly love whereby passionate love can be found only outside marriage.^[8]

Rustico's more lewd verses are the first strands of an erotic thread that winds through many Italian (and other) burlesque sonnets. In his case it is not obscenity for obscenity's sake, nor can it be deemed pornographic. It leans more toward the bawdy spirit of Chaucer, albeit coming from an infinitely lesser poet. Modern sensibilities perhaps find little humor in these coarse verses today. Given the frequency with which they occur in much Renaissance and Baroque literature, however, it is obvious that they were an accepted branch of the burlesque and, indeed, prompted laughter in the contemporary reader or listener.

Unfortunately, literary critics have historically preferred to avoid dipping their toes into these somewhat murky waters; thus the more risqué poetry remains in large part uncommented. A typical critical reaction to ribald verse is that of Carmelo Previtera, who finds four of Rustico's sonnets (XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII, and XXIX) brazenly obscene, saying that "la bruttura delle cose descritte è cosí turpe che non c'è nessuna scusa per l'autore, il quale si compiace di guazzare nella trivialità e nella sconcezza piú indecente [the baseness of the things described is such that there is no excuse for the author, who enjoys wallowing in vulgarity and the most indecent obscenity]."^[9]

Nevertheless, in this case the critic's negative personal reaction against the subject matter does not make him reject the verses without comment, and after his initial disclaimer he adds: "Eppure qui i versi sono chiari e direi quasi piú spontanei che altrove; la rappresentazione nella sua cruda espressione è viva e ricca di rilievi plastici! [Yet here the verses are clear and I would say almost more spontaneous than elsewhere; in its crude expression the imagery is lively and rich in plastic relief!]." Previtera's final judgment is that perhaps it is precisely in this "poesia lubrica" where Rustico's true voice and character lie. Rustico, the Florentine burlone who talks of all subjects openly and without reserve. But Rustico's "true" voice is found as much in the "obscene" verse as in the purely caricaturesque. His burlesque tone and overriding mocking attitude encompass and contain the obscene elements. These are merely another facet

of the burlesque and do not stand alone as a separate category of verse; this is exactly what separates them from so-called erotic literature. The reader is certainly not incited to libidinous thoughts, but at most to a sardonic grin—perhaps in Rustico's time, even to laughter.

Rustico is the first known poet to channel burlesque content into the sonnet medium. He is the precursor of many burlesque sonneteers, but he himself had no formal precursors. We would be hard-pressed to discover Sicilian or Provençal linguistic or ideological influences (except, of course, when used parodically) in such sonnets as "Messer Messerin" and "Aldobrandino," or Latinisms in "Messer Iacopo." Rustico's language is pure Tuscany; his "influences" are the streets of Florence. He is no innovator in form; his sonnets are surprisingly free of the metrical experimentation found in contemporaries such as Guittone d'Arezzo.^[10] Rustico is, however, a great innovator in the use of the still relatively new sonnet form to express a different spirit—one of critical jest.

Rustico's first follower of merit is the highly original poet Cecco Angiolieri, who appeared in Siena approximately five years later. He Would prove to be very important to the burlesque tradition in Italy. Although born around 1260 into a prominent family of the Sienese nobility, Cecco lived a somewhat disorderly life and died a poor man in 1313.^[11] In fact, he was so debt-ridden upon his death that his children renounced claim to their inheritance.

Romantic critics have wedded the scant biographical data available to Cecco's literary production and subsequently interpreted his sonnets as the moral confessions of a dissipated and tragic soul. This critical posture is worthy of consideration; it is the classic error of confusing literature with reality. Ugo Foscolo has said that in Cecco's sonnets, "un'allegria forzata mal nasconde il cruccio dell'animo che sente d'esser caduto in basso ma non ha la forza di rialzarsi [a forced gaiety poorly conceals the sorrow of a spirit that feels it has fallen but does not have the strength to raise itself back up]."^[12] No matter how poor a citizen and soldier our poet might have been, however, the Cecco of the sonnets should not be given biographical, factual credence. He is a literary persona, no more "real" and credible

than the Dante of the Vita Nuova . And this literary Cecco, along with his great love Becchina, his despised father and mother, and assorted others, are the hapless creatures that animate these lively and hyperbolic sonnets. Burlesque and satire are built upon deformed caricature and exaggeration; to assume that their images faithfully reflect true reality or authorial "sincerity" would be critically naive.^[13]

Cecco is the first true master of the burlesque sonnet. His canzoniere numbers some 150 sonnets ranging in tone from snappy caricatures of his acquaintances and sardonic parodies of the Stilnovist poets—his literary contemporaries—to shouts of rage as he rails dramatically against the injustices of a life spent in want. More often than not, Cecco is the subject of his own verse. The brilliant descriptions of his own miserable state as a lovelorn pauper make him the victim of his own burlas . Everything in Cecco is twisted, exaggerated, stretched to the limit. Presenting himself as the unrequited and suffering lover, he mocks the platitudes of Stilnovist and courtly love as he bewails its hardships. The object of his love, the foulmouthed and coarse Becchina, is the anti-Beatrice. She also is idealized, but in reverse. As Beatrice is elevated to a shining pedestal, so is Becchina lowered to her grimy one.^[14]

Sonnet XXII (Appendix 4) is a lively dialogue between Cecco and Becchina. Each verse contains a thrust and parry, a supplication from Cecco and Becchina's immediate rebuff. He is the plaintive and passionate lover; she, the haughty donna . But unlike the "belle dame sans merci," who according to the canons of courtly love is merely playing hard to get, Becchina could truly care less about her admirer's sufferings ("Non vi dò un fico") and repulses him crudely and brusquely. The poem is laced with the most plebeian language; through it Becchina is sketched as a rude and violent counterpoint to the refined courtesan.

True to his overriding sense of parodic exaggeration, Cecco's anti-Platonic love sonnets negate the noble sentiments and moral edification found in the Stilnovists. To their refined and aristocratic sensibility he opposes an overly mundane culture totally lacking in spiritual grace or ideals. His poetry exalts man's more elementary and worldly sentiments: sensual love,

the pursuit of physical satisfactions, indulgence in food and drink, and the longing for money.^[15]

It is sonnets such as "Tre cose solamente mi so 'n grado" (Appendix 5) where Cecco expounds his ideals for life, and his continual frustration in attaining them due to his penury, that led nineteenth-century critics to create a misleading biography of the poet.^[16] But Mario Marti has understood Cecco's purpose better, calling this poem "il manifesto della poetica angiolieresca, nella sua natura letteraria e nei suoi limiti culturali e spirituali [Cecco's poetic manifesto, in which he expresses the literary nature and cultural and spiritual limits of his poetry]."^[17] In it Cecco's debt to the goliardic tradition is obvious in his exaltation of "la donna, la taverna e 'l dado."

In accordance with the comedic low style determined by classical rhetorics and conserved in the burlesque tradition, the language Cecco employs is concrete and colorfully expressive. He often uses direct discourse to make his sonnets more immediate and dramatic, and to enliven short dialogues as in "—Becchina mia!" The extremely hyperbolic poems exaggerate sentiments, whether these be love, desire, hatred, anger, or intolerance, with comic passion. In several sonnets (as in "Tre cose mi so 'n grado") he inveighs against his parents, especially his father, who through his niggardliness, tyranny, and implacable longevity prevents Cecco from satisfying his earthly whims. Because of this, the poet often clamors for his father's death.^[18] Once again, these poems should not be taken as necessarily heartfelt; they are clearly within the tradition of the comic vituperium.

