Final Report Summary - CHIVALRICFICTIONS (Chivalric Literature in European Renaissance: Political Fictions. Land, enemies, alliances, authority, identity)
Project results and outcomes
The research project focused on chivalric tradition, as it developed in Italy in the 16th century - in particular in France concerning the tradition of narratives about Charlemagne, Roland and the knights of France. The issue in France is both the codified result of a long tradition and the most popular cycle between the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th century. The main results achieved are positioned at two different, but related levels:
- level 1: ideation of a theoretical framework through which to consider the chivalric tradition after the publication of Boiardos 'Inamoramento de Orlando', in order to provide a description of the relationship - and tensions - between conservative attitudes and innovation in the chivalric literary tradition during the first 20 years of the 16th century. Two different attitudes of writers dealing with the previous tradition: 'resilience' and 'malleability' have been identified. The word resilience is employed to describe, analyse and interpret the way in which these authors reacted to the novelties of a new work, whose appearance subverted some essential features of the tradition, thereby changing deeply the meaning and purposes the genre had displayed. A resilient work is a literary text which, even if it embodies a number of innovations, does not allow such novelties to threaten the permanence of what the author considers to be the essential features in the previous tradition. On the other hand, a work is malleable when it incorporates the modifications.
- level 2: a careful reading of the works in order to describe, in the development of the genre, the persistence, modification or cancellation of the narrative topoi which are specific to this kind of literature.
A new analysis of' Inamoramento de Orlando' by Boiardo was the starting point of the research, followed by the reading of:
a. Works continuing the 'Inamoramento de Orlando', by Niccolò degli Agostini, Raffaele Valcieco; Pier Francesco de Conti di Camerino;
b.Piero Durante da Gualdo Tadino, 'Leandra' (1508);
c. Francesco Cieco,' Mambriano' (1509);
d. the poems containing the story of Milone and Berta. The main narrative topoi analysed in the above-mentioned works are:
a. topoi dealing with war, enemies, and the construction of the image of the heroes, with a particular focus on the empowerment and authorisation linked to the father-son relationship, and on the representation of the identity of the hero within the enemies territories. Three different typologies of topoi are listed: 'topos of hidden identity for defence', 'topos of hidden identity for privilege' and 'topos of antonomasia';
b. topoi dealing with love and the representation of women and the relationship between women and men;
c. topoi dealing with the representation of power, its definition, and distribution;
d. topos of the chivalric narrative as a historical account.
The results of the research have been disseminated at conferences, seminars and in articles, and in a book proposal submitted, and accepted, subject to satisfactory reports by the peer-review readers of the completed manuscript, by the publisher Legenda.
Project c onclusions
1. A unitary picture of the development of this genre between 15th and 16th centuries was a major outcome of this research. 2. The project showed that minor poems should be regarded as autonomous works, and not as mere sources or as a touchstone to emphasise the artistic level reached in the major works. 3. The research provided a new theoretical frame for assessing the tradition of chivalric literature. The resilience-malleability frame can helpfully be used to deal with the traditions of other literary genres. 4. A new formal taxonomy of the types and different employments of various topoi was worked out, that serves to indicate and to assess developments, changes and recurrences of any given topos in different works. 5. Contrary to the standard view, pre-Boiardo poems have been shown as elements of a strong and meaningful tradition, which persisted even after Boiardo's contribution to the genre, and were resistant to many of Boiardo's novelties. 6. A non-aesthetic approach was employed to show that when a post-Boiardo work rejects Boiardian solutions, this is not necessarily due to the lack of artistic competencies. Rather, it could have been an explicit choice, aimed at exploiting the repertoire of political and ideological motifs and topoi coming from the pre-Boiardo tradition, which were somewhat weakened in Boiardo's treatment. Despite their apparent lack of artistic competencies, the authors of many post-Boiardo chivalric poems always displayed a perfect control of their tools.
Socio-economic impacts
The main sociological impact of the project comes from the analysis of the topoi and concerns the various conceptualisations of the 'Other' in the contemporary globalising and multicultural world. The research effectively displayed a sample of how certain narrative topoi encapsulate shared and influential, but often unconscious, representations of psychological anxieties and ideological assumptions concerning the conflict between different civilisations. In the case of the conflict between Christianity and Islam during the 16th century, certain topoi put in place devices of disguise and reversal that were signs of a deep anxiety on behalf of Christian intellectuals facing the threat of the Other coming from the East. Similar mechanisms may possibly be at work nowadays, in different context but with similar effects. The analytical work made, in particular in the first period, could be a starting point for a sociological analysis of the contemporary narratives of the conflicts of civilisation, aimed at overthrowing and debunking the 'clash of civilisations' ideology, in view of a more nuanced and harmonious view of the relationship between Western and Eastern values. In particular, the analysis of works such as Francesco Cieco's 'Mambriano' could be extended beyond the field of chivalric literature scholarship and be employed as a pattern of analysis of much contemporary discourse concerning multiculturalism, integration and assimilation, and conflict of civilisations.
