ORPHANS OF PETRARCH: THEORY OF LYRIC POETRY IN THE FRENCH AND SPANISH RENAISSANCE (BELATEDNESS, HERRERA, IMITATION, HUMANISM, DUBELLAY)

The introduction of the sonnet occasioned in France and Spain a debate which needs to be examined comparatively. It resulted in an exacerbation of the belatedness already felt by humanists with regards to Italy, but it also served as a spur to creativity. Thus the debate is examined with emphasis on statements of belatedness, and on theories of imitation and translation. Also emphasized are the shift from aurally-oriented, medieval poetry to a new, more imagistic aesthetic, and the special role of the macrotext, or organized collection.;In conclusion, the French debate was narrowly focused in time and concerned mostly with issues of literary stature: the state of the vernacular, the adoption of foreign genres over national ones, imitation, and translation. The Spanish debate was spread out over ninety years, and while also concerned with these issues, emphasized the aesthetic dimensions of the new poetry. As a result of the French concern with methods of imitation, the macrotext flourished and the old poetry died out. In Spain, the reverse happened: after a Petrarchist vogue the old forms were revived, and the macrotext remained the exception.;Du Bellay's Deffence et Illustration launched the debate in France; it is closely examined and placed in three contexts: the movement to improve the quality of French translations; Sebillet's Platonic Art Poetique, which asserted a parity between French genres and classical genres, and to which the Deffence was a response; and Speroni's Dialogo delle lingue, from which Du Bellay took two key concepts: the need for the imitation of great models, especially Petrarch, and the potential greatness of the modern vernacular. We then examine the defenders of traditional French poetry as well as the rebuttals by Du Bellay and his friends. In Spain we start with comments about the inferiority of Spanish to Italian, and then closely examine Boscan's "A la Duqesa de Soma," a major statement of the new aesthetic, particularly influential for being published with the works of Garcilaso, the premier Spanish poet and a confirmed Petarchist. The debate concludes with the Anotaciones of Herrera, and his concern with the overwhelming presence of Garcilaso, still dominating the state of poetry 45 years after his death.