A good example of Cecco's hyperbolic and humorous ingiuria is sonnet LXXXVI (Appendix 6). Here he raises Rustico's abusive spirit to new heights in a seemingly spontaneous yet artfully crafted and outrageous vendetta. Practically each verse contains an explosive and perfectly measured threat; nothing and nobody is spared the poet's wrath. In the first three stanzas Cecco converts himself into the universal elements, into the most powerful men on earth, into God, and finally into life and death themselves to destroy the world and its inhabitants. The poem is perfectly constructed to enhance the violent nature of the emotions expressed. The division of the verses into hemistichs

with caesuras between each, along with the repeated conditional clauses, produce an extremely forceful rhythm. However, the sonnet ends in a different tone and on a different note, thus revealing its comicity and inherent burla —its true nature. After the wanton destruction depicted in the first three stanzas, this one could easily be recited with a wink, as Cecco threatens to grab the beauties for himself and leave the ugly women to others. By the unexpected change in rhythm and tone, the poet effectively deflates the vindictiveness and drama of the entire sonnet.

The carefully constructed hemistichs dividing each verse into conditional and result clauses, along with Cecco's skillful manipulation of tone, contradict any possible spontaneity in its creation. As Figurelli has pointed out, burlesque verse is a full-fledged literary genre with a specific form and content, governed by its own literary canon and norms. Rather than the spontaneous manifestation of the popular spirit, as interpreted by Romantic criticism, this poetry is an artistic construction governed by strict literary discipline.^[19]

Three of Cecco's extant sonnets are addressed to Dante, and evidence the fact that Cecco was acquainted with the younger poet and participated in at least one poetic interchange—a tenson—with him. The tenson, a song (or poem) of dispute or contention (from the Latin contentio ), originated and flourished as a well-defined poetic tradition with the Provençals. It could take any metrical form, and could be between two or more poets, or between two fictitious authors created by one single poet. Still another type of tenson was that which Martín de Riquer refers to as the tensó fingida : "una composición en la que el trovador simula debatir con alguien o algo que es inimaginable o imposible que le responda [a composition wherein the troubador pretends to debate with someone or something from which a response is unimaginable or impossible]."^[20]

The somewhat ambiguous definition offered in the Leys d'amours is that "the tenso is a combat and debate, in which each maintains and reasons some word or fact."^[21] Thus the tenson is a poetic debate originating from the challenge of one poet to another, or others, to defend one side of a specific question or topic. The respondent was obliged to answer using the same

rhyme scheme and meter employed by the challenger. The topics, generally taken from everyday life, varied greatly, but the favorite was love casuistry.

Nevertheless, the Provençal poets often strayed from discussing the refined etiquette of courtly love to compose jocular dialogues dealing with scatological or obscene themes. Martín de Riquer cites a hilarious tenson between Arnaut Catalán and Ramón Berenguer IV, Count of Provence, wherein they discuss the relative wisdom of propelling to shore a becalmed ship carrying "cent dompnas d'aut paratge" (highborn ladies) by the timely emission of anal gases.^[22] Riquer reports that the theme was also dear to Alfonso X of Castile. Personal grudges were another fecund source of tensons. Rather than coming to blows, poets would air their disagreements through grievous, often slanderous verse. However, the insults and rage vented were often feigned and simply responded to the exigencies of the genre.

The tenson tradition continued through the Middle Ages, where it adopted the new metrical scheme of the sonnet, very soon after this was born, in fact. The first tenson in sonnet form was already in use by three poets of the Frederician court: Giacomo da Lentino, Piero delle Vigne, and Jacopo Mostacci; its subject was love. Curiously enough, it was the gravest poet of the Middle Ages—Dante himself—who later engaged in the earliest extant sonnet tenson (dated between 1293 and 1296) dealing in personal invective. The six sonnets he exchanged with his one-time friend Forese Donati (each writing three) are quite intriguing as well as problematic for critics because the sincerity of the sentiments they express cannot be determined conclusively. The Florentine Donati was a distant relative by marriage of Dante; his only extant poetry are the three sonnets he sent to the former. These poems reveal a fairly competent sonneteer, at least in the burlesque genre.

In his sonnets—"Chi udisse tossir la malfatata," "Ben ti faranno il nodo Salamone," and "Bicci novel, figliuol di non so cui"—Dante mocks Donati's poverty and gluttony and hints that he neglects his duties as husband. He calls him a thief and illegitimate to boot. Donati, in turn, accuses Dante of poverty and of cowardice.^[23] The rancor revealed in the sonnets could be or

could not be sincere; there is really little way to know. Nevertheless, in the Purgatory we see a great change in attitude on Dante's part toward the man who had been his opponent in youth. Dante recalls their old friendship when he encounters Donati among the now emaciated gluttons in Cantos XXIII and XXIV. While the poet gazes upon the ravaged faces of the starving shades, he finally recognizes Donati and greets him with the dismay that befits finding an old friend in such a condition, saying to him: "La faccia tua, ch'io lagrimai già morta, / mi dà di pianger mo non miglior doglia [Thy face which once I wept for dead now gives me no less cause for tears]" (23.55–56).

Dante questions Donati's rapid progress into Purgatory. He had died a mere five years earlier and therefore had not spent the requisite time outside its gates—a period equal to that he had spent on earth. Donati explains that it has been through the intercedence of the prayers offered up on his behalf by his faithful and devout wife Nella—the same woman Dante had gibed in the sonnets. Dante later alludes to their old intimacy, saying: "Se tu riduci a mente / qual fosti meco, e qual io teco fui, / ancor fia grave il memorar presente [If thou bring back to mind what thou wast with me and I with thee, the present memory will be grievous still]" (23.115–117). His words seem to show a regret for former times misspent, perhaps in silly poetic jousts. Nevertheless, Dante seems to have participated in another tenson on at least one other occasion—this time with Cecco Angiolieri.

Three sonnets remain from Cecco to Dante. The first two, "Lassar vo' lo trovare di Becchina" and "Dante Alighier, Cecco, 'l tu' serv'e amico," (Vitale, C and CI) are cordial enough and seem to indicate that the two poets were friends. Sonnet CII (Appendix 7), however, is a sharp reply to and repudiation of a sonnet—now lost—from Dante to Cecco. Cecco responds in kind to what must have been accusations on Dante's part. In a kind of poetic one-upmanship, Cecco says that whatever he is, Dante is double. The final tercet is a warning to desist, to let the tenson rest. Dante cannot compete with Cecco on his poetical territory. If he insists, he will never rid himself of Cecco's goading, satirical barb.

More important than the anecdotal value of a tenson between

the leaders of two contemporary and opposing poetical schools, the sublime Stilnovists and the low burlesque, is the fact that such a relationship—conflicting or not—did actually exist. Perhaps Dante had chided Cecco for his sharp tongue and vulgar Becchina. Nevertheless, at the time he was not totally adverse to indulging in the very type of poetry he was supposedly reproving. This is evidenced by his tensons with Forese Donati. The burlesque was not totally neglected by the sublime poets. Many great fifteenth-, sixteenth-, and seventeenth-century Italian and Spanish "serious" poets indulged in poetic burlas (these often also erotic) from time to time. Others excelled in both types. This would seem to indicate that serious and burlesque-satirical verse spring from the same poetic source. They are simply streams that ran different courses, but one was no more spontaneous or realistic than the other. They are determined literary styles which the poet has deliberately chosen to suit his inspiration.

