Mirtilla, A Pastoral: A Bilingual Edition (Volume 62) (The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series) [1 ed.] 0866985883, 9780866985888

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Isabella Andreini

Mirtilla, A Pastoral a b ili ngu al ed it ion E d i te d by

Valeria Finucci

tr a n s l ate d by

Julia Kisacky

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series, 62

MIRTILLA, A PASTORAL

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series, 62

MEDIEVAL AND RENAISSANCE TEXTS AND STUDIES VOLUME 531

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Madre María Rosa Journey of Five Capuchin Nuns Edited and translated by Sarah E. Owens Volume 1, 2009. Giovan Battista Andreini Love in the Mirror: A Bilingual Edition Edited and translated by Jon R. Snyder Volume 2, 2009 Raymond de Sabanac and Simone Zanacchi Two Women of the Great Schism: The Revelations of Constance de Rabastens by Raymond de Sabanac and Life of the Blessed Ursulina of Parma by Simone Zanacchi Edited and translated by Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski and Bruce L. Venarde Volume 3, 2010 Oliva Sabuco de Nantes Barrera The True Medicine Edited and translated by Gianna Pomata Volume 4, 2010 Louise-Geneviève Gillot de Sainctonge Dramatizing Dido, Circe, and Griselda Edited and translated by Janet Levarie Smarr Volume 5, 2010

Pernette du Guillet Complete Poems: A Bilingual Edition Edited by Karen Simroth James Translated by Marta Rijn Finch Volume 6, 2010 Antonia Pulci Saints’ Lives and Bible Stories for the Stage: A Bilingual Edition Edited by Elissa B. Weaver Translated by James Wyatt Cook Volume 7, 2010 Valeria Miani Celinda, A Tragedy: A Bilingual Edition Edited by Valeria Finucci Translated by Julia Kisacky Annotated by Valeria Finucci and Julia Kisacky Volume 8, 2010 Enchanted Eloquence: Fairy Tales by Seventeenth-Century French Women Writers Edited and translated by Lewis C. Seifert and Domna C. Stanton Volume 9, 2010

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Sophie, Electress of Hanover and Queen Sophie Charlotte of Prussia Leibniz and the Two Sophies: The Philosophical Correspondence Edited and translated by Lloyd Strickland Volume 10, 2011 In Dialogue with the Other Voice in Sixteenth-Century Italy: Literary and Social Contexts for Women’s Writing Edited by Julie D. Campbell and Maria Galli Stampino Volume 11, 2011 Sister Giustina Niccolini The Chronicle of Le Murate Edited and translated by Saundra Weddle Volume 12, 2011 Liubov Krichevskaya No Good without Reward: Selected Writings: A Bilingual Edition Edited and translated by Brian James Baer Volume 13, 2011 Elizabeth Cooke Hoby Russell The Writings of an English Sappho Edited by Patricia Phillippy With translations by Jaime Goodrich Volume 14, 2011

Lucrezia Marinella Exhortations to Women and to Others If They Please Edited and translated by Laura Benedetti Volume 15, 2012 Margherita Datini Letters to Francesco Datini Translated by Carolyn James and Antonio Pagliaro Volume 16, 2012 Delarivier Manley and Mary Pix English Women Staging Islam, 1696–1707 Edited and introduced by Bernadette Andrea Volume 17, 2012 Cecilia del Nacimiento Journeys of a Mystic Soul in Poetry and Prose Introduction and prose translations by Kevin Donnelly Poetry translations by Sandra Sider Volume 18, 2012 Lady Margaret Douglas and Others The Devonshire Manuscript: A Women’s Book of Courtly Poetry Edited and introduced by Elizabeth Heale Volume 19, 2012

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Arcangela Tarabotti Letters Familiar and Formal Edited and translated by Meredith K. Ray and Lynn Lara Westwater Volume 20, 2012 Pere Torrellas and Juan de Flores Three Spanish Querelle Texts: Grisel and Mirabella, The Slander against Women, and The Defense of Ladies against Slanderers: A Bilingual Edition and Study Edited and translated by Emily C. Francomano Volume 21, 2013 Barbara Torelli Benedetti Partenia, a Pastoral Play: A Bilingual Edition Edited and translated by Lisa Sampson and Barbara Burgess-Van Aken Volume 22, 2013 François Rousset, Jean Liebault, Jacques Guillemeau, Jacques Duval and Louis de Serres Pregnancy and Birth in Early Modern France: Treatises by Caring Physicians and Surgeons (1581–1625) Edited and translated by Valerie WorthStylianou Volume 23, 2013 Mary Astell The Christian Religion, as Professed by a Daughter of the Church of England Edited by Jacqueline Broad Volume 24, 2013

Sophia of Hanover Memoirs (1630–1680) Edited and translated by Sean Ward Volume 25, 2013 Katherine Austen Book M: A London Widow’s Life Writings Edited by Pamela S. Hammons Volume 26, 2013 Anne Killigrew “My Rare Wit Killing Sin”: Poems of a Restoration Courtier Edited by Margaret J. M. Ezell Volume 27, 2013 Tullia d’Aragona and Others The Poems and Letters of Tullia d’Aragona and Others: A Bilingual Edition Edited and translated by Julia L. Hairston Volume 28, 2014 Luisa de Carvajal y Mendoza The Life and Writings of Luisa de Carvajal y Mendoza Edited and translated by Anne J. Cruz Volume 29, 2014 Russian Women Poets of the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries: A Bilingual Edition Edited and translated by Amanda Ewington Volume 30, 2014

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Jacques Du Bosc L’Honnête Femme: The Respectable Woman in Society and the New Collection of Letters and Responses by Contemporary Women Edited and translated by Sharon Diane Nell and Aurora Wolfgang Volume 31, 2014 Lady Hester Pulter Poems, Emblems, and The Unfortunate Florinda Edited by Alice Eardley Volume 32, 2014 Jeanne Flore Tales and Trials of Love, Concerning Venus’s Punishment of Those Who Scorn True Love and Denounce Cupid’s Sovereignity: A Bilingual Edition and Study Edited and translated by Kelly Digby Peebles Poems translated by Marta Rijn Finch Volume 33, 2014 Veronica Gambara Complete Poems: A Bilingual Edition Critical introduction by Molly M. Martin Edited and translated by Molly M. Martin and Paola Ugolini Volume 34, 2014

Catherine de Médicis and Others Portraits of the Queen Mother: Polemics, Panegyrics, Letters Translation and study by Leah L. Chang and Katherine Kong Volume 35, 2014 Françoise Pascal, Marie-Catherine Desjardins, Antoinette Deshoulières, and Catherine Durand Challenges to Traditional Authority: Plays by French Women Authors, 1650–1700 Edited and translated by Perry Gethner Volume 36, 2015 Franciszka Urszula Radziwiłłowa Selected Drama and Verse Edited by Patrick John Corness and Barbara Judkowiak Translated by Patrick John Corness Translation Editor Aldona Zwierzyńska-Coldicott Introduction by Barbara Judkowiak Volume 37, 2015 Diodata Malvasia Writings on the Sisters of San Luca and Their Miraculous Madonna Edited and translated by Danielle Callegari and Shannon McHugh Volume 38, 2015

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Margaret Van Noort Spiritual Writings of Sister Margaret of the Mother of God (1635–1643) Edited by Cordula van Wyhe Translated by Susan M. Smith Volume 39, 2015 Giovan Francesco Straparola The Pleasant Nights Edited and translated by Suzanne Magnanini Volume 40, 2015 Angélique de Saint-Jean Arnauld d’Andilly Writings of Resistance Edited and translated by John J. Conley, S.J. Volume 41, 2015 Francesco Barbaro The Wealth of Wives: A Fifteenth-Century Marriage Manual Edited and translated by Margaret L. King Volume 42, 2015 Jeanne d’Albret Letters from the Queen of Navarre with an Ample Declaration Edited and translated by Kathleen M. Llewellyn, Emily E. Thompson, and Colette H. Winn Volume 43, 2016

Bathsua Makin and Mary More with a reply to More by Robert Whitehall Educating English Daughters: Late Seventeenth-Century Debates Edited by Frances Teague and Margaret J. M. Ezell Associate Editor Jessica Walker Volume 44, 2016 Anna StanisŁawska Orphan Girl: A Transaction, or an Account of the Entire Life of an Orphan Girl by way of Plaintful Threnodies in the Year 1685: The Aesop Episode Verse translation, introduction, and commentary by Barry Keane Volume 45, 2016 Alessandra Macinghi Strozzi Letters to Her Sons, 1447–1470 Edited and translated by Judith Bryce Volume 46, 2016 Mother Juana de la Cruz Mother Juana de la Cruz, 1481–1534: Visionary Sermons Edited by Jessica A. Boon and Ronald E. Surtz. Introductory material and notes by Jessica A. Boon. Translated by Ronald E. Surtz and Nora Weinerth Volume 47, 2016

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Claudine-Alexandrine Guérin de Tencin Memoirs of the Count of Comminge and The Misfortunes of Love Edited and translated by Jonathan Walsh Volume 48, 2016 Feliciana Enríquez de Guzmán, Ana Caro Mallén, and Sor Marcela de San Félix Women Playwrights of Early Modern Spain Edited by Nieves Romero-Díaz and Lisa Vollendorf Translated and annotated by Harley Erdman Volume 49, 2016 Anna Trapnel Anna Trapnel’s Report and Plea; or, A Narrative of Her Journey from London into Cornwall Edited by Hilary Hinds Volume 50, 2016 María Vela y Cueto Autobiography and Letters of a Spanish Nun Edited by Susan Laningham Translated by Jane Tar Volume 51, 2016 Christine de Pizan The Book of the Mutability of Fortune Edited and translated by Geri L. Smith Volume 52, 2017

Marguerite d’Auge, Renée Burlamacchi, and Jeanne du Laurens Sin and Salvation in Early Modern France: Three Women’s Stories Edited, and with an introduction by Colette H. Winn. Translated by Nicholas Van Handel and Colette H. Winn Volume 53, 2017 Isabella d’Este Selected Letters Edited and translated by Deanna Shemek Volume 54, 2017 Ippolita Maria Sforza Duchess and Hostage in Renaissance Naples: Letters and Orations Edited and translated by Diana Robin and Lynn Lara Westwater Volume 55, 2017 Louise Bourgeois Midwife to the Queen of France: Diverse Observations Translated by Stephanie O’Hara Edited by Alison Klairmont Lingo Volume 56, 2017

The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe: The Toronto Series

Se rie S ed i to r S Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr. Se rie S ed i to r , e ng l i Sh te x tS Elizabeth H. Hageman

Previous Publications in the Series Christine de Pizan Othea’s Letter to Hector Edited and translated by Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski and Earl Jeffrey Richards Volume 57, 2017 Marie-Geneviève-Charlotte Thiroux d’Arconville Selected Philosophical, Scientific, and Autobiographical Writings Edited and translated by Julie Candler Hayes Volume 58, 2018 Lady Mary Wroth Pamphilia to Amphilanthus in Manuscript and Print Edited by Ilona Bell Texts by Steven W. May and Ilona Bell Volume 59, 2017

Witness, Warning, and Prophecy: Quaker Women’s Writing, 1655–1700 Edited by Teresa Feroli and Margaret Olofson Thickstun Volume 60, 2018 Symphorien Champier The Ship of Virtuous Ladies Edited by Todd W. Reeser Volume 61, 2018

ISABELLA ANDREINI

Mirtilla, A Pastoral A BILINGUAL EDITION •

Edited by VALERIA FINUCCI Translated by JULIA KISACKY

Iter Press Toronto, Ontario Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies Tempe, Arizona 2018

Iter Press Tel: 416/978–7074

Email: [email protected]

Fax: 416/978–1668

Web: www.itergateway.org

Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies Tel: 480/965–5900 Email: [email protected] Fax: 480/965–1681

Web: acmrs.org

© 2018 Iter, Inc. and the Arizona Board of Regents for Arizona State University. All rights reserved. Printed in Canada. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Andreini, Isabella, 1562-1604 author. | Finucci, Valeria editor. |Kisacky, Julia, 1965– translator. | Andreini, Isabella, 1562-1604. Mirtilla. English. Title: Mirtilla : a pastoral / Isabella Andreini ; edited by Valeria Finucci ; translated by Julia Kisacky. Description: Bilingual edition. | Tempe, Arizona : Iter Press, Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2017047403 (print) | LCCN 2017054026 (ebook) | ISBN 9780866987455 (ebook) | ISBN 9780866985888 (pbk. : alk. paper) Classification: LCC PQ4562.A72 (ebook) | LCC PQ4562.A72 M5713 2018 (print) | DDC 852/.5--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017047403 Cover illustration: Paolo Veronese, Portrait of a Woman with a Dog, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid. Cover design: Maureen Morin, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries. Typesetting and production: Iter Press.

