Poetry

Ariosto’s poetry has a prestigious theoretical formulation in what, at the end of Astolfo’s journey to the moon, Ariosto has Saint John the Baptist pronounce in canto XXXV. Before taking his leave of the visiting knight, Saint John, ‘lo scrittor de l’oscura Apocalisse’ (the author of the fearsome Apocalypse), pronounces a paradoxical oration in defence of poetry. Poetry is presented as falsehood that neither imitates nor represents reality. It is based on an inevitable manipulation of reality. And so Augustus, who had done many a bad thing, thanks to his friendship with poets, was able to get a better image of himself than what in actual reality was the case: ‘Non fu sì santo né benigno Augusto / come la tuba di Virgilio suona’ (Furioso, XXXV, 26, 1-2). At the same time Nero, who did not succeed in having good relations with writers, paid for it with a very negative write-up of his doings (‘Nessun sapria se Neron fosse ingiusto / […] se gli scrittor sapea tenersi amici’, Furioso, XXXV, 26, 5-8). Poetic representation is deformed and does not stick with reality, it is in effect an arbitrary act based on pretence. Poetry is neither consolation nor evasion, it is not contemplation, but just a play on appearances that exists as a function of who it is destined to. Astolfo, whom Saint John addresses in his oration, represents literature as manipulation more than any other character. Poetry is not based on truth and indeed draws nourishment from the structural ambiguity of its message. And so the function of the encomium of the book appears under a far more ambiguous and contradictory light, since in what he says Saint John/Ludovico expresses very severe judgements on the practice of adulation indulged in by court poets and the ‘role play’  there is between lords and the representation of power. Ariosto’s concept of poetry is thus based on paradox and contradiction: on the one hand the poet suggests and writes courtly poetry and on the other he declares his refusal of the existence of courtly writing.