As the fourteenth century unfolds, several more Tuscan poets carried the burlesque standard. Among them were Folgore (Giacomo) da San Gemignano of Siena and Cenne da la Chitarra of Arezzo. These two contemporaries were closely linked through their poetry. A soldier and courtier, Folgore died before 1332.^[24] His better-known sonnets are arranged into two series, one a fourteen-sonnet corona on the months of the year, and another on the days of the week. The society depicted in his "Sonetti dei mesi" is remarkably different from the plebeian and embittered one of his countryman Cecco. In Folgore a courtly and idyllic Siena appears full of silk sheets, bountiful food, fair ladies, and chivalrous pastimes and manners. The corona is addressed to a "brigata nobile e cortese" (noble and gracious company) captained by a certain Niccolò di Nisi. Its poems enumerate the pleasures to be found in each month of the year, echoing the tradition of the Provençal plazer, which lists things that please. This light and festive poetry, full of picturesque images, presents a delightfully idealized portrait of Sienese life. The language is fresh and colloquial, popular in tone, and free of abrasive or coarse words.

Although Folgore's poems are included in anthologies of Italian burlesque-comic-realistic sonnets of the midthirteenth to

midfourteenth century, they cannot be described as burlesque as defined here. They reflect the courtly life and customs of the time in a lighthearted and fanciful way. This different spirit distances them from the sublime poets of the time, and also from the true burlesque poets. While the latter can at times adopt a similar light and festive tone of alegría, their purpose is different. Burlesque poetry prefers to point out and make fun of men's foibles and follies. It is interested in our shortcomings, not in the pleasantries of a somewhat idealized daily life.

Although Folgore cannot be classified as a true burlesque poet, he is included here because his work is inextricably linked to that of his contemporary Cenne (or Bencivenne) da la Chitarra of Arezzo. By profession a minstrel, Cenne's one claim to fame is the corona he wrote, and undoubtedly sung in the local square, parodying Folgore's "Sonetti dei mesi." Through it we catch a glimpse of the literary mockery to which many such courtly poets must have been subjected in Tuscan town squares. Following Folgore's meter and rhyme scheme exactly, he creates a gross travesty of his rival's courtly vision, providing a coarse counterpart to every element.^[25] What the Provençal plazer is to Folgore's corona, the eneug is to Cenne's: the former is an enumeration of pleasing things; the latter one, of vexatious things. In the first verse of the dedication, the "brigata nobile e cortese" is transformed into "la brigata avara senza arnesi" (miserly good-for-nothings). The poem includes the stock material of early burlesque poetry: hardships, primitive lodgings, adverse elements, unpalatable food and drink, and the ubiquitous crone. These, of course, contrast sharply and satirically with the luxurious creature comforts enjoyed by the Tuscan aristocracy depicted in Folgore's sonnet. In the subsequent sonnets, noble courtiers living a cultured and sumptuous existence continue to be steadily debased and degraded into ugly and vulgar creatures wallowing in smelly hovels.

Cenne's sonnets have little to recommend them as such; their value is purely parodic. Nevertheless they do reveal, once again, that the burlesque is a poetical attitude, or stance. It is a tendency toward the comic and away from the serious, but not necessarily toward sincerity or reality. As Previtera points out, here we have a poetic rivalry between two rimatori : one a man

of the court, the other a cantore di piazza . The former is serious (if not sincere) in attitude; the latter mocks that poetic posture.^[26] The corona should be judged for what it is—a parody. And as a parody it is successful. It goes hand-in-hand with its predecessor, matching it image for image and rhyme for rhyme. It is quick, incisive, and ends up making us laugh—not at it but with it. We are left with an invisible barrier between us and the original. This comic barrier prevents us from ever seeing Folgore's sonnets in the same respectful light again.

The remaining burlesque sonneteers of the late thirteenth century and first half of the fourteenth century are very minor figures with only a few extant poems each. While a few such as Pietro dei Faitinelli (Lucca) and Pieraccio Tedaldi (Florence) show a certain amount of poetic vigor; they are for the most part mediocre rhymesters whose work is conventional and lacks depth of spirit. Most are merely inferior continuers of Cecco Angiolieri, the only truly important burlesque poet of the period. In fact, not until the Italian Renaissance is well under way will burlesque poets of originality be found once again.

Bourgeois Poets of the Second Half of the Fourteenth Century

In the second half of the fourteenth century the so-called realistic poetry of Cecco and his generation flows into a type of verse generally referred to as "poesia borghese." The name is quite appropriate, as the aim of these poets is to depict daily life, generally seen from a comic angle. They profess no great depth of thought nor subtlety of language and style. They wrote for their fellows and were eagerly read by Florence's middle classes. While heirs of their predecessors, they also diverge from them in a fairly marked way. These contemporaries of Petrarch and Boccaccio inherit the colorful, unrefined language, popular style, and critical spirit often found in thirteenth-century poetry. But they differ much in tone and attitude. Gone is Cecco's bitterness and avowed dissoluteness. It is replaced by more tranquil, good-humored, and humorous pictures of popular life. A spirit of understanding and affection for the everyday existence and pastimes of the populace often underlies the gentle mocking we more often find in the second half

of the fourteenth century. At times a tendency toward moralizing becomes apparent and the tavern, women, and dice are replaced by the rewards of family life.

In no other is this more obvious than in Antonio Pucci (c. 1310–1388). Pucci served the Florentine commune as bell-ringer and town-crier. As the person responsible for broadcasting official proclamations in the streets, he had ample opportunity to mingle with the citizenry and ascertain public opinion on daily news. This he would later comment upon in his poems, many of which were, in fact, composed to be recited in public and fulfilled the function of today's newspaper editorials.

Pucci was a perspicacious, well-informed man with finely honed powers of observation. He made good use of them by chronicling Florentine daily life for his contemporaries and for modern readers. Through his verses we learn of the customs, attitudes, preoccupations, and sense of humor of the fourteenth-century man and woman of the street in Florence.

Pucci's extensive poetic corpus includes over one hundred sonnets on all themes, from love to politics. Of these, approximately thirty are burlesque.^[27] They deal mainly with humorous anecdotes from daily life. "Deh, fammi una canzon, fammi un sonetto" (Appendix 10), is a description of friends who pester him with requests for poems—which he spends sleepless nights composing at his own expense—and who then feel that the offer of a drink should be adequate payment. The nature and tone of this poem is representative of Pucci's burlesque work. Rather than harshly critical of surrounding reality, the narrator most often becomes the good-natured victim of lighthearted joking.

This is seen in another sonnet which is a typical "gato por liebre" tale of a swindling poulterer who sold the poet:

                        per pollastra
Sabato sera una vecchia gallina,
Ch'era degli anni più d'una trentina
Stata dell'altre guidatrice e mastra.^[28]

                        [for a pullet
Saturday evening an old hen,
in age about thirty years,
leader and mistress of the others.]

And in "Amico mio barbier, quando tu meni," Pucci gently ribs a barber whose way with the razor transforms his shop into a torture chamber.^[29]

Pucci's burlesque sonnets are written in a familiar tone and in a flowing, seemingly spontaneous or improvisational style. His rich poetic vein yields lively images which rarely indulge in the obscenity or crude language found among burlesque poets of the previous century. His poetry appears truly "realistic" in the sense that it reflects real life—neither idealizing nor brutalizing it. Pucci prefers to point out life's incongruencies with an indulgent smile. He is fond of giving advice for good living, and in his Noie complains about rude people who misbehave in church and commit other infractions of the rules of etiquette. He is also one of the few poets to respond to the commonplace misogynous literature of the time by coming to the defense of women and married life in several sonnets, one of which begins:

La femmina fa l'uom viver contento:
gli uomini senza lor niente fanno.
Trista la casa dove non ne stanno,
però che senza lor vi si fa stento.^[30]

[Woman makes man live happily:
Without them men do nothing.
Sad is the house where there are none,
Since without them it's hard to get by.]