Contents Acknowledgments List of Illustrations Introduction: Pastoral Drama and Women’s Authorial Voice The Other Voice Biography Works Andreini, the Actress The Female Stage The Pastoral Play Mirtilla: Structure and Themes Note on the Italian Text Note on the Transcription Note on the Translation

xiii xv 1 1 2 9 13 18 29 32 42 45 46

Mirtilla: Italian Text

48

Prologo Atto Primo Atto Secondo Atto Terzo Atto Quarto Atto Quinto

52 64 98 126 170 214

Mirtilla: English Translation with Endnotes

49

Prologue 53 Act One 65 Act Two 99 Act Three 127 Act Four 171 Act Five 215 Notes 256 Bibliography

271

Index

287

Acknowledgments This book is Part IV of what through the years has become a tetralogy of sorts and a scholarly obsession: the recovery of the first work of Italian Renaissance women writers in different literary genres. The first three have all been published in The Other Voice series and this one is meant to conclude, perhaps only provisionally, a relentless fascination for the writing of early modern women. The initial work involved the discovery and publication of the first female-authored novel, Giulia Bigolina’s Urania, a Romance (ca. 1552-55; 2005); the second involved the recovery of the first chivalric romance, Moderata Fonte’s Floridoro, a Chivalric Romance (1583; 2006); the third involved the retrieval of the first tragedy, Valeria Miani’s Celinda, a Tragedy (1611; 2010); and the fourth proposes now the first pastoral, Isabella Andreini’s Mirtilla, a Pastoral (1586). What these four women share, beside their literary significance, is a city of birth (for three of them): Padua, and with it, by metonymy, the city under which Padua functioned politically, economically and intellectually: Venice (Fonte’s birthplace). That Padua, more a town than a city in the early modern period, could offer such a spread of literary activities and an environment conducive to academic initiatives can be attributed almost single-handedly to the presence of the university (Studio) that the Signoria in Venice had created and painstakingly maintained there through the years. Women had no access to a full-fledged schooling, whether in Padua or Venice, let alone a university-level education, but then women knew how to use their surroundings to their advantage. Such was especially the case of Isabella Andreini, born poor in Padua and yet able to shape her life as a divina of the stage, adored in both Italy and France, a shining example of a selfmade individual with a sound mind and an enterprising agenda. Valeria Finucci would like to thank the institution that through the years has supported this research, the Arts & Sciences Committee on Faculty Research at Duke University, as well as the staff of the Duke’s Rubenstein Library and that of the Marciana Library in Venice. She also owes a special debt of gratitude for unflagging support to Haig Khachatoorian, Maurizio Rippa Bonati, Mary Ann Friese Witt, Ronald Witt, Elizabeth Clark, Annamaria Ferrarotti, Julia Kisacky, and Giuseppe Gerbino. Julia Kisacky would like to thank Albert Rabil for the initial encouragement for this project; Valeria Finucci for materials she shared and for her usual fine work editing the translation; Baylor University’s Department of Modern Languages and Cultures for financial support of this project; and Jeff Hunt for help with Classical references. Needless to say, the two of us have enjoyed a long history of literary collaboration, as this third volume that we are publishing together testifies. Ours xiii

xiv Acknowledgments has been a partnership born in scholars’ heaven as our passion for the recovery of our literary mothers has kept us intellectually engaged through the years. We would like to thank the anonymous reader for the press, whose generous insights have guided us in the revisions; the most enlightened copy-editor we have ever encountered, Cheryl Lemmens, who gave us brilliant suggestions; and Margaret English-Haskin, who is seeing our manuscript through its final editorial steps. None of our publications would have been possible without the visionary undertaking of Margaret King and Albert Rabil, the creators of The Other Voice Series, who have reshaped not only the Italian, but the entire European early modern canon though their own inspired work and the publication of what is by now a series of more than a hundred volumes, each one attesting to women’s ceaseless productivity. It is to them and to their unflagging optimism and encouragement that this book is lovingly dedicated.

List of Illustrations Cover

Paolo Veronese, Portrait of a Woman with a Dog, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid.

Figure 1.

Unknown, “Isabella Andreini, Comica Gelosa,” in Mirtilla, Pastorale di Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa, Verona, Girolamo Discepolo, 1586.

15

Figure 2.

Title page of Isabella Andreini, Mirtilla, Verona, Appresso Girolamo Discepolo, 1586. 43

Figure 3.

Title page of Isabella Andreini, Mirtilla, Sebastiano Dalle Donne & Camillo Franceschini Compagni, 1588.

xv

44

Editor’s Introduction Pastoral Drama and Women’s Authorial Voice The Other Voice Isabella Andreini (1562–1604) was the most famous actress of the Italian Renaissance. Princes and kings invited her to their courts and showered her with praises and gifts; poets celebrated her art and beauty; academicians admitted her to their male-only gatherings; and people of every social class declared over and over that they were moved, indeed stunned, by her acting gifts. Together with her husband, Francesco, she directed a Commedia dell’Arte company, the Gelosi, and ceaselessly traveled through Italy and France for performances. Andreini was also a poet, a letter writer, a singer, a composer of pastoral eclogues, and a playwright. As a poet, she penned more than four hundred poems of varying length and meter, such as sonnets, canzoni, scherzi, madrigals, and the new canzonette. She was as good an extemporizer as she was with polished humanistic pieces, was popular both in Italy and abroad, and was the recipient of celebratory verses by the most revered poets of the time, including Torquato Tasso, Giambattista Marino, and Gabriello Chiabrera. As an epistolarian, she composed dozens of elegant letters, many of them reflections on life and not necessarily meant for publication, but which nevertheless became a model for love letters in France. She was also a singer, performed her own poems set to music, and was praised and recognized for her gifts by two musical academies, the Filarmonica of Verona and the Olimpica of Vicenza. She may even have written a chivalric epic, according to a fellow poet.1 And she composed nine pastoral eclogues that, rather than being simple verse exercises à la mode, may have been staged between longer plays. But it is as a dramatist that she is most known today. Surely it is a feat of historical significance that she published the first play ever written by a woman in Italian, La Mirtilla, in 1588—the same year in which Maddalena Campiglia published her Flori. In the words of a French contemporary, Pierre Mathieu, Andreini was “an Italian woman learned in poetry, whose equal has not been found for elegance, readiness and ease in all sorts of style suited to the stage. If she had lived in Greece when comedy was in vogue statues would have been raised

1. The mention that Andreini was engaged in writing an epic romance, now lost, comes from her fellow poet, Muzio Manfredi. See his Cento lettere scritte da Mutio Manfredi nuovamente date in luce (Pavia: Andrea Viano, 1594), 100.

1

2 Editor’s Introduction to her and she would have been crowned with flowers in the theater.”2 Although Mirtilla went through many editions and was swiftly translated into French, and although the comic bent with which the author infused it proved fruitful to other women writers who chose to approach theater, the play still came to be dismissed as imitative, overly plotted, and escapist, another example on a minor note of a repetitive pastoral modeled on the two main sources for the genre: Torquato Tasso’s Aminta (1573) and Giovan Battista Guarini’s Il pastor fido (published in 1590, but in circulation earlier).3 Yet then is not now. The gendered script of Mirtilla is finding anew its rightful place among the ever-growing field of “other voices” in the European early modern period, to which this edition of her work will testify.

Biography Isabella Andreini, née Isabella Canali, belongs to the growing list of early modern intellectual women born in Padua, a well-connected and lively Renaissance town, where Venice established its university. Hailing from that city, for instance, are a poet, Gaspara Stampa (1523–1554); a novelist, Giulia Bigolina (ca. 1518–ca. 1569); a playwright, Valeria Miani (ca. 1563–post 1620); a chemist, Camilla Erculiani (1540–ca. 1590); and a painter, Chiara Varotari (1584–ca. 1663).4 Andreini’s father, Paolo, was probably of Venetian origin and may have been quite poor. At 2. I cite from Domnica Radulescu, “Isabella’s Trick or What a Sixteenth-Century Comedienne Can Teach Us Today,” in The Theater of Teaching and the Lessons of Theater, ed. Domnica Radulescu and Maria Stadter Fox (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2005), 161–89, at 167. 3. For an example among many of a negative opinion of Mirtilla, see Piermario Vescovo, “Isabella Andreini,” in Le stanze ritrovate: Antologia di scrittrici venete dal Quattrocento al Novecento, ed. Antonia Arslan, Adriana Chemello, and Gilberto Pizzamiglio (Venice: Eidos, 1991), 83–94, at 86–87. For a critique of Vescovo’s take, see my review essay, “La scrittura femminile. Considerazioni in margine alla lettura di Le stanze ritrovate: Antologia di scrittrici venete dal Quattrocento al Novecento,” Annali d’Italianistica 9 (1991): 322–29. 4. Until a couple of decades ago only the name of Gaspara Stampa was familiar to readers; the others had to be recovered or simply discovered, as in the case of Bigolina. Now Bigolina’s manuscript, the first prose romance in Italian written by a woman, has appeared in a critical edition in Italian as Urania, ed. Valeria Finucci (Rome: Bulzoni, 2002), and in English translation as Urania: A Romance, ed. and trans. Valeria Finucci (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). As for Miani, her tragedy, the first in the genre for women writers, has been published in a bilingual edition as Celinda, a Tragedy, ed. Valeria Finucci and trans. Julia Kisacky (Toronto: Iter Inc. and Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2010). Now Miani’s pastoral, Amorosa speranza. Favola pastorale della molto mag[nifi]ca signora Valeria Miani (Venice: Francesco Bolzetta, 1604) is being translated into English as Amorosa speranza, a Pastoral Drama, by Alexandra Coller. Herculiana has been a serious subject of study by Meredith Ray in Daughters of Alchemy: Women and Scientific Culture in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015), and paintings by Chiara Varotari have been exhibited in a number of venues in Padua as well as at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC, in 2007. For a lucid, nuanced, and comprehensive examination of the work of early

Editor’s Introduction 3 thirteen Isabella encountered Francesco Andreini, an actor already well known for playing on stage the part of the lover, the innamorato. The year after, in 1576, she had her first child, Giovan Battista, who later became a famous actor in the role of the male love interest, Lelio, as well as one of the best Italian playwrights of the seventeenth century.5 Isabella may have been married already by now to Francesco, or have married him some time after her son’s birth.6 This early part of her life, unlike her period of adulthood and fame, is still clouded in secrecy, as documents relative to herself and her husband seem to have been destroyed on purpose, a choice perhaps made in order to project the image for which Andreini became widely known and respected in Italy and abroad: that of the chaste wife and of the riveting performer. We know that Francesco was born in Pistoia, Tuscany, around or before 1548, and that his family surname was de Cerrachi, although he abandoned it after he became an actor. His theatrical persona—he moved from playing the love interest to the signature role of Capitan Spaventa da Vall’Inferno—was deeply influenced by an event that took place earlier in his life when he served as a soldier: captured by the Turks, he was enslaved in Barbary for eight years.7 Francesco and Isabella probably joined the Compagnia dei Gelosi in the winter of 1578 in Florence; by the time of the pre-Lenten Carnival of Venice in 1579, Francesco could list a full roster of committed actors, with Isabella recorded modern Italian women writers, see Virginia Cox, Women’s Writing in Italy, 1400–1650 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008). 5. Giovan Battista [Giambattista] Andreini (1576–1654) became the capocomico (director) and leading actor of the Compagnia dei Gelosi as well as of the Compagnia dei Fedeli, in which his first wife as well as the second were also primadonnas. He published a good number of comedies and pastorals, such as La Florinda (1603), Lo Schiavetto (1612), La Veneziana (1619), Amore nello specchio (1622), La Sultana (1622), La Ferinda (1622), La Centaura (1622), Li duo Lelii (1622), Le due commedie in commedia (1623), I due baci (1634), and Ismeria (1639), as well as sacred representations, such as Adamo (1613, considered a source for John Milton’s Paradise Lost), and La Maddalena (1617). 6. The plausible date of 1575 (and not 1576 or 1578) has been posited most convincingly by Claudia Burattelli in Comici dell’Arte: Corrispondenze, ed. Claudia Burattelli, Domenica Landolfi, and Anna Zinanni (Florence: Le Lettere, 1993), 1:97 (note), given that the couple’s first son, Giovan Battista, was born on February 9, 1576, as written in his baptism certificate in the Registro dei battezzati maschi dal 1571 al 1577 dalla lettera A alla lettera G (Florence: Archivio dell’Opera del Duomo), c. 172v. See also Maurizio Rebaudengo, Giovan Battista Andreini tra poetica e drammaturgia (Turin: Rosenberg and Sellier, 1994), 10. For an extended biography of Isabella Andreini, see Francesca Romana De’ Angelis, La divina Isabella (Florence: Sansoni, 1991). 7. Andreini’s son, Giovan Battista, testifies to his father’s imprisonment: “Preso dal turco, otto anni colà dimorò.” See his La Ferza. Ragionamento secondo contro l’accusa data alla commedia (Paris: Nicolao Callemont, 1625), now in La Commedia dell’Arte e la società barocca. Volume 2: La professione del teatro, ed. Ferruccio Marotti and Giovanna Romei (Rome: Bulzoni, 1991), 489–534, at 509. See also Stefano Mazzoni, “Genealogia e vicende della famiglia Andreini,” in Origini della commedia improvvisa o dell’arte: XIX Convegno Internazionale, Roma 1995, ed. Maria Luisa Chiabò and Federico Doglio (Rome: Edizioni Torre d’Orfeo, 1996), 107–52, esp. 109–10.

4 Editor’s Introduction as playing the part of the “innamorata” and he that of the braggart captain.8 They soon made of “I Gelosi” one of the most sought after acting groups of the late Renaissance, both in Italy and abroad.9 During the many years of their marriage, she gave birth to seven other children: four daughters (all destined to the convent in order to guarantee them an “honest” life, given the itinerant nature of actors performing in Compagnie dell’Arte) and three sons.10 It has been suggested that the reason Andreini was educated, was able to sing and play an instrument, and could write poetry from an early age should be self-evident: her humble family was apprenticing her for a career that in the end (and fortunately for her) she was able not to embrace, that of the high-class courtesan. This profession marked—in reality or more often just in fantasy—most, if not all, the first actresses on the early modern stage because it was understood that while actors imitated reality in their performances, actresses instead “incarnated” it: if the parts they played had sensual connotations, it followed that they must have been sexually available.11 Be that as it may, one could also hypothesize 8. The list of actors of 1579 appears in “Ragionamento XIV” of Francesco Andreini, Le Bravure del Capitano Spavento, divise in molti ragionamenti (Venice: Giacomo Antonio Somasco, 1607), now in vol. 2 of Marotti and Romei, La Commedia dell’Arte e la società barocca. For the timing of the couple’s joining the Gelosi, see also Kenneth Richards and Laura Richards, The Commedia dell’Arte: A Documentary History (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990), 63. The choice of the name I Gelosi (Company of the Jealous Ones) comes from the troupe’s motto: “Virtù, fama et honor ne fèr gelosi” (“We are jealous of attaining virtue, fame, and honour”), as noted in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. 9. The Andreini may have also recited outside the company, according to Ireneo Sanesi: for example, with the Compagnia de’ Confidenti in 1589, elsewhere in 1590, and with the Uniti in 1601. See Sanesi, La commedia, 2 vols. (Milan: Vallardi, 1935), excerpted in Ferdinando Taviani and Mirella Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte: La memoria delle compagnie italiane del XVI, XVII e XVIII secolo, 4th ed. (Florence: Usher, 2007), 96. 10. In 1587 the eldest daughter, Lavinia, was placed in the service of Duchess Eleonora de’ Medici in Mantua, and her younger sister was accepted in the service of the Grand Duke and Duchess of Tuscany. On February 1, 1597, Lavinia Andreini is recorded as entering the monastery of the Madri della Cantelma in Mantua. She took the vows as Sister Fulvia in June 1599. In 1606, a sister is also listed as being among the Madri della Cantelma. See Anne MacNeil, “Chronology,” in Music and Women of the Commedia dell’Arte in the Late Sixteenth Century (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 222, 241, 247, and 259. All daughters were eventually placed in Mantuan convents, and Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga paid for their dowry, since the Compagnia de’ Gelosi and later that of de’ Fedeli were under his sponsorship. One son, Domenico, became an army captain in the Gonzaga retinue; another, Paolo, was a monk in the Vallumbrosian order in Pavia. For more information on the Andreini children, see Burattelli, Landolfi, and Zinanni, eds., Comici dell’Arte: Corrispondenze, 1:85, 96, 114, and 167. 11. The suggestion that Andreini could have been primed at a young age for a career as a courtesan has been made often, most seriously by Ferdinando Taviani in “La fleur et le guerrier: Les actrices de la Commedia dell’Arte,” Bouffoneries 15/16 (1986): 61–93, at 75–76 and 89–90. For a contrary view, see Virginia Scott, “La vertu et la volupté: Models for the Actress in Early Modern Italy and France,” Theatre Research International 23 (1998): 152–58.