The research project focused on chivalric tradition, as it developed in Italy in the 16th century - in particular in France concerning the tradition of narratives about Charlemagne, Roland and the knights of France. The issue in France is both the codified result of a long tradition and the most popular cycle between the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th century. The main results achieved are positioned at two different, but related levels:
- level 1: ideation of a theoretical framework through which to consider the chivalric tradition after the publication of Boiardos 'Inamoramento de Orlando', in order to provide a description of the relationship - and tensions - between conservative attitudes and innovation in the chivalric literary tradition during the first 20 years of the 16th century. Two different attitudes of writers dealing with the previous tradition: 'resilience' and 'malleability' have been identified. The word resilience is employed to describe, analyse and interpret the way in which these authors reacted to the novelties of a new work, whose appearance subverted some essential features of the tradition, thereby changing deeply the meaning and purposes the genre had displayed. A resilient work is a literary text which, even if it embodies a number of innovations, does not allow such novelties to threaten the permanence of what the author considers to be the essential features in the previous tradition. On the other hand, a work is malleable when it incorporates the modifications.
- level 2: a careful reading of the works in order to describe, in the development of the genre, the persistence, modification or cancellation of the narrative topoi which are specific to this kind of literature.
A new analysis of' Inamoramento de Orlando' by Boiardo was the starting point of the research, followed by the reading of:
a. Works continuing the 'Inamoramento de Orlando', by Niccolò degli Agostini, Raffaele Valcieco; Pier Francesco de Conti di Camerino;
b.Piero Durante da Gualdo Tadino, 'Leandra' (1508);
c. Francesco Cieco,' Mambriano' (1509);
d. the poems containing the story of Milone and Berta. The main narrative topoi analysed in the above-mentioned works are:
a. topoi dealing with war, enemies, and the construction of the image of the heroes, with a particular focus on the empowerment and authorisation linked to the father-son relationship, and on the representation of the identity of the hero within the enemies territories. Three different typologies of topoi are listed: 'topos of hidden identity for defence', 'topos of hidden identity for privilege' and 'topos of antonomasia';
b. topoi dealing with love and the representation of women and the relationship between women and men;
c. topoi dealing with the representation of power, its definition, and distribution;
d. topos of the chivalric narrative as a historical account.
The results of the research have been disseminated at conferences, seminars and in articles, and in a book proposal submitted, and accepted, subject to satisfactory reports by the peer-review readers of the completed manuscript, by the publisher Legenda.
Project c onclusions
1. A unitary picture of the development of this genre between 15th and 16th centuries was a major outcome of this research. 2. The project showed that minor poems should be regarded as autonomous works, and not as mere sources or as a touchstone to emphasise the artistic level reached in the major works. 3. The research provided a new theoretical frame for assessing the tradition of chivalric literature. The resilience-malleability frame can helpfully be used to deal with the traditions of other literary genres. 4. A new formal taxonomy of the types and different employments of various topoi was worked out, that serves to indicate and to assess developments, changes and recurrences of any given topos in different works. 5. Contrary to the standard view, pre-Boiardo poems have been shown as elements of a strong and meaningful tradition, which persisted even after Boiardo's contribution to the genre, and were resistant to many of Boiardo's novelties. 6. A non-aesthetic approach was employed to show that when a post-Boiardo work rejects Boiardian solutions, this is not necessarily due to the lack of artistic competencies. Rather, it could have been an explicit choice, aimed at exploiting the repertoire of political and ideological motifs and topoi coming from the pre-Boiardo tradition, which were somewhat weakened in Boiardo's treatment. Despite their apparent lack of artistic competencies, the authors of many post-Boiardo chivalric poems always displayed a perfect control of their tools.
Socio-economic impacts
The main sociological impact of the project comes from the analysis of the topoi and concerns the various conceptualisations of the 'Other' in the contemporary globalising and multicultural world. The research effectively displayed a sample of how certain narrative topoi encapsulate shared and influential, but often unconscious, representations of psychological anxieties and ideological assumptions concerning the conflict between different civilisations. In the case of the conflict between Christianity and Islam during the 16th century, certain topoi put in place devices of disguise and reversal that were signs of a deep anxiety on behalf of Christian intellectuals facing the threat of the Other coming from the East. Similar mechanisms may possibly be at work nowadays, in different context but with similar effects. The analytical work made, in particular in the first period, could be a starting point for a sociological analysis of the contemporary narratives of the conflicts of civilisation, aimed at overthrowing and debunking the 'clash of civilisations' ideology, in view of a more nuanced and harmonious view of the relationship between Western and Eastern values. In particular, the analysis of works such as Francesco Cieco's 'Mambriano' could be extended beyond the field of chivalric literature scholarship and be employed as a pattern of analysis of much contemporary discourse concerning multiculturalism, integration and assimilation, and conflict of civilisations.