The great majority of Pucci's sonnets were caudati or tailed (in Spanish estrambotados or con estrambote ). It seems that this addition to the sonnet appeared spontaneously in the late thirteenth century among Florentine and Pisan poets. There is only one conserved by Guittone, one each by Dante and Petrarch, and seven by Boccaccio. In the late fourteenth century its use became more pervasive, above all in the more familiar types of sonnet.

This one, two, or more verse addition to the sonnet was originally called the "ritornello." As thus it is registered by Antonio da Tempo in his 1332 Latin treatise on vernacular poetry and metrics, Delle Rime volgari .^[31] However, da Tempo seems to refer to each additional verse, but not the whole tail, as a ritornello. The term ritornello was soon abandoned and replaced by "coda," the term still used today.

The structure of the tailed sonnet is studied in detail by Leandro Biadene in his Morfologia del sonetto nei secoli XIII–XIV .^[32] Briefly summarized, Biadene mentions five types of coda having, respectively, one to five verses. Type three, by far the most common, has two main forms. These are either three hendecasyllabic verses or, more often, one heptasyllabic followed by two hendecasyllabic verses. The rhyme structure of the coda can vary, but its first verse normally rhymes with the last verse of the sonnet, while the last two verses of the coda form a rhyming couplet. This form was certainly the most successful and after the fourteenth century became for all intents and purposes the model for the sonetto caudato in Italy and, later, in Spain.

Biadene feels that the coda is not an integral part of the composition, and is simply the sonnet's "commiato" or envoi . It soon became a formal characteristic of the burlesque sonnet, especially in poets to be discussed shortly such as Burchiello, Pistoia, Francesco Berni, and, of course, Cervantes. Berni was the true champion of the Italian tailed sonnet, writing some with up to thirty codas or sixty additional verses. A coda four times longer than the sonnet to which it is attached surely disproves Biadene's contention that the coda is a mere leave-taking.

Another important figure among late-fourteenth-century bourgeois poets is the Florentine Franco Sacchetti (c. 1332–1400), best known for his Trecentonovelle —novellas similar to those of Boccaccio but supposedly based upon real events in Florentine life.^[33] Also a poet, his extensive canzoniere is entitled Il libro delle Rime .^[34] Perhaps his most accomplished verse are the light lyrics—ballads, madrigals, and canzonette—written for music. Nevertheless, he did write many types of poetry on as many topics: historical, satirical, moral, political, love, and burlesque.

Sacchetti's burlesque sonnets often hark back to Cecco Angiolieri when they denounce old women (also a favorite theme among his ballads) or show couples bantering as in the dialogue "Deh, Donna, udite. . . . Or di', col malanno."^[35] But more important here are those poems in which Sacchetti anticipates a manner of burlesque sonnet to be developed and perfected in the fifteenth century by Burchiello. This new type of poetry approaches nonsense rhyme. It is full of whimsical neologisms, puns, equivocal expressions, rhetorical games, and conceits.

Sacchetti's best-known sonnet in this vein is "Nasi cornuti e visi digrignati" (Appendix 11).

The purpose of the sonnet—and of this type of poetry—is simply to create a series of grotesque and disjointed images that appear to make sense, but do not. They seem to lead somewhere, but they lead nowhere. The poem is merely a linguistic and poetic joke. The unpleasant horned noses and dried-up vines, the lunatics and the gay cavaliers, the owls and the chestnuts, are merely items on a strange and senseless list. The enigmatic literary allusions, like those to Boccaccio's Truffia and Buffia (imaginary lands invented by Friar Cipolla in Day 6, Book 10 of the Decameron ), to Minos (both the devilish judge in Canto V of the Inferno who decides punishment with his tail and the judge of the dead in classical mythology), to Hercules and to Bacchus, lend shades of meaning to the poem. But there is no allegory; there is no "meaning" beyond the surface. The words may make sense, but that is where sense ends. This literary game will develop considerably in the Quattrocento.

Il Burchiello and Burchiellesque Verse in the Fifteenth Century

In the first half of the fifteenth century the attention of Italian intellectuals turned to humanistic pursuits. While the indefatigable Poggio Bracciolini busied himself in searching out classical manuscripts, the study of antiquity gave a renewed, classical impulse to learning and literature. Petrarchism was in full swing among the hoards of for the most part mediocre and conventional versifiers who were currently making a business of poetry. Concomitant with this stagnation in "serious" verse, however, was a significant development in the popular and semipopular poetry (càntari, serventesi, frottole, strambotti, etc.) that rang out throughout Tuscan streets in the late Trecento. Sapegno has described this movement as a gradual merging with learned literature, to which the popular vein contributes ideas, images, and linguistic coloring and rhythms. As popular poetry was integrated into the written medium, it lost its original directness and emotional clarity to become a delightful and conscious game.^[36]

The first attempts at this integration and subsequent "literaturization" of popular verse are appreciated in the poems of Franco Sacchetti. The true leader of this movement, however, was Domenico di Giovanni (1404–1448), known as "il Burchiello" (little bark). Burchiello was a Florentine barber whose shop on the Via Calimala became a meeting place for the city's wits and literati during the 1420s and 1430s. This barber poet was esteemed by other poets and patrons alike, so much so that he spawned a group of young followers known as "burchielleschi." Bernardo Bellincioni, Matteo Franco, and Antonio Alamanni are among the better known. These poets took up his themes and style shortly after Burchiello's death.^[37] Proof of his popularity among more exalted circles was the fact that the great Maecenas Lorenzo de' Medici kept a book of Burchiello's verse in his bedroom.^[38]

Burchiello wrote many different types of poetry: serventesi, a kind of parody of lofty narrative poems built around fanciful situations; typically burlesque misogynous and socially critical poems; bitter personal invective as in his tensons with Roselli; autobiographical sonnets lamenting the inequities and hardships of his life; and a group of prison poems wherein a tone of rising above the elements underlies his protestations against slow starvation in a lice-ridden cell. The majority of his poems are tailed sonnets.

"Cimici, e pulci, con molti pidocchi" (Appendix 12) is representative of his "autobiographical" poems, and brings to mind Cecco Angiolieri's bitter sonnets in the same vein. This poem shares a similar tone of self-mockery and comic exaggeration. It finds the author in an impossibly wretched inn, enumerating the miseries of a night spent among insects, mice, a snoring sheep, and two other unfortunate souls. Burchiello seems to mock himself for somehow allowing himself to get into such a situation. He does not vent his anger by decrying external causes (as Cecco would), but instead, apparently resigned to his fate, he tries simply to get on with life. He even attempts to maintain a modicum of dignity by protesting to the innkeeper. But the futility of the gesture only makes us laugh at his ill-timed and ill-placed indignation.

In a thematically similar sonnet, "Se nel passato in agio sono stato," the poet laments:

     Io sono in un palazzo sgangherato,
Ond'entra il freddo da tutte le bande;
E s'io fo foco, il fumo me ne mande,
Così me ne vo a letto mal cenato:
     E così lagrimando fo Sonetti,
Perchè dormir non posso per li Sorchi,
Che fanno maggior gridi, che 'Porchetti:^[39]

     [I am in a ramshackle palace,
Where the cold comes in from all sides;
And if I make a fire, the smoke drives me away,
So I go to bed poorly supped.
     And, tearfully, I write sonnets,
Since I cannot sleep for the mice,
Who squeal louder than piglets.]

Once again, hunger, cold, and problems with rodents scurrying noisily about are the poet's lot. The interesting part is that Burchiello wants us to believe that his only consolation in such an unfortunate existence is his art as he tearfully scribbles sonnets. In the prison poems he also begs for pen and ink in order to while away his time composing verse.