Editor’s Introduction 5 that what determined Isabella’s success was a vivid intelligence and a lively nature, coupled with a resolve on the part of her husband and fellow actor both to protect her reputation by marrying her and to enable her self-expression and boost her accomplishments as member of a professional acting group. Although historically the first actresses were very poor, often employed as mimes or mountebanks, we know that when they were able to be taken in by a Compagnia—as in Isabella’s case—they could be the darlings of the day and even acquire the honorific title of “Signoras,” in the assessment of the Jesuit Gian Domenico Ottonelli.12 For decades the Andreinis cooperated on stage and “composed and recited comedies, tragicomedies, tragedies, pastorals, intermezzi, and other staged inventions.”13 In writing about herself, the actress/playwright was demure, as when she acknowledged in a letter, for example, that she “had just learned how to write (so to speak) when she started to compose my Mirtilla.”14 She also worked ceaselessly at shedding any appearance of impropriety when dancing, playing an instrument, and reciting. Her gestures were controlled; her shows of love or affection when playing the love interest on stage were justified because either she was too outraged to understand what she was saying, or a wedding ceremony was scripted for her at the end of the play. Time and again she affirmed in writing the importance of marriage and of an honest life for women, as in her Lettere.15 Her choice to express herself only in the high Tuscan language and not in dialectal form made her appear cultivated, and

12. “[L]e comiche, escluse dal banco e dalla scena, sono per ordinario confinate alla fatica dell’ago e della conocchia e se la passano in travagliosa vita, guadagnando il vitto co’ quotidiani sudori e con gli stenti. Ma ricevute nelle compagnie de’ comici hanno la parte migliore e più sicura; son accarezzate et onorate; e si posson pregiare del grazioso titolo di Signora.” In Giovanni Domenico Ottonelli, Della Christiana Moderatione del Theatro, now in Ferdinando Taviani, La commedia dell’arte e la società barocca, Volume 1: La fascinazione del teatro (Rome: Bulzoni, 1969), 356. On marriage strategies in the Renaissance, see Daniela Hacke, Women, Sex and Marriage in Early Modern Venice (Aldershot, UK, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2004). 13. As Francesco recalls in his memoir, the Gelosi showed future companies the true way of “componere e di recitar Comedie, Tragicomedie, Tragedie, Pastorali, intermedii apparenti, ed altre invenzioni rappresentative.” See his Le Bravure del Capitano Spavento in Marotti and Romei, eds., La commedia dell’Arte e la società barocca, 218. 14. The letter is addressed to Duke Carlo Emanuele of Savoy and was published after her death by her husband in Lettere d’Isabella Andreini Padovana, Comica Gelosa et Academica Intenta Nominata l’Accesa (Venice: Marc’ Antonio Zaltieri, 1607). 15. Andreini often returned to the issue of the importance of matrimony, even when she considered it not advantageous to women, as in her often-reprinted letter “On the Birth of a Woman,” in Lettere d’Isabella Andreini. For an extended reading of the importance of the issue of matrimonial contentment in Andreini’s life in the context of women’s writing in the period, see Alexandra Coller, “Isabella Andreini’s La Mirtilla (1588): Pastoral Drama and Conjugal Love in Counter-Reformation Italy,” Italian Quarterly 46 (2009): 17–29.

6 Editor’s Introduction her clothes on stage were never scant or unrefined because, as she wrote, “a lovely figure in disheveled dress / will lose its grace.”16 Throughout Andreini’s life, poets celebrated her output in verse, her reciting style, her facility in improvising, her verbal skills, her exemplary ways, and (as it was also customary) her beauty, as in a well-known sonnet by her contemporary Torquato Tasso: When fostering Mother Nature fashioned Your precious veil and mortal spoils, She sought out beauty and gathered it like a flower, Taking jewels from the earth and stars from the Heavens.17 The encyclopedist Tommaso Garzoni called her “a superb spectacle of virtue and beauty.”18 The literary critic and poet Giovanni Crescimbeni praised her “extreme chastity and most innocent costumes.”19 She was so well known as “eloquent in her mouth” (“ore facunda,” the inscription on her tomb says) that in 1601 she was invited to become a member of the Accademia degli Intenti of Pavia, an uncommon feat for a woman in that era, taking the name of “Accesa” and the motto “Elevat Ardor [The Flame Rises].”20 Her resolve was to present herself to a distinguished and influential brotherhood of well-known erudites as an intellectual, not as a mere actress. Andreini had numerous contacts with the artistic and literary intelligentsia of the time: Tasso and his fellow writers Gabriello Chiabrera, Giovan 16. In Selected Poems of Isabella Andreini, ed. Anne MacNeil, trans. James Wyatt Cook (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2005), 189. 17. “Quando v’ordiva il prezioso velo / L’alma natura e le mortali spoglie, / Il bel cogliea, sì come il fior si coglie, / Togliendo gemme in terra e lumi in Cielo.” In Torquato Tasso, Rime. Reprinted, together with poems of other contemporaries, in Andreini, Lettere. See also Ferdinando Taviani, “ ‘Bella d’Asia’: Torquato Tasso, gli attori, e l’immortalità,” Paragone Letteratura 36 (1984): 3–76, at 3. 18. Tommaso Garzoni, “De comici,” in La piazza universale di tutte le professioni del mondo, e nobili et ignobili (Venice: Giovanni Battista Somasco, 1585). 19. “[U]na somma castità e un costume inocentissimo,” in Giovanni Mario Crescimbeni, Comentarj … intorno alla sua historia della volgar poesia, vol. 4, bk. 3 (Rome: Antonio de’ Rossi, 1710), 148. 20. After induction there, Andreini added the appellative of “Accademica Intenta” to her usual one of “Comica Gelosa.” She also had contacts with two other academies, the Olimpici in Vicenza and the Filarmonici in Verona, although she was not officially inducted into either. On the Accademia degli Intenti, see Michele Maylender, Storia delle accademie d’Italia, 5 vols. (Bologna: Forni, 1926–30; facsimile reprint, 1976), ad vocem “Intenti.” On the participation of women in Italian academies, see Virginia Cox, “Members, Muses, Mascots: Women and Italian Academies,” in The Italian Academies, 1525–1700: Networks of Culture, Innovation and Dissent, ed. Jane E. Everson, Denis V. Reidy, and Lisa Sampson (Cambridge: Legenda, 2016), 53–78. On the difficulty for women writers to enter into academies well into the eighteenth century (they were often inducted as honorary members but not as effective members tout court), see Elisabetta Graziosi, “Arcadia femminile: presenze e modelli,” Filologia e critica 17 (1992): 321–58.

Editor’s Introduction 7 Battista Marino, Angelo Ingegneri, Laura Guidiccioni, and Gherardo Borgogni, the nobleman and art patron Pirro Visconti, the philologist Erycius Puteanus, and the composers Leone Leoni, Ottavio Rinuccini, and Claudio Monteverdi.21 Her presence was sought in many courts and cities, and her performances inevitably drew large crowds. In 1583, when trying to form a company of actors for his own enjoyment at the Mantuan court by uniting three different troupes, Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga pushed to have the Andreini duo at his court. His attempt failed because the Gelosi were under an obligation to perform in Venice at the time, but the duke employed the Gelosi on numerous occasions, such as in 1588, 1589, and 1590; he very often recommended them for employment elsewhere; and he released them from obligations in Mantua only when politically or economically advisable. Although the Gelosi performed in Venice, Milan, Turin, Padua, Ferrara, Rome, Bologna, Pavia, and Florence in their many touring engagements, their ideal home was Mantua, and they, as well as their son Giovan Battista, regularly returned to that city.22 France also beckoned, however, and Andreini was able to recite in front of two French kings: Henri III in 1577, and Henri IV in 1603.23 When going to Blois in 1577, for a performance specifically requested by Henri III, the Gelosi were stopped at Charité-sur-Loire by Huguenots who “would not let them go except for the king’s ransom,” an indication of how much the Italian troupe was admired in the French court.24 The success of their acts was so remarkable, and so many people rushed to see them, that as Pierre de l’Estoile notes in his journal, the four most famous Parisian preachers could not have much of an audience until the company stayed in town.25 Andreini also performed in Paris in 1601, and 21. For the verses that Andreini wrote to honor Guidiccioni, see Selected Poems of Isabella Andreini, ed. MacNeil, 106–15; for the correspondence with Puteanus, see MacNeil, Music and Women. For Andreini’s relationship with literati and musicians such as Leoni and Monteverdi, see Kathryn Bosi, “Accolades for an Actress: On Some Literary and Musical Tributes for Isabella Andreini,” Recercare 15 (2003): 73–117. 22. See Emilio Faccioli, “Cronache e personaggi della vita teatrale,” in Faccioli, ed., Mantova: Le Lettere, 3 vols. (Mantua: Istituto d’Arco per la Storia di Mantova, 1962), 2:553–611, and the abundant section on chronology covering the years of Isabella Andreini’s performances with the Gelosi, 1579–1604, in MacNeil, Music and Women, 202–58. 23. The first, fully documented presence of the Andreini in France is actually in 1578, but some critics agree that the couple may have been there earlier. See, for example, Julie Campbell, Literary Circles and Gender in Early Modern Europe: A Cross-Cultural Approach (Aldershot, UK, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2006), 84. Performance of the company with the primadonna Vittoria Piissimi was specifically requested by Henri III, who had seen Piissimi perform for him at the time of his visit to Venice in 1574. 24. See Charles Sterling, “Early Paintings of the Commedia dell’Arte in France,” Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s. 2, no. 1 (1943): 11–32, at 15. 25. Pierre de L’Estoile, Journal des choses memorables advenuës durant tout le règne de Henri III Roy de France et de Pologne (1621) – Extraits, introd. Edme Champion (Paris: A. Colin, 1906), 38.

8 Editor’s Introduction again in 1603, as noted above, before Henri IV—“with complete contentment” on both his part and that of his queen, Marie de’ Medici, who actively promoted her performances.26 Given that French actresses did not appear on stage until 1672, the Gelosi fascinated the Valois and the Navarre courts not only with their stock comedic routines (lazzi), horseplay, pranks, and dance shows, but also with the literary references, mythological allusions, and refined Petrarchan vocabulary that the actresses in their company injected into their routines. Andreini’s reputation was such, in fact, that she was honored as the exceptional and accomplished performer in the very first French publication that defended the new comedies from their detractors, that of Mademoiselle de Beau-Lieu.27 It was on her return journey to Italy from France that Andreini died following a miscarriage. It was her ninth pregnancy.28 For years on end people kept visiting her tomb in the Church of St. Croix in Lyon.29 There, as the Latin inscription reads, she was celebrated as a good wife, an honest and religious woman, a well-spoken intellectual, and a friend of music and theater.30 She was given a state funeral, and a celebratory medal was coined after her death, showing her image on one side and two trumpets on the other. After she passed away, the Gelosi ceased to exist. Left bereft by the one “who was the reason of my entire happiness,” Francesco ended his acting career. He retired in Mantua, lived peacefully under the protection of the couple’s greatest admirer, its duke (who had already granted him the title of citizen of Mantua in 1601), and asked that at his death his 26. Marie de’ Medici wrote her sister Eleonora de’ Medici in Mantua about her satisfaction at being entertained by the Gelosi in Paris in April 1603. Henri IV, too, wrote a letter asking that the company be treated well during their return trip. See MacNeil, “Chronology,” in Music and Women, 256. On the reception of Andreini in France, see Daniela Mauri, “La Mirtilla di Isabella Andreini e la sua seconda traduzione francese,” in Studi di filologia e letteratura francese in onore di Anna Maria Finoli, ed. Maria Colombo, Marina Fumagalli, and Anna Maria Raugei (Pisa: Edizioni ETS, 1996): 243–60; and Armand Baschet, Les comédiens italiens à la cour de France (Paris: E. Plon et Cie), 1882. On Marie de’ Medici’s contacts with Italian actors of the Commedia dell’Arte, see Siro Ferrone, Attori, mercanti, corsari: La Commedia dell’Arte in Europa tra Cinque e Seicento (Turin: Einaudi, 1993), 66–67. 27. Mademoiselle de Beau-Lieu, La première atteinte contre ceux qui accusent les comédies (Paris: Jean Richer, 1603). See also Raymond Lebègue, “Les débuts de la Commedia dell’Arte en France,” Rivista di studi teatrali 9/10 (1954): 71–77, at 73. 28. For an extended reading of the event, see Roberto Tessari, “O Diva, o ‘Estable à tous chevaux’: L’ultimo viaggio di Isabella Andreini,” in Viaggi teatrali dall’Italia a Parigi fra Cinque e Seicento, ed. Roberto Alonge (Genoa: Costa and Nolan, 1989), 128–42, at 129. 29. As her son Giovan Battista recollects, “Et ogni giorno pellegrine genti … da così famosa città passando … vanno ad onorar il sepolcro di quella con preghiere e a celebrarla con lodi.” In La Ferza, 68. Giambattista also published a work to honor his mother, Pianto d’Apollo. Rime funebri in morte d’Isabella Andreini (Milan: Girolamo Bordoni and Pietromartire Locarni, 1606). 30. “Isabella Andreina Patavina Mulier magna virtute praedita. Honestatis ornamentum, maritalique, pudicitiae decus, ore facunda, mente facunda, religiosa, pia, Musis amica, & artis Scenicae caput hic resurrectionem expectat.” See Taviani and Schino, eds., Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 126.

Editor’s Introduction 9 ashes be mixed with hers.31 He became her hagiographer, writing profusely about her and about the way they had functioned within the Gelosi. He may have even published his own writings by attributing them to his wife, since she was the diva and the more famous of the two.