But Burchiello's best known sonnets are those which became his legacy to the so-called poesia burchiellesca. As foreshadowed by Sacchetti, these poems "alla burchia" (at random) are a type of nonsense rhyme. The poet creates enigmatic jigsaw puzzles out of disconnected words and phrases written largely in fifteenth-century Florentine slang. They are a jumble of incoherent sounds and crazy images, and burlesque allusions.

"Andando a uccellare una stagione" (Appendix 13) is typical of this type of sonnet. It appears as a series of grotesque and ultimately meaningless images. The complete lack of correspondence between the bizarre scenes creates an atmosphere of total incoherence. What could be stranger than skinning a snail and feeding it to a lion? Except, of course, raising a pavilion out of the skin. We never know what the poet is "talking about" because, naturally, he is not talking about anything. To search

for meaning in this type of verse is, as in the sonnet, to go bird-hunting at night—most likely we will return empty-handed.

In spite of this basic characteristic of unintelligibility, breaks occasionally do occur in the confusion to allow images infused with significance to shine through. One of the best examples of these sudden and inspired bits of eloquence occurs in the sonnet "O Nasi saturnin da scioglier balle," whose second tercet reads: "Ma che rigoglio è quel d'una guastada, / Ch'avendo pieno il corpo d'acqua fresca, / Vuole una sopravesta di rugiada [But what pride is that of a pitcher, which having its body full of cool water wants an overcoat of dew]."^[40] The almost epigrammatic concept applied to such a mundane object as a pitcher of water brings to mind the whimsy of the greguería . Through artistic creativity, Burchiello is making poetry out of any object, no matter how trivial. And perhaps this is precisely the ultimate "meaning" of this nonsense rhyme—that given wit, anything can be made poetic.

One final poem which must be mentioned is "La Poesia combatte col Rasojo" (Appendix 14), probably Burchiello's best-known sonnet. In it "Poetry" and the "Razor" do battle over the barber poet's devotions. The former haughtily draws attention to the nobility of literary pursuits while disdaining the vile accoutrements and manual activities of the barber's trade. The latter politely and pragmatically points to the fact that, without him, the poet would simply be flat broke. The sonnet treats a dilemma perhaps shared by other bourgeois poets of the time: how to reconcile one's need to make a living with one's more genteel poetic aspirations.

In the slightly ambiguous coda, Burchiello seems to take a conciliatory yet highly practical stance—let whoever loves him more buy his wine. He does not want to choose between his vocation and his avocation, but will remain true to whomever provides for him. Because, as Watkins says, "Poetry means poverty," our barber poet is reluctant to embrace her alone.^[41] Better to make one's way as one can rather than embody the commonplace of the noble but starving poet.

Numerous were the poeti burchielleschi who continued the poetic game popularized by Burchiello, both during his lifetime

and after his death. For the most part, however, they are imitative sonneteers who follow the conventions established by the burlesque tradition's more original poets. In fact, only one, extremely fecund, poet stands out among the so-called burchielleschi : Antonio Cammelli (1436–1502), known as "il Pistoia" after his birthplace. Pistoia's 553 burlesque sonnets, almost all tailed, constitute the largest burlesque canzoniere in Italian literature.

Pistoia was a member of a generation of court poets who lived and wrote under the patronage of the great Italian lords in the late fifteenth century. These poets provided entertainment for courtiers and their rulers. Therefore, versifying became a professional activity designed to amuse an audience rather than to express the poet's sincere sentiments. Because of their precarious situation and dependence upon the benevolence of the court, the status of these poets could at times deteriorate almost to that of the court fools. However, they did not enjoy the freedom of expression typically granted the buffoons.

The burlesque genre flourished in particular at the court of Lorenzo de' Medici with Luigi Pulci, Matteo Franco, Bernardo Bellincioni, and with Lorenzo himself. This greatest of Italian cultural patrons was quite proficient in the burlesque. Proof of this are his Beoni and Canti carnascialeschi —the songs he wrote to accompany the Carnival festivities he sponsored in Florence. He even tried his hand at the burlesque sonnet.^[42]

Although traditionally considered among the Burchiellesque poets, Pistoia's sonnets "alla burchia" are relatively few. The majority are clear, straightforward compositions on traditional burlesque themes: his miserable life at court; his ruinous house; lack of adequate food, clothing, and money; caricatures of people from all walks of life and professions and of all shapes and sizes; characterizations of the citizens of the various citystates; invectives against his literary contemporaries, and so forth. His canzoniere is a vast canvas depicting private, public, and political life in the late fifteenth century.

His own unrewarding situation at court was one of Pistoia's favorite subjects. He complains about not having enough money even to get a shave. He is reduced to eating horrible meals with the court buffoons and other servants in their dark, dank tinelli . A good example of these sonnets is XXVIII, "Cenando, Fidel

mio, hersira in corte," which describes such a dinner at the Mantuan court among the buffoons Fidel, Seraphino, and Galasso.^[43]

At times Pistoia turns his irreverent pen away from the courtiers, jesters, poets, clerics, doctors, judges, soldiers, and women he loved to caricature, and turns it upon himself as in sonnet XL, "Piì di cent'anni imaginò Natura" (Appendix 15). The description of his dubious physical delights is typically hyperbolic, and yet does not so degrade the man as to turn him into a bestial monstrosity as Rustico had done so long ago in his "Messer Messerin." The tone is closer to one of comic exaggeration of the ugly features he most probably did not have. In a few brush strokes his inspiration and facile wit create a swarthy, top-heavy Punch who from the waist down measures no more than dos dedos (two fingers). Although the sum of the parts is certainly grotesque, the sonnet breathes good humor rather than disgust.

Perhaps one of Pistoia's better-known sonnets is "Figliuola, non andar senza belletto" (Appendix 16). Here we have the poet at what he does best—presenting a very human snippet of life: the mother of an unattractive young girl prepares her for an evening wedding party. The mother comes across as a proto-Celestina as she instructs her daughter to apply rouge to her unfashionably dark skin and to push up her breasts. After dressing and adorning the girl, she proudly announces her triumph: "Tu pari una regina!" She then goes on to craftily tell the daughter to flirt with whomever she pleases, but without being dishonest! The comicality of the mother's paradoxical advice to behave honestly after the litany of instructions on how to cover her imperfections could not be more patent. Her parting words then lead into the rather nasty moral of the remaining tercets. But because this final condemnation is so bitterly dissonant, it rings false. Thus the "moral" of the poem is negated and the behavior reflected in the previous stanzas is regarded more sympathetically. The overall tone of the poem is one of indulgence toward human frailty.

The theme of women's artful use of makeup and their guile in the procurement of a husband is, of course, a staple of burlesque literature. Nevertheless, Pistoia's sonnet is a little gem within the tradition. In so few lines he manages to depict the desperate dilemma of a mother with an unattractive and still

unwed daughter on her hands. She resorts to the only means available to her to resolve the predicament—to do the best with what she has. Rather than approving the harsh castigation of the final tercets, Pistoia would probably stand back with a little nod of the head and a wink before this small vicissitude of life.

Another commonplace in burlesque literature is the description of ancient, rickety, and lame horses. Pistoia holds his own here also. One palfrey is so skinny and scabrous "che ricamato / avea il mantel di gemme sopra gli ossi [that he had a cloak embroidered in gems over his bones]" (sonnet CCLXXV). In sonnet CCLXXXVLL, another whose master is starving him to death calls for a priest and a notary "ch'io mi confessi e faci testamento [to hear my confession and prepare my will]." Vittorio Rossi has linked Pistoia and his admirer, the great burlesque poet Francesco Berni, through the second tercet of Pistoia's sonnet LXXXII, about a mule, which reads: "Mal volentier si leva ove el si pone; / sia pur un sasso quanto vuol sotter[r]a, / se gli dà drento, il cava del sabbione [She's unwilling to get up from where she sat down, / and no matter how deep down a stone is / she'll find one to stumble against even in the sand]." Rossi points out that Berni will take up this same image as an artistic motif in his sonnet "Dal più profondo e tenebroso centro," and identifies Pistoia as the later poet's most important precursor.^[44]

Pistoia can, in this sense, be called a poet of transition between the Burchiellesque sonnet and the new type of burlesque sonnet to be written by Berni. He moves away from nonsensical verse to take up again the traditional motifs which have woven through the burlesque tapestry since its beginnings. Unfortunately, because Pistoia was so fecund and produced so many sonnets in a relatively short period of time (most were written between 1478 and 1502; many were circumstantial besides and done upon demand), they often give the impression of being rushed and too improvisational. As Pèrcopo says: "scrive troppo, lima poco, ed usa una lingua ibrida, tosco-emiliana [He writes too much, polishes little, and uses a hybrid Tuscan-Emilian tongue]."^[45]

These defects notwithstanding, Pistoia was certainly more than a mere precursor of Berni. He was the most accomplished burlesque poet of his period, and was recognized as such and

copied by many. Berni so admired the older poet's sonnets that when he found out that Isabella Gonzaga, Pistoia's patroness, had the codex of his "Libro," he wrote a letter to her through his friend Francesco della Torre asking to see it.^[46] The Marchésa immediately granted their request, with the condition that they provide their estimation of Pistoia's work upon returning it. The poets complied, with the following critique:

il libro è bello secondo quei tempi, nei quali questa nostra lingua non era condotta così al sommo come ora, e se l'autore mostra non esser troppo ricco di guidizio, mostra certo non esser privo di spirito e di invenzione. Secondo questi tempi più floridi, mi pare, per dire il vero, un poco spinoso, ma non si però che, tra li spini, non si possano cogliere di molte rose. Vostra Eccellenza se lo tenga caro, perchè cuando per altro non meritasse esser prezzato, assai meriterebbe per essere dedicato a Lei.^[47]

[it is a fine book for those times when our language had not reached today's heights. If the author seems not too rich in judgment, he does not lack spirit and invention. In these more flourishing times, it seems to me, in truth, a little thorny, however, one can gather many roses behind the thorns. Your Excellency should hold it dear, for even if it merits esteem for no other reason, it does so for being dedicated to you.]

As Pèrcopo observes, few poets who are precursors have been judged favorably by the subsequent masters of a particular genre. Berni will also invoke Pistoia's spirit when he sits down to write a burlesque sonnet on the quack "Maestro Guazzalletto medico":

O spirito bizzarro del Pistoia,
Dove sei tu? Chè ti perdi un soggetto,
Un'opra da compor, non che un sonetto,
Più bella del Danese e dell'Ancroia.^[48]

[Oh, singular spirit of Pistoia,
Where are you? You are missing a great subject,
A work to fashion, perhaps even a sonnet,
More beautiful than those of the Dane and of Ancroia.]

Pistoia also wrote satirical and political poems, but few, if any, poets have dedicated themselves so totally to the burlesque son-

net. That he wanted to produce a body of work sufficiently vast to cover all the elements that made up his surroundings is evidenced by his canzoniere . His "Libro dei sonetti faceti" was the first conscious attempt to produce a book composed solely of burlesque sonnets.

Francesco Berni and the Burlesque Sonnet in the Sixteenth Century

Sixteenth-century Italy saw a continued growth in the more learned poetic forms such as sonnets, canzoni, and capitoli . The number of poets proliferated, overflowing the courts and academies alongside artists and buffoons. They often held ecclesiastical positions such as secretaries to powerful men of the Church. Just such a person was Francesco Berni—the culminating figure of the burlesque sonnet tradition in Italy.

Born in Lamporecchio in Bibbiena in 1496 or 1497, Berni studied in Florence until the age of nineteen. That city still breathed the atmosphere charged with art and flourishing literature, a large part of which was popular and burlesque, that had been established by Lorenzo the Magnificent. There Berni would spend his formative years reading not only Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio but also the burlesque greats Pistoia, Burchiello, and Pulci.

In 1515, Berni left Florence for Rome, where he made his living as secretary to various men of the cloth. Rome was much suited to his gay, humorous character, and he became the darling of literati and artists at the papal court. During this period Berni became a member of the Roman Accademia dei Vignaiuoli. This institution was typical of the festive social and literary organizations that flourished in Italy in the sixteenth century. Its members included famous contemporary burlesque poets such as Mauro, della Casa, Firenzuola, Bini, and Molza. Together they established a convivial and facetious atmosphere, reciting their outrageous verses for the pleasure of priests and literati alike. The Vignaiuoli adopted the names of plants and herbs in keeping with the name of their academy, as was the custom. Thus they were il Mosto, l'Agresto, il Fico, il Cardo, il Radicchio, and similar. The Vignaiuoli would meet almost

daily, honing their poetic skills by improvising verse on imposed topics. This verse would then be sung, filling the hearts of the listeners "non di minor piacere che di stupore [with no less delight than amazement]" and be judged by two "severi Censori" (strict censors).^[49] A representative selection of these poems is included in the three-volume edition entitled Opere burlesche del Berni, del Casa, del Varchi, etc. (Rome, 1760). The group would also organize poetic banquets whose festivities seemed to revolve around the tasting of worthy wines and engaging in general high spirits.

Known as the "Prince of Burlesque Poets," Berni bequeathed the name "Bernesque" to his particular type of jocose verse. With typical facetiousness and exaggeration, through his poetry he comically flaunts the vices of an age—the accepted vanity, indolence, and, most especially, the decadence that flourished at the papal court.

Berni's verse and letters reveal a festive, humorous man with an innate love of fun. Yet he was also quick to anger and capable of seething hatred, as evidenced by a bitter feud with Pietro Aretino (himself known as the "Scourge of Princes" owing to his sharp tongue). The mortal hatred between the two poets and political rivals is immortalized in sonnets of the most bitter personal invective. Similar to this personal invective, although less coarse, are Berni's burlesque-satirical sonnets on the papacy of Clement VII. In them he makes poetry out of the highly popular Roman pasquinade.

The history of the pasquinade is quite interesting. "Pasquino" was a damaged ancient bust unearthed in Rome in 1501. There are several anecdotal explanations for his nickname. One account is that a tailor named Pasquino lived where the statue was originally located. His shop was reportedly a notorious gathering place for Rome's wits. There they would discuss local events and compose impromptu epigrams and poems on them. After Pasquino's death the statue had to be removed while the streets were being repaired. It was placed next to the old shop and from then on adopted the tailor's name. Henceforth Pasquino, who can still be seen today in Rome's Piazza di Pasquino, became the "author" of the anonymous satirical epigrams and verses, written either in Latin or in the vernacular, customarily

placed on or around the statue. These "Pasquinate" were witty and extremely mordant (often libelous), especially those reproving the vices of Cinquecento popes and their retinues.^[50]

The sixteenth-century pasquinade is related to the burlesque sonnet in both content and form. The favorite meter for the pasquinade was the tailed sonnet; many were also dialogued. The close relationship between the pasquinade and Berni's sonnets is obvious in those he wrote on Clement VII's inept papacy and illness. In "Il papa non fa altro che mangiare," he criticizes the pope's bumbling doctors who will not rest until they have killed their patient.^[51] In "Fate a modo de un vostro servidore," he advises the ailing pope just to get it over with, saying: "Pigliate un orinale, / E date lor con esso nel mostaccio: / Levate noi di noia, e voi d'impaccio [Grab a chamber-pot and hit them with it across the moustache: you will rid us of our boredom and yourself of embarrassment]."^[52] "Un papato composto di rispetti" is a similar pasquinadelike sonnet on Clement's inadequacies.^[53] What differentiates these sonnets from the average pasquinade, however, is their artfulness. Many of the pasquinades, while ingenious, were simply anonymous slander—a more developed version of today's graffiti. Berni was an accomplished poet, and as such was able to elevate the material of the pasquinade to the level of literature.