Works Andreini’s most well-known work today is La Mirtilla, a pastoral drama in five acts written a few years before its publication in 1588 and likely tried out many times on stage by the Gelosi before being released in print. It was published in Verona by the printing house of Girolamo Discepolo in an edition of a few copies on February 24, 1588, and was dedicated to Lavinia della Rovere, a distinguished aristocratic patron of the arts.32 The play sold out right away, and so many people had been unable to get a copy or even just to see the book, according to the new printers Sebastiano Dalle Donne and Camillo Franceschini, that they resolved to make more buyers happy (“dar contentezza”) with a new edition, which they printed, again in Verona, on April 26.33 It was dedicated to Lodovica Pellegrina.34 A revised version came out in 1594 with changes likely made as a result of live performances, mostly involving cutting back lengthy dialogues.35 31. “[C]olei ch’era cagione d’ogni mia allegrezza,” Andreini, Lettere, 136r and 155r-v. For more on Francesco’s life and theatrical activities after his wife’s death, see Roberto Tessari, “Francesco Andreini e la stagione d’oro,” in Origini della commedia improvvisa o dell’arte: XIX Convegno Internazionale, Roma 1995, ed. Maria Luisa Chiabò and Federico Doglio (Rome: Edizioni Torre d’Orfeo, 1996), 85–105. For the granting of citizenship, see MacNeil, “Chronology,” in Music and Women, 252. 32. Lavinia Feltria della Rovere (1558–1632), princess of Urbino and marchioness of Vasto, was the wife of Alfonso Felice d’Avalos, by whom she had four children. Raised at the refined court of Urbino, she loved art and poetry. Her friendship with Torquato Tasso is attested to by a number of poems that he dedicated to her. 33. As they write in the dedication section: “La pastorale della signora Isabella Andreini piacque sì fattamente à tutti quelli che l’hanno havuta per le mani questi giorni adietro, che fù stampata, ch’io mi sono risoluto di adornar d’essa le mie stampe, e appresso dar contentezza à quelli che la desiderano, non avendone potuto, non dico havere, ma appena vedere in quella prima inpressione.” 34. Very little is known about Lodovica Pellegrina besides her status of dame. Together with the other dedicatee, Lavinia della Rovere, she demonstrates how increasingly important was the role of secular women in patronage networks, often with gender in mind. On female patronage of the arts, see Beyond Isabella: Secular Women Patrons of Art in Renaissance Italy, ed. Sheryl E. Reiss and David. G. Wilkins (Kirksville, MO: Truman State University Press, 2001), and Catherine E. King, Renaissance Women Patrons: Wives and Widows in Italy, c. 1300–1550 (Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 1998). 35. Changes are mostly stylistic or were meant for a better delivery on stage, especially in Act 1.1. See Mauri, “La Mirtilla di Isabella Andreini,” 246–47. For an accurate list of changes, see Maria Luisa Doglio, “Introduzione,” in Isabella Andreini, La Mirtilla (Pisa: Pacini Fazzi, 1995), 24–28.

10 Editor’s Introduction Mirtilla enjoyed many editions. Beside the two in 1588, there were two in 1590, one in 1594 as mentioned, and then one each in 1598, in 1599, in 1602, in 1605, in 1616, and in 1620.36 The play was also translated twice into French: in a 1599 unpublished prose translation by Roland du Jardin Sieur des Roches, entitled Amours de Bergers, now at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris; and in 1602 by an anonymous translator.37 A modern edition appeared in Italian in 1995, edited by Maria Luisa Doglio; and a first, witty translation into English by Julie Campbell came out in 2002. Both the Doglio and Campbell editions have commendably presented Andreini to modern audiences. Campbell’s rendering of Mirtilla is rich, modern, and captivating. Missing from it, however, is a full-fledged critical and annotated commentary.38 This present edition in the Other Voice series, which places the original Italian facing an English translation, is warranted by an increased recognition in the last few years of the importance of female-authored drama in early modern letters and by an ongoing positive rethinking of the Commedia dell’Arte genre. Thirteen years after Mirtilla appeared in print, Andreini published Rime, a collection of 359 poems dedicated to Cardinal Cinzio Aldobrandini, nephew of Pope Clement VIII and a powerful admirer of poets and of intellectuals. She had worked at it for five years.39 The collection appeared in a new edition in France two years later, in 1603, just as she was invited to perform with the Gelosi at the French court.40 The majority of Andreini’s verses were sonnets and madrigals, but she also experimented with other forms, such as scherzi, conzonette morali, egloghe boscherecce, sestine, epitalami, capitoli, centoni, and versi funerari, all in36. Mirtilla. Pastorale d’Isabella Andreini, comica gelosa (Verona: Girolamo Discepolo, 1588); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Verona: Sebastiano Dalle Donne and Camillo Franceschini, 1588); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Ferrara: Vittorio Baldini, 1590); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Mantua: Francesco Osanna, 1590); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Bergamo: Comin Ventura, 1594); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Venice: Marc’Antonio Bonibelli, 1598); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Verona: Francesco Dalle Donne and Scipione Vargnano, 1599); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Venice: Lucio Spineda, 1602); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Milan: Girolamo Bordoni and Pietromartire Locarni, 1605); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Venice: Ghirardo Imberti, 1616); Mirtilla. Pastorale (Venice: Ghirardo Imberti, 1620). 37. Amours de Bergers (Paris: B.N., Ms. FR 25483), trans. Roland du Jardin Sieur des Roches; Myrtille. Bergerie (Paris: Matthieu Guillemot, 1602). For the French versions, see Mauri, “La Mirtilla di Isabella Andreini,” 255–60. 38. La Mirtilla, ed. Maria Luisa Doglio; and Mirtilla, a Pastoral, ed. and trans. Julie Campbell (Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2002). 39. Isabella Andreini, Rime d’Isabella Andreini Padovana, comica gelosa (Milan: Girolamo Bordoni and Pietromartire Locarni, 1601). A number of poems in Rime are now in English translation in Selected Poems by Isabella Andreini, ed. MacNeil. The reference that Andreini had been writing poems for a few years with the aim of publishing them in the Rime is in a dialogue by her fellow correspondent, Pietro Borgogni. See MacNeil, “Introduction” to Selected Poems, 1–28, at 10. 40. Isabella Andreini, Rime (Paris: Claude de Monstr’œil, 1603).

Editor’s Introduction 11 terestingly written in a voice that is purposely gendered male, thus allowing her to participate as equal to the literary and humanistic skirmishes popular at the time in Italy.41 Whether she experimented with and even parodied the Petrarchan style or switched to the more self-absorbed vein of Torquato Tasso, whether she paid homage to the scherzi of Gabriello Chiabrera or to the neoclassical conventions of Pierre de Ronsard, Andreini was keen to have many of her poems set to music, and sang at least twenty of them. A new edition of Rime appeared after her death in 1605, curated, as the publisher states, by Francesco and his children. It is quite different from the first: it has 105 sonnets, 18 madrigals, and a single canzone, and is composed of poetry sent by her and to her by known poets and academicians and French nobles. It cements the notion that Andreini enjoyed a varied and vigorous interaction with, and accolades from, fellow poets, academicians, philosophers, and admirers throughout Italy and France.42 Andreini’s Lettere, some written in the female and some in the male voice, and most not intended to be actually sent to a reader, were published posthumously by Francesco in 1607. She had started writing them, a collection of more than one hundred missives, in 1601. We do not know how many she wrote, because Francesco added some of his own letters to the compilation before sending them to press and may have also modified a number of those written by his wife, thus making difficult any attribution. The Lettere turned out to be extremely popular and enjoyed nineteen editions between 1607 and 1663—a literary feast.43 They were soon translated into French, and their structure and themes became so pop41. As MacNeil writes, “Andreini’s literary persona invokes a male voice, achieved mainly through a masculine gendering of the poems’ subjects, but also through humanistic imitation. Her verses are written from a man’s point of view and in a forceful literary style associated with men. … At the same time, it [the style] affords her a wider scope of literary influence and social mobility, which she achieves in scholarly circles and academy.” In “Introduction,” Selected Poems, 2–3. See also Luisella Giachino, “Dall’effimero teatrale alla quête dell’immortalità: Le Rime di Isabella Andreini,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 178 (2001): 530–52. 42. Isabella Andreini, Rime. Parte seconda (Milan: Girolamo Bordoni and Pietromartire Locarni, 1605). 43. The book comprises 151 letters, organized by title but with no date or addressee. For a thorough reading, see Silvia Fabrizio-Costa, “ ‘Onore’/‘Amore’: Une interprétation des ‘Lettere’ d’Isabella Andreini (1562–1604), la première ‘Diva’ du théâtre moderne,” Les langues néo-latines: Revue des langues romanes 281 (1992): 29–55; and more recently Meredith Ray, “Between Stage and Page: The Letters of Isabella Andreini,” in her Writing Gender in Women’s Letter Collections of the Italian Renaissance (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), 156–83. There are also some private and unpublished letters from Andreini to Erycius Puteanus (1574–1646), a Dutch encyclopedist who lived briefly in Padua, in Charles Ruelens, Erycius Puteanus et Isabelle Andreini: Lecture faite à l’Académie d’Archéologie le 3 Février 1889 (Antwerp: Van Merlen, 1889). On this correspondence, see MacNeil, Music and Women. For a list of books of letters published in the period, see Amedeo Quondam, Le ‘carte messaggiere’: Retorica e modelli di comunicazione epistolare. Per un indice dei libri di lettere del Cinquecento (Rome: Bulzoni, 1981), 286.

12 Editor’s Introduction ular that, according to Bernard Bray, the form of the love letter in France comes from three specific sources: Ovid’s Heroides, the letters of Abelard and Heloise, and (startlingly) the Italian letters of Isabella Andreini.44 In 1617, Fragmenti di alcune scritture della Signora Isabella Andreini, a set of dialogues on how various expressions of love were recited on stage, were published by Francesco to keep the memory of his wife alive. They were reprinted in 1620 and 1621. These dialogues were unconnected to specific plots and thus could be adapted to serve ad hoc purposes on stage, whether a lamentation on true love was needed or a more general questione d’amore on a male/female relationship was pertinent.45 Andreini was a gifted writer, and after her death her name kept appearing, even if often en passant, in the majority of theatrical anthologies and historical biographies of the following centuries.46 As the philologist Erycius Putenaus put it, “Truly in my opinion you supply a defect of Nature, Andreina—you, who are not only capable of male glory but in fact an equal partner to it.”47 44. Bernard A. Bray, L’art de la lettre amoureuse: Des manuels aux romans, 1550–1700 (The Hague: Mouton, 1967), 14. Giovanna Malquori Fondi is of the same opinion. See “De la ‘lettre-canevas’ à la ‘pièce de cabinet’: Les Lettere d’Isabella Andreini, traduites par Francois de Grenaille,” in Contacts culturels et échanges linguistiques au XVIIe siècle en France, ed. Yves Giraud (Paris: Papers in SeventeenthCentury Literature, 1997), 125–45. 45. Some titles are sufficient to give an idea of the content, such as “On True Love,” or “Whether it is better to love someone rather than oneself,” or “Whether a loved one should also love,” or “On amorous fever.” See Isabella Andreini, Fragmenti di alcune scritture della Signora Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa et Academica Intenta. Raccolti dal marito Francesco Andreini Comico Geloso detto il Capitano Spavento (Venice: Giovanni Battista Combi, 1617); Fragmenti di alcune scritture della Signora Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa, et Academica Intenta. Raccolti da Francesco Andreini Comico Geloso, detto il Capitano Spavento, e dati in luce da Flamminio Scala Comico (Venice: Giovanni Battista Combi, 1620); and Fragmenti di alcune scritture della Signora Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa et Academica Intenta, Raccolti dal marito Francesco Andreini Comico Geloso detto il Capitan Spavento (Turin: Giovanni Domenico Tarino, 1621). For a reading of this work, see Daniela Mauri, “I Fragmenti di alcune scritture di Isabella Andreini ‘comica gelosa’,” in Studi sul teatro in Europa in onore di Mariangela Mazzocchi Doglio, ed. Paolo Bosisio (Rome: Bulzoni, 2011), 385–99. 46. See for example, Claude and François Parfaict, Histoire de l’Ancien Théatre Italien depuis son origine en France jusqu’à sa suppression en l’année 1697 (Paris: Lambert, 1753), 4–7; Gian Maria Mazzuchelli, Gli scrittori d’Italia (Brescia: Giambatista Bossini, 1753), vol. 2, Part 2: 711–13; Francesco Bartoli, Notizie istoriche de’ comici italiani che fiorirono intorno all’anno MDL fino ai giorni presenti (Padua: Li Conzatti, 1781–82; facsimile reprint, Bologna: Forni, 1978), 31–36; Luigi Rasi, I comici italiani, 2 vols. (Florence: Fratelli Bocca, 1897–1905), 1:87–117; Jolanda De Blasi, Le scrittrici italiane dalle origini al 1800 (Florence: Nemi, 1930), 160–65; Ugo Falena, “Isabella Andreini,” in La Rassegna nazionale (1905), 267–79; Rosamond Gilder, “Isabella Andreini,” in Enter the Actress: The First Women in Theatre (London: Harrap, 1931), 67–81. For more bibliography, see de’ Angelis, La divina Isabella. 47. “Epistle 19” of November 1601 to Isabella Andreini, in MacNeil, Music and Women, 306. Women’s last names were often rendered in the feminine in the Renaissance, thus “Andreini” becomes “Andreina.”

Editor’s Introduction 13

Andreini, the Actress Let me introduce a story that contextualizes Andreini’s personality as a woman, actress, and playwright. It is recounted in a collection of fictional “histories” authored by the historian and novelist Luca Assarino at the start of the seventeenth century and published as Raguagli del regno d’amore Cipro (News from Cyprus, the Kingdom of Love).48 In the kingdom ruled by Venus in Cyprus, Assarino wrote in “Raguaglio” 12, a dispute arose between Isabella Andreini, on the one hand, and Laura di Chabrières, the ethereal woman crowding Francesco Petrarca’s mind and days, on the other, as to which of the two should have the rights of precedence and the honor of sitting ahead of the other during a feast.49 Since the quarrel between the two ladies was proving insoluble, a meeting was arranged for them to defend their position in front of the island’s Senate Tribunal. Some people felt that Isabella was too presumptuous in asserting her rights to precedence and honor, but she looked forward to defending her station. In her argument before the justices, Isabella first granted that Laura was beautiful. But she also claimed that Laura would have had no merit were it not for Petrarch singing her praises in worshipful admiration, and that her fame was predicated on Petrarch living a long life in which he could continually reassert the importance of her beauty. In her own case, Isabella argued, her fame rested only on her output and on her own self-fashioning as a stage presence. Next, Isabella contested Laura’s supremacy in rectitude and virtue. It was true that Laura was virtuous, she claimed, but she had a noble family to protect her; moreover, she lived in a small village where there was hardly any temptation to rebuff. In her own case, however, Isabella had to overcome her low origins and lack of protection and had to defend her chosen lifestyle in places as far away from her native Padua as Paris, and in a profession not particularly known for the probity of its practitioners. The result of this dispute was amicably solved by the Senate. Isabella did indeed have the rights of precedence over Laura, it was decreed, because what she had implied made sense to the justices. She was a self-made woman who had been able to present herself to society as women of the time almost never had the possibility of doing: if not noble by birth, at least noble in her actions; if unprotected by family lineage, at least notoriously virtuous; if beautiful, then chaste by choice. To this Isabella had astutely added her most important card: intellectual merits, 48. Luca Assarino (1602–1672), Raguagli del regno d’amore Cipro (Venice: Li Turrini, 1646). Assarino is still known today for his romance, La stratonica (1635), a true bestseller at the time. 49. The “Raguaglio” is entitled: “Professing the most immaculate honesty, Madonna Laura and Isabella Andreini banter with each other at a feast, and then, after complaining about each other in the Senate, Madonna Laura loses the contest” (“Professando Mad. Laura e Isabella Andreini immacolatissima honestà, si motteggiano in una festa, e querelandosi poi l’una dell’altra nel Senato, Mad. Laura perdè la lite”). In Raguagli, 57–63. The translation from Italian is mine.

14 Editor’s Introduction for she needed no Petrarch to sing her praises. Her recognition in the republic of letters, she professed, could easily last beyond her lifetime. That Andreini as a woman would claim to be beautiful, just like the Laura celebrated on paper by Petrarch, we can glean from contemporary images. In a number of drawings that have come to us through the centuries, including those in the frontispieces of Mirtilla and Rime, Andreini looks directly at the viewer, her long hair framing an attractive, round face (Figure 1). We know that in many of her performances she sported ribbons and brooches with small jewels and a pearl necklace, and that she adorned her neck with ornate white ruffs.50 She consistently worked to project the image of a confident actress, conscious of how best to promote a feminine persona in command of her representation, the “celebrity artist,” as Rosalind Kerr calls her.51 This identity is perfectly displayed in the recently recognized portrait that constitutes the cover of this edition of Mirtilla, Portrait of a Woman with a Dog, by the Venetian Paolo Veronese, at the Museo ThyssenBornemisza in Madrid. The gorgeous young woman with a striped dress half open at the knee and a masculine cut of her bodice, with no jewels but a slim book in her hand (perhaps a Petrarchino or a canovaccio),52 has the same round face that distinguishes other portraits of the actress. The painting can be dated probably around 1583, when the Andreini were engaged in Venice for the Carnival at the newly established Teatro Michel; Veronese’s studio was not far away.53 50. “Portava i capelli ammassati nella parte anteriore del capo, come una corona, lasciando spoglia la curva della nuca. Ai capelli intrecciava nastri con spille e piccoli gioielli e completava l’ascesa con uno spillone prezioso, appuntato di lato, ornato come un ramoscello di fiori o una piuma di pavone.” In Taviani, “Bella d’Asia,” 5. On the importance of hair for women’s individuality and sociability in the Renaissance, see Evelyn Welch, “Art on the Edge: Hair and Hands in Renaissance Italy,” Renaissance Studies 23, no. 3 (2009): 241–68. On Andreini’s portraits, see Renzo Guardenti, “Attrici in effigie,” Culture teatrali 10 (2004): 55–71; Stefano Mazzoni, “La vita di Isabella,” Culture teatrali 10 (2004): 87–92; and Mazzoni, “Genealogia e vicende della famiglia Andreini.” On the style, color, and material of clothes in Venice in the 1570s, see Valeria Finucci, “Intellectual Tourism in Late SixteenthCentury Italy: Costume and Manners in Venice and Padua,” in Mores Italiae: Costumi e scene di vita nel Rinascimento // Mores Italiae: Costume and Life in the Renaissance, ed. Maurizio Rippa Bonati and Valeria Finucci (Cittadella: Biblos, 2007), 37–77. 51. Rosalind Kerr, “Isabella Andreini: The Making of a Diva,” in The Rise of the Diva on the Sixteenth Century Commedia dell’Arte Stage (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016), 102–46. 52. It was typical for rich Renaissance women to be portrayed with a slim book in their hands containing poems by Petrarch to testify to their literacy and, metonymically, to the fact that they embodied the ideal feminine features that Petrarch had immortalized in his poetry. But given Andreini’s profession, she may be holding instead a script, thus fashioning herself as author, idealized wife, and actress. 53. “As the only visual depiction of Isabella Andreini which reveals such feminine/masculine playing with gender,” Maria Ines Aliverti notes, “our portrait may quite literally be regarded as a genuine demonstration of her self-fashioning.” See Aliverti, “An Icon for a New Woman: A Previously Unidentified Portrait of Isabella Andreini by Paolo Veronese,” Early Theatre 11, no. 2 (2008): 159–80, at 170. We know that the Andreini were engaged in 1583 by the nobleman Alvise Michel, patron of the “Stanza

Editor’s Introduction 15

Figure 1. Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa. That Andreini as an actress would know how to convince the public of her performing abilities goes without saying, given the fame that surrounded her on that score. She herself, in the introductory sonnet of her Rime, mentioned the necessary falseness (“false ardor,” “false words,” “false sorrows” “spurious delights”) needed by an actress and a love poet. Her arguing for poetic distance in matters of love—a rhetorical strategy required by the customary presentation of her persona as above reproach—matches her argument that as an artist she is also mimetically embodying other people’s emotions:

delle commedie” in Venice, from a letter that Francesco wrote to Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga on April 13, 1588. See MacNeil, Music and Women, entry # 9, 272–73.

16 Editor’s Introduction If ever there is anyone who reads my neglected poems, do not believe in their false ardors For imagined loves on stage I am used to handle with false emotions. I sang the Muses’ high furors, sometimes bewailing my false sorrows, sometimes singing my spurious delights.54 This embodiment happens, she insists, even when performing in a transvestite role: And as in theaters I have played now as a woman and now as a man what nature and art wanted to teach, so still following my star in the April of a fugitive age I wrote more than one thousand sheets in various styles.55 The stress on the value of her acting sets Andreini’s sonnets apart from the Petrarchan tradition that she thematically and stylistically charts because, rather than relying on an autobiographical (or supposedly autobiographical) voice that inscribes true feelings, she declares her moods to be false as she expresses them in a seemingly indifferent male or female voice.56 The audience of the time liked gender switching and titillating parts en travesti.57 In fact, almost half of the fifty scenarios included in Flaminio Scala’s Teatro delle favole rappresentative (1611; Representative Stage Plots), where there are scenes played by an actress named “Isabella,” involve a woman on stage dressed as a man. Andreini cross-dressed at 54. “S’alcun fia mai, che i versi miei negletti / Legga, non creda a questi finti ardori, / Che ne le scene immaginati amori / Usa a trattar con non leali affetti, // Con bugiardi non men con finti detti / De le Muse spiegai gli alti furori, / Talor piangendo i falsi miei dolori, / Talor cantando i falsi miei diletti.” In Andreini, Rime, Sonnet 1. 55. “E come ne’ teatri or donna, ed ora / Uom fei rappresentando in vario stile / Quanto volle insegnar Natura ed Arte, // Così la stella mia seguendo ancora / Di fuggitiva età nel verde aprile / Vergai con vario stil ben mille carte.” In Andreini, Rime, Sonnet 1. 56. As Virginia Cox writes, “The trouvaille is a brilliant one, the more so for its witty reversal of Tasso’s emphasis on the veracity of the experiences described in his Rime Amorose … and … licenses her to experiment with sensual erotic idioms too risqué for a woman to adopt without some such distancing device.” See Cox, The Prodigious Muse: Women’s Writing in Counter-Reformation Italy (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011), 77. 57. On women’s role en travesti on the Italian stage, see, for example, Laura Giannetti, “Women in Men’s Clothing: Female Cross-Dressing Plays and the Construction of Feminine Identity,” in Lelia’s Kiss: Imagining Gender, Sex, and Marriage in Italian Renaissance Comedy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), 24–75.

Editor’s Introduction 17 least a dozen times in such scenarios. But even when playing a female part, she was able to take on different personalities in a whirlwind of fast-paced actions: Day 6, for example, shows a character named Isabella, wife of Pantalone, playing the madwoman (“The Jealous Old Man”); Day 21 has Isabella, daughter of Doctor Graziano, at the windows speaking to her lover (“The Fake Sorcerer”); Day 25 has Isabella playing the part of a jealous female (“The Jealous Isabella”); and Day 36 introduces Isabella as a medium (“Isabella the Astrologer”).58 The most astounding and recognized role that Andreini literally invented on stage was that of the innamorata, or ingénue, a part that allowed her to be transgressive in the very moment that she presented herself as a powerless victim of love. This part was already fully adumbrated in the Scala scenario of Day 38, “La pazzia d’Isabella.” It became her signature piece following her performance at the wedding of Ferdinando de Medici and Christine de Lorraine on May 13, 1589, in Florence.59 Here, Andreini improvised a hysterical dialogue of the young, innocent, and betrayed damsel in love, so confused by the circumstances leading to the loss of her beloved Fileno that she kept switching from one language to the other, combining food with war, evoking Aristotle as well as dabbling with vulgar associations, playing the wronged and the innocent, as she went “running as a madwoman through the city, accosting this person and now that, and speaking in Spanish, then in Greek, next in Italian and many other languages, but all of them nonsensical.”60 And in a pinnacle of bravura as actress, she started imitating the 58. The scenarios for Day 6, Day 21, Day 25, and Day 36 are now reprinted in translation in Natalie Crohn Schmitt’s Befriending the Commedia dell’Arte of Flaminio Scala: The Comic Scenarios (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014), at 125–50, 151–80, 181–210, and 211–41, respectively. See also Richard Andrews, ed. and trans., The Commedia dell’Arte of Flaminio Scala: A Translation and Analysis of 30 Scenarios (Lanham, MD, Toronto, and Plymouth, UK: Scarecrow Press, 2008). 59. The calendar of events called for a second performance of Gerolamo Bargagli’s La Pellegrina. Instead the Gelosi went on stage with their two primadonnas, Vittoria Piissimi, called La Cingana (the “Gipsy”) for the parts she loved to play and also played in this circumstance; and Isabella, who played the part of the madwoman in love. For an extended reading of the festivities, see James M. Saslow, The Medici Wedding of 1589: Florentine Festival as Theatrum Mundi (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989). 60. “[C]ome pazza se n’andava scorrendo per la cittade, fermando hor questo et hora quello e parlando hora in spagnuolo, hora in Greco, hora in italiano, e molti altri linguaggi, ma tutti fuor di proposito.” In Giuseppe Pavoni, Diario descritto da Giuseppe Pavoni delle feste celebrate nelle solennissime nozze deli Serenissimi sposi, il Sig. Ferdinando de’ Medici e la Sig. Donna Christina di Lorena Gran Duchi di Toscana (Bologna: Giovanni Rossi, 1589), now in Flaminio Scala, Il teatro delle favole rappresentative, ed. Ferruccio Marotti (Milan: Il Polifilo, 1976), vol. 1, Appendix 2, 73–74. See also Radulescu, “Isabella’s Trick,” 173–74; Anne MacNeil, “The Divine Madness of Isabella Andreini,” Journal of the Royal Musical Association 120 (1995): 195–215; MacNeil, Music and Women; Cesare Molinari, “L’altra faccia del 1589: Isabella Andreini e la sua pazzia,” in Firenze e la Toscana dei Medici nell’Europa del Cinquecento, ed. Giancarlo Garfagnini, 3 vols. (Florence: Olschki, 1983), 2:565–73; Robert Henke, Performance and Literature in the Commedia dell’Arte (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

18 Editor’s Introduction speaking style of all her male fellow players in the company, such as Pantalone, Gratiano, Zanni, Pedrolino, Francatrippa, Burattino, Capitan Cardone, and Franceschina, thus transforming the scene of an out of control madwoman into one of fully measured theatrical buffoonery, a moment of loss that could have led to a tragic Ophelia-like death and instead resolved into comic brilliance.61 The audience was mesmerized.

The Female Stage To better situate the phenomenon of Andreini as prima donna, I would like to retrace chronologically the early presence of women performing on the Italian stage, drawing from contemporary documents. At the lower social level, there had never been a problem for women belonging to troupes of mountebanks to act. Together with their companions, they would set their scene in a square on an easily raised wooden stage, often with no background decoration, with or without masks, and with the accompaniment of such instruments as the lute and guitar. Because of the peripatetic and public nature of these appearances, however, the sexual reputation of these performers was consistently impugned.62 The matter was different when daughters or wives of patrons or court ladies recited in the palazzo or within its courtyard with their own circle of friends. They were providing an exclusive, sought-after entertainment for their peers, after all, and if the play staged was a classical one and could be declaimed in Latin, then so much the better, since courtly women’s education could be displayed and the “excellence” of the female sex emphasized. For instance, in May 1482 in the Este court 2002), 103–5; and Eric Nicholson, “Ophelia sings like a Prima Donna Innamorata: Ophelia’s Mad Scene and the Italian Female Performer,” in Transnational Exchange in Early Modern Theater, ed. Robert Henke and Eric Nicholson (Aldershot, UK, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008), 81–98. 61. The character of the “mad Isabella” soon became so well known, even outside Italy, that Thomas Middleton and William Rowley could easily cast a (fake) mad Isabella in their Jacobean tragedy of 1622, The Changeling; see the edition by Bryan Loughrey and Neil Taylor (London: Penguin, 1988), 345–421. On the subsequent recurrence of the madwoman in the comic and musical theater of the time, see Paolo Fabbri, “On the Origins of an Operatic Topos: The Mad-Scene,” in Con che soavità: Studies in Italian Opera, Song, and Dance, 1580–1740, ed. Iain Fenlon and Tim Carter (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), 157–95. 62. Regarding the itinerant nature of performers, and just to mention some of the Gelosi’s commitments during the year 1579, when Isabella was in the company, we know that the group was in Venice in January, in Ferrara in February, in Mantua some time during the spring (from where they were sent away by Duke Guglielmo Gonzaga), in Milan in June, in Genoa in July and August, and in Ferrara again in November. See Ireneo Sanesi, La commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 95. On itinerant companies and their improvised repertories, see more generally Ferrone, Attori, mercanti, corsari. On female mountebanks, see Bella Mirabella, “Stealing Center Stage: Female Mountebanks, Pseudoscience, and Nonprofessional Theater,” English Language Notes 47, no. 2 (2009): 35–47.