In 1526 Berni wrote his prose Dialogo contra i poeti, a document that can be considered a burlesque ars poetica . It illuminates the poet's polemical literary stance, one that most probably was shared by other burlesque poets of the period. What emerges from the dialogue is a general attack on the humanistic concept of poetry and a distancing from the main poetical current of the day—Petrarchism. The two speakers are Berni and his friend Giambattista Sanga. They begin by denouncing the presumption of the armies of poetasters who importune their friends at all hours, forcing them to read the sheaves of verse they inevitably carry under their arms. The utmost conceit of these would-be poets is their lust for immortality, as evidenced by their desire to publish as soon as they are able to gather together "cinquanta sillabe"—something Berni himself was always reluctant to do. He even goes so far as to suggest an inquisition to seek out and punish these pedants. He accuses them—tongue

in cheek—of heresy, for while calling themselves Christians they nevertheless worship pagan gods in their poetry. Jove replaces Christ, Juno Our Lady, and Mercury, Mars, and Bacchus the saints. They ignore the teachings of the Church, considering them unworthy of their genius, and instead embrace nature.

Berni also mocks poets who presume to Horatian divine furor:

Se non ch'io li scuso per pazzi, perché essi medesimi si battezano cosí, ed hanno piacer di esser chiamati pazzi, dicendo che son furiosi e che hanno il furor divino e volano sopra le stelle, e cotali altre sciocchezze; io ti giuro a Dio ch'i' credo che li scannarei.^[54]

[If I did not pardon them as madmen—for they call themselves and like to be called madmen, saying that they are furious, that they are possessed by divine furor, and fly above the stars, and other such foolishness—I swear to you in God's name that I believe I would slit their throats.]

Here Berni appears to echo Erasmus's Folly when she comments about poets: "'Self-love and Flattery' are their special friends, and no other race of men worships me with such wholehearted devotion."^[55]

Farther on Berni totally rejects the Aristotelian principle of imitatio, declaring all poets, starting with Virgil, to be a bunch of thieves too lazy to invent for themselves. He concludes that thievery is, in fact, the poet's business and that the person who does not rob verses cannot be a good poet.^[56]

Berni also despised the hoards of mediocre and imitative Petrarchan poets whose exaggerated refinements and blind servitude to an inflated poetic ideal he did not share. He mocked these "professional," thus hypocritical, poets and proffered in their place a conception of poetry as recreation and entertainment. Berni's rhymesters:

non fanno professione di poeti; e se pur han fatto qualche cosa a' suoi dí, è stato per mostrare al mondo che, oltre alle opere virtuose che appartiene a far ad uomo, non è impertinente con qualche cosa che abbi men del grave ricrearsi un poco, e che sanno anche far delle bagattelle per passar tempo. Anzi dirò che quelli pochi versi che han fatto, han fatto per mostrare a questi animali che e' sono

asini et ignoranti, e che, quando vogliono, sanno far meglio con li piedi quello che essi stentono e sudono e si mordono le mani facendo.^[57]

[are not professional poets; and if they did something in their day, it was to show the world that a little recreation with trifles is not incompatible with the virtuous deeds that it is man's lot to perform. In fact, I would say that they wrote their few verses to show those other animals that they are ignorant asses and that, when they want, these people can produce better poetry with their feet than others do with great difficulty, much sweat, and knuckle-biting.]

If we can believe him, Berni's comments are extremely important for an understanding of what exactly the burlesque meant to him. His inspiration and conception of poetry emerge from the atmosphere of the academy—the type of literary academy (precisely like that of the Vignaiuoli) that flourished in the late quattrocento and early cinquecento. These were no longer assemblies of serious humanists grouped together to ponder classical texts. Those early Renaissance associations had been replaced by frivolous gatherings of literati and the nobility, banded together for mutual amusement and pleasure. The purpose of their poetry was to entertain, to provide fun and opportunities for jest and laughter. Berni blossomed in such an atmosphere; to try to maintain a serious attitude toward poetry, especially his own, would have betrayed his character and reputation. Indeed, he is reluctant to refer to his own poetry as such, saying about his youthful capitoli : "E se quelle baie che tu di' . . . se debbono chiamare poesia, da ora io le renunzio [And if those jests that you say . . . should be called poetry, from this moment I renounce them]."^[58] These capitoli, written in terza rima, consisted of mock encomiums of ridiculous, insignificant things such as fish, eels, chamber-pots, gelatine, and thistles. They would often contain obscene double entendres.^[59]

When we speak of Berni's anti-Petrarchism, it must be understood that he respected and admired the work of the master. What he resented was the bloated and pretentious verse of his imitators. In this, of course, he was not alone; the anti-Petrarchan current flowed deeply in his day. What Berni of-

fered as an antidote to the copious tears and stereotypical commonplaces of these professional versemongers was the burlesque: a poetry built on invention, jest, and, to an extent, on reality. A poetry to amuse and entertain, often, of course, at the expense of others.

The best expression of this anti-Petrarchan tendency is his "Sonetto alla sua donna" (Appendix 17), an extremely successful parody of Bembo's sonnet on the beauties of his lady.^[60] Because in the standard love lyric youth reigns supreme, burlesque poetry portrays old age in the meanest of terms. Therefore, in this poem Berni creates a wonderful mismatch between noun and epithet to destroy the trite components of traditional Petrarchan youthful beauty. Waving golden locks become a few stiff, graying, and entangled strands surrounding a furrowed brow. What remain are lashes of snow, teeth of ebony, milky lips, and stubby fingers. He closes the sonnet with a sneering crack at the "divine Slaves of Love"—the poets whom Aretino also mocked as the "sempre assassinati d'amore." These, concludes Berni smartly, are the beauties of his lady.

Berni was also very fond of teasing his contemporaries with his joking sonnets. Through them he would comment ironically on the anecdotes of court life. In his "Sonetto di Ser Cecco" (Appendix 18) he ridicules Francesco Benci di Assisi, a secretary to the papal court. What is most interesting in this sonnet is the ingenious way in which Berni has constructed it to express in its very form the inseparability of Ser Cecco and the court. Each element in the poem reveals this duality. Except for the final coda there are only two rhymes—Cecco and corte. The quatrains are divided into four sets of two verses each, and each two-verse set explains the mutual sides of one statement. The construction of the first three tercets also matches; the final verses of each are almost equal. In the final coda we learn that the duality will continue on. Through Trifone (Benci), Francesco's nephew, there will always be a Ser Cecco in the court.

The poem demonstrates Berni's deft command of the sonnet form. Gone is the improvisational air and often somewhat careless construction of his predecessors. Berni rarely makes a mistake in rhyme, even in the very long tailed sonnets. We get the

feeling of control and selectivity. The poet molds the traditional motives of burlesque verse to his own requirements so as to reveal his sharp wit to maximum advantage.

The "Sonetto sopra la barba di Domenico d'Ancona" (Appendix 19) is similar in its teasing tone. Here, however, the sonnet is a magnificent mock planctus, replete with references to the inevitable ravages of time and death. Apparently d'Ancona was very proud of his beard, but was forced to shave it by order of his bishop under pain of losing benefices. Off went the beard and up sprang Berni's sonnet. The poem is epic drama. It is not difficult to imagine Berni standing surrounded by his companion Vignaiuoli, eyes Heavenward, somberly entoning the silly-sounding rhymes in -uti . The final perversely ridiculous epitaph must have brought the house down.