Editor’s Introduction 19 in Ferrara, Anna Sforza, first wife of Duke Alfonso d’Este, played the male part of Hippolito together with five other court ladies in an untitled drama.63 In 1539, at the same court, Anna d’Este, the seven-year-old daughter of Duke Ercole II of Ferrara, recited the male part of Pamphilo in a private representation of Terentius’ Andria. Four years later, in 1543, she was on stage again reciting in Latin with her two sisters, one eight years old and the other six and a half.64 Women also recited in sacred representations held inside the church or outside its steps without much risk to their character, given the revered subject, as when in 1534 twenty-five or thirty girls, ranging in age from thirteen to sixteen, took the parts of virgins, martyrs, and sibyls in front of princes, cardinals, and a public of about five thousand people, “and none of them blushed or feared” the event.65 Women were also used to comment on the action in the tragic chorus, as in Treviso on February 15, 1517, when four women dressed as courtesans and four dressed as nymphs constituted the chorus of the Tragedia by Jacopo da Legname.66 Intermedi or intermezzi, which were often mythological in nature, also used women, and again there was no risk to a woman’s repute in performing these scenes because their acting could hardly be said to have realistic implications. We know, for example, that a woman reciting in an intermezzo preceding Nicola Grasso’s Eutichia, which was staged together with Bernardo Bibbiena’s La calandria in 1514, ran away in the middle of her scene, although she was able to declaim the following evening to the applause of the spectators.67 The issue was different when professional actresses started to appear on stage. A woman named Polonia may have recited in Venice as early as the first 63. A letter by Francesco Bagnocavallo to Isabella d’Este, dated May 21, 1492, informs that “Madonna Anna era Hippolito, la Lionora era la Lionora di Trotti, la serva di Lionora era lo illustrissimo Don Bondeno, la Suxana era la madre di Hipolito, la Lucretia pizolla la compagna della Badessa, la Madalena la Masara di Lionora, lo ill.mo don Julio era lo prectore.” See Egidio Scoglio, Il teatro alla corte estense (Lodi: Biancardi, 1965), 53. 64. From a letter of Duke Ercole II to Cardinal Gonzaga, May 25, 1539: “Voglio che vediate recitare, in secreto però, una comedia ne la quale la mia primogenita donna Anna recita anche lei, et ancor che sia in latino, per esser la Andria de Terenzo, son sicuro che non vi spiacerà una puta di sette anni servir nella persona di Panphilo.” See Scoglio, Il teatro alla corte estense, 93 and 95. 65. “[T]utti li homini uno per uno disseno li soi versi molto posatamente e bene, doppo similmente le giovene: quale veramente furono anchor più degne di laude de li homini, perchè presso al honestà loro monstroreno una gran promptezza, senza mai niuna de loro inrosirsi né temere.” This citation comes from a letter of Lodovico Zuccone dated March 15, 1534; see Alessandro D’Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2 vols. (Turin: Loescher, 1891), 2:434. 66. See D’Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2:123, n. 1. 67. Anon., Codice Vaticano Urbinate, 490, in Vito Pandolfi, Il teatro del Rinascimento e la commedia dell’arte (Rome: Lerici, 1969), 69. We also know that “Barbara fiorentina,” who sang in the intermezzi of Machiavelli’s Clizia in 1525 in Florence, had a liaison with the author. For descriptions of intermezzi in Ferrara in which women apparently recited and sang, see Scoglio, Il teatro alla corte estense.

20 Editor’s Introduction decade of the sixteenth century, but we have no records or further information on her identity.68 Eric Nicholson has argued that female actors performed in Italy as early as the 1540s.69 The Sienese group of intellectuals called Gl’Intronati also used women to play female parts, in which case actresses may have acted as early as 1531 for the play Il sacrificio and 1532 for Gl’Ingannati.70 Siena may have indeed been in the avant garde as far as allowing women to play in comedies. In a book on the Congrega dei Rozzi, Curzio Mazzi described the fines imposed by the authorities (“Officiali di Balia”) against male and female actors who performed a non-identified comedy on January 17, 1542, at a time when prohibitions had been enacted against night “veglie” and the use of masks and cross-dressing.71 Still in Siena, three women, one in the role of a servant and two in the roles of ladies, appeared in a regular comedy on February 8, 1548.72 At other times an informal group, such as that of the Paduan actor Ruzante (Angelo Beolco), traveled with men and women from city to city to perform. We do not know whether the women in Ruzante’s troupe were just used for singing or also for reciting. Cristoforo da Messisbugo, the memorialist of the court banquets for the Este family, wrote that on January 24, 1529, at the dinner to celebrate the marriage of Alfonso d’Este with Renata of France, and in the presence of about one hundred gentlemen, the actor Ruzante performed and sang madrigals “alla pavana” together with five male actors and two women. The fact that in Ruzante’s plays the names of female characters are constant, just as those of male characters who in fact are associated with real men, makes one think that the women 68. See Cesare Molinari, La commedia dell’arte (Milan: Mondadori, 1985), 63. 69. Eric Nicholson, “Romance as Role-Model: Early Female Performances of Orlando Furioso and Gerusalemme Liberata,” in Renaissance Transactions: Ariosto and Tasso, ed. Valeria Finucci (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999), 246–69. 70. Keir Elam cites Girolamo Bargagli’s Dialogo dei Giuochi che nelle vegghie senesi si usano di fare (1572), which accounts retrospectively for the Sienese academy’s recruitment of actors: “The [academicians] said that this woman would have imitated well the part of a servant, this other a matron, the young man a parasite, that other a lover, and so went around distributing all the parts that are required in a comedy.” See his “The Fertile Eunuch: Twelfth Night, Early Modern Intercourse, and the Fruits of Castration,” Shakespeare Quarterly 47 (1997): 1–36. Yet a male actor was still playing the woman’s part of Lelia/Fabio in the 1545 staging of Gl’Ingannati in Naples. 71. Curzio Mazzi, La congrega dei Rozzi di Siena nel secolo XVI, 2 vols. (Florence: Le Monnier, 1882), 1:262–63. Some of the actors were exiled, specifically one who had worn a beard in the representation; as for women, the punishment followed sumptuary law legislation, with due consideration given to the degree of their transgression. Those who had simply come to see the comedy were forbidden to wear gold and elaborate clothes for up to three months; those who had acted, such as Madonna Francesca Petroni and Madonna Lisabetta di Giovanni Borghesi, had the prohibition extended to six months. For Madonna Eufrasia di Messer Lodovico Borghesi, however, who had cross-dressed as a servant and thus jumped across social classes, the punishment had to last a year. 72. See Leo Košuta, “Siena nella vita e nell’opera di Marino Darsa,” Ricerche slavistiche 9 (1961): 67–121, at 78–80.

Editor’s Introduction 21 also acted, even though they may have sung rather than spoken most words.73 Pastoral plays, too, were occasionally opened to women’s performance early in the sixteenth century, as when in the Chigi palace in Rome in July 1512 a pastoral representation was held in which boys and girls from Siena recited.74 The first official document in which a group of men signed a contract to perform for a fee, not in a court but in a city (in this case, Padua and Venice) and as professional actors, is dated February 25, 1545.75 Rulers understood quite correctly that supporting theater was important; it provided popular entertainment that offered escapism, especially for young men, and kept the city safer. They eagerly sponsored performances, chiefly during Carnival time.76 Such was especially the case of Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga, who made of Mantua the capital of entertainment in Italy from the 1580s until his death in 1612.77 Commedia 73. Giorgio Padoan thinks that Ruzante’s company was mixed. See “Angelo Beolco da Ruzante a Puerdoçimo,” in Momenti del Rinascimento Veneto (Padua: Antenore, 1978), 94–192, at 178–79, n. 272. Singing, just like dancing, was not reserved to intermezzi in Ruzante’s plays, but was spread out throughout the play. Ronnie Ferguson argues that the baring of Betia’s back in La Betia met with the public’s disapproval, most probably, because a woman was reciting that part. See The Theatre of Angelo Beolco (Ruzante): Text, Context and Performance (Ravenna: Longo, 2000), 182–83. 74. “[R]ecitata da alcuni putti et putte senesi, che molto ben dissero, e fu bella materia.” This information is contained in a letter to Isabella d’Este in D’Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2:81. 75. The contract involves eight actors signing in the presence of a notary to recite comedies between Easter 1545 and Carnival 1546. Provisions in the contract included the sharing of money, the substitution of sick actors, even the buying of a horse to transport their stuff (“robe”). See Ester Cocco, “Una compagnia comica della prima metà del secolo XVI,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 65 (1915): 55–70. Another contract among some of the same actors as well as new ones was signed in Padua in 1549, in which the actor Checo, a blacksmith from Concariola, was engaged in performing women’s parts (“che fa da dona”). For the text of these contracts, see “Primi contratti,” in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della commedia dell’arte, 184–93. The number of eight or nine actors constitutes a constant in Compagnia dell’Arte groups, a far cry from the elaborately expensive, but rarely repeated, court-sponsored representations. At a staging in the Este court in Ferrara of classic Latin comedies such as the Eunucus, Trinummo, and Poenulus, there were, for example, 133 actors; 144 were then employed in the Intermezzi at the cost of about two thousand ducats. See Guido Davico Bonino, Il teatro italiano II: Le Commedie del Cinquecento, I (Turin: Einaudi, 1977), xi; and D’Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2:127–37. 76. As Antonio Ceruto put it in a letter to Guglielmo, Duke of Mantua, in 1567, some Venetian gentlemen had proposed that companies should be welcomed because “mentre la gioventù sta ocupata in quei solazzi non tendono alli giochi, alle biasfeme et altre tristitie, et che se guadagnano spendono ancora, et che le città si deveno tenere alegre a qualche modo.” See Burattelli, Landolfi, and Zinanni, eds., Comici dell’Arte, I, 183. 77. As a historian reported, “Per tutto [Mantua] si vedevano feste, corsi, giostre, maschere, conviti, tornei, commedie, musiche, delizie, balli e danze…. In Mantova stava collocato il regno de’ piaceri e de’ trattenimenti, … le commedie con parole e attioni piene dell’arti d’Ovidio: l’Andreine e le Florinde sopra le scene, le cantatrici ne’ palagi con un lamento d’Armida o d’Arianna e co’ versi d’Angelica e Medoro.” See Scipione Agnelli, Gli annali di Mantova, scritti da Scipione Agnello Maffei, vescovo di

22 Editor’s Introduction dell’Arte was born as a combination of street buffoonery (coming from companies such as those of the mattaccini, which used to dance comic parts, and those of zanni for comic relief) and improvised recitation by itinerant professional actors. But it became popular only when it was evident that the presence of women on stage added considerably to the finances of the group and to the enjoyment of the spectators. This is explicitly what made the compagnie dell’arte successful. Even before women were allowed on stage, when young boys performed female parts, just the sound of a woman’s voice from behind a courtain—and not yet her presence—was sufficient to attract spectators and motivate them to pay, or so recounts an outspoken critic of women on stage, Gian Domenico Ottonelli. He notes that the comic Sivelli would occasionally have a feminine voice heard behind the curtains. That way, without ever showing on the stage a woman or a young boy dressed as a woman, “he was liked very much by the spectators and was praised and admired by everybody.”78 The presence and success of women, in return, motivated actors to perform in new roles more attuned to daily life and concerns.79 Within twenty years professional Italian troupes were so much renowned that Massimo Troiano, an intellectual at the court of the Duke of Baviera, was sent to Italy to engage some of them.80 The kinds of recitation, dance, and music that women performed in these new Compagnies had been already popularized by “honest courtesans” reciting in private salons and academies. In 1614 Pier Maria Cecchini wrote that actresses Casale (Tortona: Nicoló e fratelli Viola, 1675), 931–32. See also Roberto Tessari, “Il teatro a Mantova tra 1563 e 1630: Una mirabile galleria dell’effimero,” in Gonzaga: La Celeste Galleria, vol. 2: L’esercizio del collezionismo, ed. Raffaella Morselli (Milan: Skira, 2002), 177–83. 78. “Quel valente comico faceva alle volte la commmedia da sé solo, rappresentando varii personaggi … e quando voleva rappresentare una donna non si vestiva da donna, ma faceva sentir dentro la scena la voce femminile. E così, tirando tutta l’azione sino a fine, senza far vedere mai femmina o giovanetto vestito da femmina, piaceva molto agli spettatori e da tutti era lodato et ammirato.” See Domenico Ottonelli, Della christiana moderatione del theatro, in Taviani, La commedia dell’arte e la società barocca, 395. See also the long note by Ferdinando Taviani on the use of masks in the Commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 451. It pays to add that this praise by Ottonelli comes after he fully realized that his preference for boys on stage acting the part of women, as in the English theater, was problematic. In 1641 he was shown a letter from Venice describing how a young transvestite was mutilated. He approved of such a punishement for sodomy, but he also understood the enormity of the retaliation and came out against the dressing of boys in feminine attire. See Joseph Connors, “Chi era Ottonelli?” In Pietro da Cortona. Atti del Convegno internazionale (Roma/Firenze 12–15 novembre 1997) ed. Christoph Frommel and Sebastian Schütze (Milan: Electa, 1998), 29–35, at 31. 79. As Taviani suggests: “È lecito immaginare, infatti, che siano state proprio le attrici ad aprire la strada ad un nuovo tipo di uomini pronti a divenire attori e ad attrarli nelle compagnie, non solo per amore, ma anche per consonanza di studi e di cultura.” See “Strategie di difesa e di mercato,” in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’arte, 339. 80. See Cesare Molinari, La commedia dell’arte, 66.

Editor’s Introduction 23 had started to play in public fifty years earlier. Indeed, on October 10, 1564, Lucrezia da Siena (domina Lucretia Senensis)—perhaps an “honest courtesan,” as her classic first name and no identifiable last name would imply—signed a contract in Rome with a company of performers that included six men in her house (“in domo dicte domine Lucretie”) for performances at the Carnival of the following year.81 Soon after, actresses became the rage: Flaminia Romana may have started acting by 1556, if we believe a note by the Mantuan playwright Leone De’ Sommi; by 1567 she appears to be the director of her own company (“Compagnia della Flaminia”), with which one Sunday she performed in Mantua the part of Dido, changed from tragedy to tragicomedy. She was fond of playing strong women’s parts drawn from Ariosto’s Orlando furioso, and we have records of her acting both the part of the woman warrior Marfisa in 1566 and that of the vengeful Drusilla of the Marganorre story in 1567.82 Her success was such that the Podestà of the city had to forbid notaries to go to her performances because it was impossible to find lawyers during the hours of her show.83 A woman from Rome, “a young comedian with whom many fell in love, one who plays the moresche well, and the Forze d’Ercole even better, not a very good looking one, but graceful,” performed in Mantua on August 6, 1562.84 The Venetian Vincenza Armani, who played comic, tragic, and pastoral parts, had entire communities rush to see her performances because of the power of her interpretations. She acted in both male and female roles, and recited as well as sang the allegorical parts of Mercury, Apollo, Venus and Minerva. When she performed tragic parts—a thorough novelty, since tragic roles were customarily forbidden to actresses—she dressed in black. Armani was also a sound improviser, and was praised by De Sommi for being able, each night in Mantua in 1567, to handle a new improvised subject (“un soggetto nuovo da recitar all’improvviso”) 81. Pier Maria Cecchini, Discorsi intorno alle Comedie, Comedianti e Spettatori (Vicenza: Domenico Amadio, 1614). On Senensis, see Cesare Molinari, La commedia dell’arte, 73. The same date, 1564, is given by Mario Apollonio, Storia della Commedia dell’Arte (Rome and Milan: Augustea, 1930), 93. The text of the contract is in Emilio Re, “Commedianti a Roma nel secolo XVI,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 63 (1914): 291–300, at 299–300. The other actors, beside Lucrezia, are Gian Carlo Guarnera, Alfonso Castaldo, Michelangelo Coletti, Marco Antonio de Gabiati, Domenico de’ Rossi di Forlì, and Claudio Orsino. The contractors call themselves “commedianti,” which makes us think that they were already professional. 82. See D’Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2:447–49; Nicholson, “Romance as Role-Model,” 246–48; and Richard Andrews, “Isabella Andreini and Others: Women on Stage in the Late Cinquecento,” in Women in Italian Renaissance Culture and Society, ed. Letizia Panizza (London: Legenda, 2000), 316–33. 83. “[P]erché in quell’ora non poteva avere notaio alcuno.” In Faccioli, ed., Mantova: Le Lettere, 2:571. 84. The mention is in a letter by Baldassarre da Preti to Ercole Gonzaga, Archivio di Stato di Mantova, Gonzaga, busta 1941, c.n.n.; see Claudia Burrattelli, Spettacoli di corte a Mantova tra Cinque e Seicento (Florence: Le Lettere, 1999), 219.

24 Editor’s Introduction when performing a “canovaccio,” that is, any one of a set of possible plots and costumes that actors could draw from a well-known repertory.85 Her arrival in a city for a performance was preceded by a gun salvo, and all the authorities would come to greet her. Princes competed in having her at their courts, and knights entered tournaments for her sake. Her death in 1569 of poison, perhaps an act of vengeance by an unsuccessful pursuer, elicited consternation among her admirers and a lengthy eulogy from her fellow actor Adriano Valerini.86 The “divina” Vittoria Piissimi’s performances in Venice in 1574 before Henri III of Valois were considered so spectacular that she and her company were soon invited to France, where they performed in January in Blois and later in Paris in 1576–77.87 Pierre de l’Estoile complained in his Memoirs-Journaux (1574–1611) about the powerful influence of the Italian players on the court of Henri III, citing women’s licentiousness in attire: “in truth their influence was so great, principally among the young ladies, that they took to showing their breasts.”88 Piissimi, who was dubbed “La Cingana” for playing gypsy parts, was also called to recite in 1581 at the wedding of Vincenzo Gonzaga and Margherita Farnese. At that time, and again in 1576 and in 1589, Piissimi not only recited with Andreini’s company of the Gelosi, but also directed the Compagnia dei Confidenti between 1579 and 1581, a troupe in which Diana Ponti (called Lavinia) appeared briefly in 1582 and Isabella Andreini in 1589. We have records of other actresses who performed in that company in the 1580s, such as Giulia Bolico in 1583, and Angela Salomoni and Angela Martinelli in 1587 and 1588. The company went to Spain in 1587–88. Bolico, called Giulia Brolo, was recommended by Vincenzo Gonzaga in 1589 as a good actress. She also belonged, as did Vittoria Piissimi for many years, to the 85. See I canovacci della commedia dell’arte, ed. Anna Maria Testaverde (Turin: Einaudi, 2007), as well as Testaverde’s rich introduction and illustrations. 86. What we know about Armani comes mostly from an actor in her company: see Adriano Valerini’s Oratione … in morte della Divina Signora Vincenza Armani (Venice: Sebastiano and Giovanni Dalle Donne, fratelli, 1570), in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 132–40. Armani died of poison at the peak of her career, having recited to great acclaim in Rome, Florence, Siena, Vicenza, Padua, Parma, Mantua, and Venice, among other cities. She often interpreted parts taken from Ariosto’s chivalric romance. See Nicholson, “Romance as Role-Model,” and D’Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2:450. Before Armani, Valerini was connected to the equally famous actress Lidia da Bagnocavallo. 87. On the ceremonial welcoming of Henri III in Venice (he was on route to Reims to be crowned), when acting groups and music players recited on floating platforms in front of the Ca’ Foscari palace where Henri resided, an event that initiated the strong French fascination for Italian Compagnie dell’Arte, see the chapter “His Most Christian Majesty” in Iain Fenlon, The Ceremonial City: History, Memory and Myth in Renaissance Venice (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2007). 88. Pierre de L’Estoile, The Paris of Henry of Navarre as Seen by Pierre de l’Estoile, ed. and trans. Nancy Lyman Roelker (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1958), 59–60. On Piissimi’s visit to France with the Gelosi, see also Sanesi, La commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 94; and Garzoni, “De comici,” in La piazza universale.

Editor’s Introduction 25 Compagnia degli Uniti, which later contracted such actresses as Margherita Pavoli in 1592, a still not properly identified “Aurelia” in 1593, and Angelica Alberghini, as well as the duo Virginia and Lucilla Maloni, in 1594. Virginia Maloni was also part of the Compagnia dei Gelosi in 1596, and according to Ireneo Sanesi she must have been a prestigious figure in the group at the time because only her name appears in the license to play that the Senate of Genoa issued to the Gelosi on May 20, 1596.89 Diana Ponti was the most admired member of the Compagnia de’ Desiosi, so much so that it was called the Compagnia della Diana. In Mantua in 1585 she performed for Duke Vincenzo. Although she played for the Compagnia dei Confidenti in 1582, she remained with the Desiosi until a temporary move to France in 1600–1601 with the Compagnia degli Accesi.90 Marina Antonazzoni, a Venetian, also performed at the same time as Armani and Andreini.91 Virginia Ramponi (1583–1629/30), daughter-in-law of Isabella Andreini, was the prima donna innamorata of the Compagnia dei Fedeli, which she formed with her husband, Giovan Battista, in 1601. She was known not only as an actress under the name of La Florinda, for a part she played famously in 1603, but also as a poet and singer. Called upon to substitute at the last minute for the soprano Caterina Martinelli, the lead female singer in Monteverdi’s operatic masterpiece Arianna (staged for the marriage of Francesco Gonzaga and Margherita of Savoy), she learned her part to such great effect in just six days, according to contemporary critics, that “no one in the audience failed to be touched, and there was no woman who did not shed a few tears when she cried.”92 By 1613 her company was in France to perform for Marie de Medici, and remained there for a year to stage plays at the Louvre, at the Hotel de Bourgogne, and in Fontainebleau.93 Famous also were the fits of jealousy between her and another actress of the company, 89. Sanesi, La commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 96. 90. Sanesi, La commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 97. For general information on actresses performing on stage, see Bartoli, Notizie istoriche de’ comici italiani, 1:50–53. 91. See Rasi, I comici italiani, 1:169–84; and Elena Povoledo, “I comici professionisti e la commedia dell’arte: Caratteri, tecniche, fortuna,” in Storia della cultura veneta, vol. 4/1: Il Seicento, ed. Girolamo Arnaldi and Manlio Pastore Stocchi (Vicenza: Neri Pozza, 1983), 381–408, at 396. 92. “[N]on si trovò ascoltante alcuno che non s’intenerisse, né fu pur una dama che non versasse qualche lagrimetta al suo bel pianto.” Cited in Faccioli, Mantova: Le Lettere, 2:584. On Ramponi, see Nino Pirrotta, “Commedia dell’arte and Opera,” in Music and Culture in Italy from the Middle Ages to the Baroque (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984), 343–60; Emily Wilbourne, “ ‘Isabella ringiovanita’: Virginia Ramponi Andreini before Arianna,” Recercare 19 (2007): 47–71; and Alessandro Ademollo, La bell’Adriana ed altre virtuose del suo tempo alla corte di Mantova: Contributo di documenti per la storia della musica in Italia nel primo quarto del Seicento (Città di Castello: Lapi, 1888), 42–44 and 71–75. Ramponi also sang the title role in 1611 in another Monteverdi opera, Il rapimento di Proserpina. 93. Sanesi, La commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 106.

26 Editor’s Introduction Virginia Rotari (also called Lidia), a long-time lover of her husband, whom he married upon her death in 1628. Orsola Cecchini, called La Flaminia, played Angelica in Pazzia d’Orlando with the Compagnia degli Accesi, and employed a particularly tragic brand of female insanity, one different from the comic type played by Andreini. She also liked to play male parts, and there is a record of her shooting with the “archibugio” (the harquebus, or matchlock gun).94 As we see from the excursus above, actresses signed contracts, traveled to foreign lands, performed both on temporary stages in squares for a fee and at courts in front of princes and kings, and were invited to perform regularly in dukes’ or duchesses’ private chambers.95 The presence of good actresses was cited as a reason for wanting to join a company, as in the case of a woman called Aurelia (her last name is unknown) who wanted to join the Uniti, which she called “la Compagnia di Vittoria,” “hoping to advance herself in the profession following such an important woman.”96 Italy was the place to be if one wanted to see women on stage, whether on the musical or the dramatic stage. Writing about Venice in 1610, the English traveler Thomas Coryate marveled at what he saw being played in the open: “Here I observed certaine things that I never saw before. For I saw women acte, a thing that I never saw before, though I have heard that it hath beene sometimes used in London, and they performed it with as good a grace, action, gesture, and whatsoever convenient for a Player as ever I saw any masculine Actor.”97 Or we can see how in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Lord Polonius could present 94. Information on Cecchini is in Raccolta di varie rime in lode della Sig. Orsola Cecchini nella compagnia degli Accesi detta Flaminia. Al molto illustrissimo Sig. Alessandro Brivio (Milan: Giovanni Battista Alzato, 1608). On her using a gun on stage, see 35. As well, the actress Angela D’Orso played the part of a captain leading soldiers to an attack; see Bartoli, Notizie istoriche de’ comici italiani, 2:68. See also Ferdinando Taviani, “Un vivo contrasto. Seminario su attrici e attori della Commedia dell’Arte,” Teatro e storia 1 (1986): 25–75. 95. For example, in 1578 the Uniti recited in the “camera della signora Duchessa d’Urbino,” according to a letter by Bernardo Carigiani, the Medici representative at the Este Court in Ferrara. See Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 100. 96. “[S]perando con la scorta di sì gran donna di poter avanzarsi nella professione.” See Sanesi, La commedia, in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 103. On women’s performances in dramatic representations, see also Lisa Sampson, “ ‘Drammatica Secreta’: Barbara Torelli Benedetti’s Partenia (c. 1587) and Women in Late Sixteenth-Century Theatre,” in Theatre, Opera and Performance in Italy from the Fifteenth Century to the Present: Essays in Honour of Richard Andrews, ed. Brian Richardson, Simon Gilson, and Catherine Keen (Leeds: Society for Italian Studies, Occasional Papers 6, 2004), 99–115. 97. Thomas Coryate, Coryat’s Crudities (London, 1611), 247. Coryate may have been wrong about the presence of actresses on the London stage, since they only began appearing when the theaters reopened in 1660. See Stephen Orgel, Impersonations: The Performance of Gender in Shakespeare’s England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 4–7. See also Michael Shapiro, “The Introduction of Actresses in England: Delay or Defensiveness?” in Enacting Gender on the English Renaissance Stage,

Editor’s Introduction 27 an Italian Commedia as having “the best actors in the world either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comic, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comic-historical-pastoral, scene individable, or poem unlimited. Seneca cannot be too heavy, nor Plautus too light.”98 As could be expected, the new, fashionable, and actively sought after presence of actresses on stage raised immediate concerns regarding their morality. This is the main reason why Andreini felt it was so important to defend her virtue in the dispute with Petrarch’s Laura, detailed earlier. Reflecting Counter-Reformation pangs, the philosopher and theologian Francesco Maria Del Monaco, for example, rabidly denounced the presence at that time of any woman on any sort of stage—comic, tragic, or musical—for where there was a woman in public there was an invitation to licentiousness.99 For Giovanni Domenico Ottonelli, actresses were dangerous because their presence on stage inevitably increased “the carnal triumphs of dishonesty.”100 Similarly trenchant, the Jesuit Pietro Gambacorta exposed the lure of the actress who, feigning madness, could freely expose herself.101 And Domenico Gori was no less acerbic: in comedy “all is a preparation to lasciviousness—the effeminate music, the plots, the gestures … so that when the actress arrives, the spectator is so enfeebled by what has taken place earlier that it

ed. Viviana Comensoli and Anne Russell (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 177–200, at 188; and Frances Barasch, “Italian Actresses in Shakespeare’s World: Vittoria and Isabella,” Shakespeare Bulletin 19, no. 3 (2001): 5–9. But actresses of Italian troupes were allowed to perform in London. 98. William Shakespeare, Hamlet, ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2012), 2.2. 99. “[D]ovunque c’è una donna, specie se è particolarmente bella e graziosa (come sono per lo più quelle che si fanno recitare nei teatri), lì vi è sempre un incitamento alla libidine.” See Francesco Maria Del Monaco, Actores et spectatores comoediarum nostri temporis paraenesis (Padua: Lorenzo Pasquati, 1621). 100. “Et invero una femmina, comica di professione, perita nell’arte, pratica della scena, formosa per natura, speciosa per artificio et ornata con pompa e con vanissima diligenza, una tal femmina, dico, come non recherà gravissimo danno a molte anime deboli di virtù?…come non accrescerà le vittorie lascive et i carnali trionfi della disonestà?… A chi dice la comica è bella, ma pudica, io rispondo prima con Iuvenale: Rara est concordia formae, atque pudicitiae.” See Giovanni Domenico Ottonelli (1584–1620), Della pericolosa conversatione con le donne, ò poco modeste, ò ritirate, ò cantatrici, ò accademiche … ove si risolvono molti casi di coscienza (Florence: Luca Franceschini and Alessandro Logi, 1646), in Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 169. 101. “Comparisce vera donna, giovane, bella, ornata lascivamente, la quale essendo con attenzione mirata, senza che vi fusse altro, questo solo è manifesto pericolo di rovina alla gioventù: il sangue bolle, gli anni son verdi, la carne è viva, le passioni ardenti, et i diavoli pronti…. Che sarà poi udire la donna parlare? e d’amore? …. Che sarà vedere che l’adultero chiede un bacio, e l’ottiene? Che sarà che la donna, fingendosi pazza, comparisce mezzo spogliata, o con veste trasparente?” From “Trattato sopra le commedie mercenarie oscene” (1585, unpublished), now in Taviani, La commedia dell’arte e la società barocca, xci.