This poem is a perfect example of what new developments Berni brings to the genre. As burlesque sonneteer he was inevitably indebted to those who had preceded him. He even openly acknowledged this debt on more than one occasion. Berni invoked Pistoia's spirit when writing his "sonetto caudatissimo," as Mario Marti calls it, on Maestro Guazzalletto. In another sonnet, written to Ippolito de' Medici, "Sul tristo impantanamento a Malalbergo," he wishes he had Burchiello's wit:

S'i' avessi l'ingegno del Burchiello,
Io vi farei volentieri un sonetto;
Ché non ebbi già mai tèma e subietto
Piú dolce, piú piacevol né piú bello.^[61]

[If I had Burchiello's wit,
I would willingly write you a sonnet;
For never did I have a theme and subject
More sweet, more pleasant, more beautiful.]

Berni indeed embraced the traditional burlesque repertoire: caricature of common human defects and types (including his relatives and ancient housekeeper Ancroia), antifeminine and antiecclesiastical diatribes, comic descriptions of ruinous houses and decrepit nags, blistering invectives against political and personal enemies. Nevertheless, he improved a great deal upon his models. Through his wit and novel images he surpassed con-

ventional treatment of the old themes. In this sonnet on D'Ancona's beard he approaches the subject of criticism of man's foolish pride from a different tack. Along with d'Ancona's beard goes the source of his pride and probably the external symbol of his virility. Better to have lost his head, which could have been embalmed and exhibited, beard intact, above a door for all to behold. In this way the beard could have taken on the properties of a saintly relic instead of meeting its doom on the barbershop floor.

The same type of new imagery can be found in his "Sonetto contra la moglie" (Appendix 20). In it Berni takes up the traditional misogynous commonplace of the woes of married life. His litany of noie, however, is a series of witty comparisons and paradoxes: to be tired and have no place to sit, to lend money but be in debt, to have one leg clothed and the other bare. But the worst of all these frustrations is, of course, to have a wife. Obviously the sincerity of his feelings are of no concern. What is important is how he manipulates this stock topic.

Berni often uses a system of enumeration of elements that build to what Mario Marti has called a hyperbolic crescendo. In this sonnet against wives each verse is a self-contained unit expressing a different noia . The verses build upon each other, leading up to the crowning element—the worst annoyance of all. This is stated in the final verse, which sums up all the previous ones and sends the poem on its way. Once again, it is this very careful and controlled construction, plus the fresh and highly descriptive images, that distinguish Berni from previous burlesque sonneteers. The same type of conceptistic imagery can be seen in his "Sonetto sopra la mula dell' Alcionio," who has "un par di natiche sí strette / E sí ben spianate che la pare / Stata nel torchio come le berrette [a pair of buttocks so narrow / and so flat that they look as though / they had been run through a hat-press]."^[62] The examples are as limitless as the sonnets he wrote.

Berni's images are incisive, compact, and full of ingenuity. With them the burlesque sonnet finds new vigor and the three-centuries-old tradition is rejuvenated and given renewed impetus for the future. His influence will be felt among not only his contemporaries but also the Spanish poets who will take up

the tradition not long after Boscán imports the sonnet into their country. In fact, if we listen to Berni's concepts carefully, we can almost hear a Quevedo en ciernes .

Berni was a witty, facetious entertainer. He had no lofty poetic pretensions, but did an admirable job of decanting his whimsical spirit into funny, well-constructed sonnets. His choice of comic—rather than serious—verse was, of course, intentional. If he did try his hand at serious verse, he found it was not really him. As he said in his "Capitolo al Cardinale Ippolito de' Medici":

Provai un tratto a scrivere elegante,
In prosa e in versi, e fecine parecchi,
Et ebbi voglia anch'io d'esser gigante;
Ma messer Cinzio mi tirò gli orecchi,
E disse: —Bernia, fa pur dell'Anguille,
Ché questo è  il proprio umor dove tu pecchi:
Arte non è da te cantar d' Achille;^[63]

[Once I tried to write an elegant passage,
And did several in prose and in verse,
And I even longed to be a giant.
But Mister Cinzio gave my ears a tug,
And said: Berni, stick to the eels,
That is the humor where you sin;
It is not your art to sing of Achilles;]

This good-natured way of expressing where his talents lie reveals true literary self-knowledge.

Berni enjoyed enormous success throughout the sixteenth century. His contemporaries lived for his celebrated tailed sonnets, capitoli, and epistles. He was imitated by many, even influencing the work of his good friend Michelangelo, little known as a festive poet. The great artist read and enjoyed Berni; the best proof of this is the Bernesque verse he wrote. His scatological capitolo "I'sto rinchiuso come la midolla" is not unlike Berni's "Capitolo dell'Orinale." He also wrote a tailed sonnet comically depicting the physical discomforts involved in painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel entitled "I'o gia facto un gozo in questo stento."

Bernesque verse became a fashion so tremendously in vogue

that any aspiring burlesque poet had to prove himself in it. Many generations would produce sonnets and capitoli following the Bernesque model. This resulted in the publication of many editions of Berni's and their poems. Berni's immediate successor and greatest admirer was Anton Francesco Grazzini ("il Lasca"). Besides being an accomplished and fecund burlesque poet in his own right, Lasca also published the earliest editions of Berni and other Bernesque poets: the now extremely rare 1548 Giunti edition entitled Opere burlesche del Berni, del Casa, del Varchi, del Mauro, di messer Bino, del Molza, del Dolce e del Firenzuola, and in 1555 the second book of the same Opere burlesche including poems by Martelli, Francesi, Aretino, and others.^[64] The titles of these editions provide a representative list of the best known among the great number of sixteenth-century burlesque sonneteers. Although very well known in their day, the majority of these poets are quite forgotten today.

Although Lasca was doubtless the best of these poets, writing approximately 200 sonnets as well as canzoni and capitoli, Berni was the only true master. None of his successors add anything totally new to the tradition. For many, if not most of these poets, burlesque verse was a fashionable but marginal activity, carried out during their hours of leisure or within the confines of the academy. They were humanists, prelates, secretaries to cardinals, "serious" poets, or even artists such as Michelangelo. For the most part they follow Berni's inspiration and take up the mock encomium capitolo and sonnet, creating poems in praise of the kiss (della Casa); of the bed, of beans, and of Priapus (Mauro); on the quartan fever (Aretino); on the "mal franzese" (Bini); on salad and the fig (Molza); on the paintbrush (Firenzuola); on ricotta cheese and fennel (Varchi). As is obvious from these few titles, a strong salacious vein runs through such verse. This provides a wealth of new obscene euphemisms to the literary lexicon.

The preceeding overview has illustrated the development of the burlesque sonnet from its origins up to the point at which it is adopted in other European countries. Of necessity, many little-studied poets who merit further attention have been neglected. Nevertheless, a more in-depth examination of the leaders of the genre is more fruitful than an excessively lengthy and

superficial listing of sonneteers, many of whom would have been unknown outside Italy even during their own time. This brief study of the "major" figures within this "minor" tradition reveals what, besides Petrarchism, Boscán brought to Spain with the sonnet in the sixteenth century. The sonnet was not simply the poem appropriate for love or the expression of intimate feelings. Since the form stabilized in the thirteenth century it has also been the bearer of comic verse—from political satire to personal invective, from nonsense rhyme to parody of serious poetic movements. In the midsixteenth century, the burlesque sonnet traveled to Spain, where it soon adapted to its new environment and language.