28 Editor’s Introduction is impossible to morally resist.”102 But Nicolò Barbieri defended actresses by stating that the stage offered representations of reality, not reality itself.103 And a role for women in tragedies, although only for those with a happy ending (“tragedie a lieto fine”), was also advocated in writing by the early 1550s by Giovambattista Girardi Cinzio, with the proviso, however, that the actress be alone on stage to give free rein to her amorous passion as if she were in her own room.104 As in the scene of the madwoman that Andreini played in Florence, the very act of performance meant that the new actresses had to invent the details of the stories they were representing, because the entire stage production historically preceding their entrance on stage was practically non-existent for them: the roles of female characters had previously been created for men, not women, to play. Countless plots had presented adolescent girls (which could be easily played by cross-dressed boy actors) or older serving maids in comic roles (played humorously or coarsely, often by older actors specializing in the lewd character of Franceschina), but no adult, serious, credible woman.105 Thus, the way that the new flesh-and-blood female comedians behaved, dressed, moved, talked, lived, and died on stage had to be literally produced from scratch. Here is one example of the adjustment: in the set Renaissance stages of the time, all actions routinely took place outside, in the main square, and thus it was unlikely that real-life marriageable women could be found unaccompanied in public in order to further a love interest. The new actresses, therefore, invented an original way to present themselves as chaste: they would be on the balcony or by a window of a house in the main square, visible but inside, able to talk but unavailable to the touch, seemingly exposed to the passer-by’s gaze but safeguarded by the walls of their home.106 To give another example, we know that in the traditional Renaissance stage, boy 102. Whatever is done in comedy “è preparativo a lascivia: le musiche effiminano, le narrative, i gesti, etc., tanto che quando arriva la femmina che recita, altrui si trova tanto debole per le precedenti cose, che moralmente è impossibile resistere.” See Domenico Gori, Trattato contro alle commedie lascive (1604), in Ferdinando Taviani, La commedia dell’arte e la società barocca, 139. See also Bernadette Majorana, “Finzioni, imitazioni, azioni: donne e teatro.” In Donna, disciplina, creanza cristiana dal XV al XVII secolo: Studi e testi a stampa, ed. Gabriella Zarri (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1996), 121–39. 103. Nicolò Barbieri, La Supplica. Discorso famigliare di Nicolò Barbieri detto Beltrame, diretta a quelli, che scrivendo ò parlando trattano de’ comici, trascurando i meriti delle azzioni virtuose (Venice: Marco Ginammi, 1634). 104. Giovanni Battista Giraldi Cinzio, “Discorso overo Lettera di Giovambattista Giraldi Cinzio intorno al Comporre delle Comedie e delle Tragedie,” in Scritti critici, ed. Camillo Guerrieri-Crocetti (Milan: Marzorati, 1973), 169–224, at 218. 105. Franceschina was also played occasionally by actresses. In the Gelosi, Silvia Roncagli had that role. 106. See Jane Tylus, “Women at the Windows: ‘Commedia dell’Arte’ and Theatrical Practice in Early Modern Italy,” Theatre Journal 49, no. 3 (1997): 323–42.

Editor’s Introduction 29 actors playing the part of adolescent women declared their puppy love in public; when actresses started to recite, however, their expressions of longing and anguish acquired a new, definitely feminine, and more mature tone as if real lives where being presented. The public rushed to see women perform because they could identify with what was being represented. As a result, Commedia dell’Arte troupes multiplied. Andreini’s son, Giovan Battista, made the point clear: “What could possibly be more lifeless than a comedy recited by men only? Don’t you see that the removal [of women] also removes the verisimilitude, heart and soul [of the drama], its very grace and feeling?”107 Andreini performed both in premeditate comedies, with plots written out in their entirety, and in improvised comedies, with plots lightly sketched, which allowed her to adjust her humor and delivery as needed and in constant feedback with her public or her patron.108 As typical for a prima donna, she never wore a mask. Among the possible roles for an actress, the pastoral was the most promising as a female-friendly genre, offering the same protection for women as a closed room, balcony, or window because it was predicated on the notion of a pristine, innocent nature. Here, nymphs (there are no real girls or women in the pastoral) could roam freely in the woods as long as they limited themselves to talk, sing, dance, and hunt. It is the genre that Andreini shrewdly chose for her play Mirtilla.

The Pastoral Play The pastoral is a conservative, low genre that according to its most famous practitioner, Giambattista Guarini, chooses not to deal with the “atrocious events, blood and death, which are horrible to see and inhuman; nor does it make us so

107. Giovan Battista Andreini, La Ferza, in Marotti and Romei, La Commedia dell’Arte e la società barocca, 510. For pictorial records of actresses in Commedia dell’arte, see M. A. Katritzky, “Reading the Actress in Commedia Imagery,” in Women Players in England, 1500–1660: Beyond the All-Male Stage, ed. Pamela Allen Brown and Peter Parolin (Aldershot, UK, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2005), 109–43. 108. On the importance of improvisation for the new actresses, see especially Taviani and Schino, Il segreto della Commedia dell’Arte, 339: “All’inizio sono loro, le attrici, ad incarnare il livello più nobile di quel che presto diventerà il simbolo della Commedia dell’Arte: l’improvvisazione.” See also Andrea Perrucci, Dell’arte rappresentativa premeditata, ed all’improvviso. Giovevole non solo a chi si diletta di rappresentare, ma a’ Predicatori, Oratori, Accademici e Curiosi (Naples: Michele Luigi Mutio, 1699); Kathleen McGill, “Improvisatory Competence and the Cueing of Performance: The Case of the Commedia dell’Arte,” Text and Performance Quarterly 10 (1990): 111–22; as well as McGill, “Women and Performance: The Development and Improvisation by the Sixteenth-Century Commedia dell’Arte,” Theater Journal 43 (1991): 59–69.

30 Editor’s Introduction unrestrained in laughter that we sin against modesty.”109 Unlike comedy, a genre subversive by nature, or tragedy, a genre not particularly suited to the “bourgeois” Italian imagination and too lugubrious to be sponsored by rulers, the pastoral flourished because it offered a pleasant integration of virtuous shepherds and of similarly virtuous and gentle (yet headstrong) nymphs engaged in innocent pastimes or in pondering amorous issues. The educated shepherds (not to be confused with the rougher country bumpkins or goatherds inhabiting the same locales) could be thought of as citizens of cultivated background who had moved away from court intrigue in the city to live in the never-never land of an elegiac, Arcadian setting populated by trees, an occasional hut, a fountain, and in some sophisticated plays also a temple. They could spend their time hunting, singing, playing music, dancing, and engaging in amiable conversations, confident that the weather was always perfect, simple food was forever available, and no war or even skirmish was looming on the horizon. In this fashion, shepherds could replace their often-problematic allegiance to a ruler or a figure of authority in the city with a commitment to rustic values and a celebration of the union of man and nature. Their most urgent problem was typically unreciprocated love, but all ended well as every play brought back harmony in its last act. This development—love leading to a sanctified union—was argued for reason of “decorum” in Guarini’s Il Pastor Fido, and enthusiastically followed by female playwrights. The pastoral’s bland social commentary, escapist nature, artificial settings, possibilities of recombining different actions (Louise George Clubb justly speaks of “theatergrams”), familiarity of repertory, and its seeming approval of court ideology made it the entertainment of choice at court, festivals, and wedding celebrations.110 109. Giovanni Battista Guarini, Il Verato secondo ovvero replica dell’Attizzato Accademico ferrarese in difesa del Pastor Fido (Florence: Filippo Giunti, 1593), in Opere, 3:1–384 (Verona: Giovanni Alberto Tumermani, 1738), at 198–99. On Guarini’s “rewriting” of Tasso’s topoi in Aminta, see Matteo Residori, “ ‘Veder il suo in man d’altri’: Note sulla presenza dell’Aminta nel Pastor fido,” Chroniques italiennes 5 (2004): 1–15. 110. As Jane Tylus puts it, “the location of the courtly ethos in a pastoral sphere tended to naturalize—and eventually neutralize—the ruling ideology.” See “Veiling the Stage: The Politics of Innocence in Renaissance Drama,” Theatre Journal 41, no. 1 (1989): 16–29, at 21. Work on the pastoral is flourishing. See Marzia Pieri, La scena boschereccia nel Rinascimento italiano (Padua: Liviana, 1983); Enrico Carrara, La poesia pastorale (Milan: Vallardi, 1909); Louise George Clubb, Italian Drama in Shakespeare’s Time (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989); Lisa Sampson, Pastoral Drama in Early Modern Italy: The Making of a New Genre (London: Legenda, 2006); Giovanna Romei, “La commedia dell’arte e la favola pastorale,” in Sviluppi della drammaturgia pastorale nell’Europa del CinqueSeicento, ed. Maria Luisa Chiabò and Federico Doglio (Viterbo: Centro studi sul teatro medioevale e rinascimentale, 1992), 181–99; Laura Riccò, “Ben mille pastorali”: L’itinerario dell’Ingegneri da Tasso a Guarini e oltre (Roma: Bulzoni, 2014); Laura Riccò, L’Arcadia “in mano”: Illustrazioni editoriali della favola pastorale (1583–1678), 2 vols. (Rome: Bulzoni, 2012); Giuseppe Gerbino, Music and the Myth of Arcadia in Renaissance Italy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); and Françoise Lavocat, “Playing Shepherd: Allegory, Fiction, Reality,” in Pastoral and the Humanities: Arcadia Re-Inscribed,

Editor’s Introduction 31 The new form of pastoral in five acts was so successful from the very start that it literally exploded in the mid- to late sixteenth century with more than two hundred plays in circulation.111 The genre employed themes present in classical and Renaissance literature, such as those in Theocritus’ Idylls and in Virgil’s bucolic poetry, the Eclogues; in Ovid’s mixture of myth and transformation in Metamorphoses; in Giovanni Boccaccio’s pastoral fables Ninfale fiesolano and Caccia di Diana; in Francesco Petrarca’s sonnets of love and loss in Rime sparse; in Angelo Poliziano’s Platonic and Orphic Favola d’Orfeo; in Jacopo Sannazaro’s pastoral romance, Arcadia; and in Lodovico Ariosto’s octaves of love, hurt, madness, and quest in Orlando furioso. As Angelo Ingegneri explained in codifying the new genre: With their rustic apparatus and scenery, and with costumes more elegant than pretentious, they [the pastorals] are most pleasing to the eye; and with their soft verse and delicate sentiments, they are most beautiful to the ears and to the intellect. … In permitting onstage young maidens and honest women who are forbidden from comedy, they give a voice to the noblest of affections, not to be disdained by tragedy itself. In sum, as a mean between one sort of poem and the other, they delight many to the point of marvel.112 Many pastorals were never performed and were sent directly to press, sometimes because they were too long; those performed were relatively inexpensive to stage because they required a simple verdant background and a fountain (unlike the dramatic theater, which needed more expensive settings and outfits, as well as a perspective), and the costumes were simple, in accordance with the ed. Mathilde Skoie and Sonia Bjørnstad Velásquez (Bristol: Phoenix, 2006), 65–77. On the repetitive, and thus familiar nature, of staged productions, see Lorenzo Bianconi and Thomas Walker, “Dalla ‘Finta Pazza’ alla ‘Veremonda’: Storia di Febiarmonici,” Rivista italiana di musicologia 10 (1975): 379– 454. More generally on the pastoral, see Robert Henke, Pastoral Transformations: Italian Tragicomedy and Shakespeare’s Late Plays (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1997), and Louis A. Montrose, “Of Gentlemen and Shepherds: The Politics of Elizabethan Pastoral Form,” ELH 50 (1983): 415–59. 111. Louise George Clubb, Italian Plays, 1500–1700, in the Folger Library (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1968), and Marzia Pieri, La scena boschereccia. 112. “Restano adunque le Pastorali, le quali con apparato rustico e di verdura, e con abiti più leggiadri che sontuosi, riescono alla vista vaghissime; che co ‘l verso soave, e colla sentenza dilicata sono gratissime a gli orecchi et all’intelletto …; che, admettendo le vergini in palco e le donne oneste, quello che alle commedie non lice, danno luoco a nobili affetti, non disdicevoli alle tragedie istesse; e che in somma, come mezzane fra l’una e l’altra sorte di poema, dilettano a maraviglia altrui.” See Angelo Ingegneri, Della poesia rappresentativa e del modo di rappresentare le favole sceniche (Ferrara: Vittorio Baldini, 1598), in Ferruccio Marotti, ed., Storia documentaria del teatro italiano: Lo spettacolo dall’Umanesimo al Manierismo (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1974), 276.

32 Editor’s Introduction rustic lifestyle being highlighted.113 The earliest pastorals were staged in private houses, often in the garden during the summer, and under the sponsorship of moneyed patrons and dukes. Only later did they come to be performed in small theaters or on spare stage-sets. They occasionally had choral accompaniment or even intermedi between acts. Actors, amateurs or professional, would also often sing, dance, and play an instrument during the performance.114

Mirtilla: Structure and Themes The year 1588 was momentous in women’s writings, since until then no play— pastoral, comedy, or tragedy—had materialized in print penned by a woman in Italian. Then Andreini’s Mirtilla appeared, as well as Maddalena Campiglia’s pastoral, Flori.115 This achievement would be followed in 1604 by Valeria Miani’s Amorosa speranza (which was already completed by 1598), testifying to the popularity of the genre as a vehicle for women writers.116 Later pastorals by women were Isabetta Coreglia’s Dori (1634) and Erindo il Fido (1650).117 There were also cases of written but unpublished pastorals, such as Partenia by Barbara Torelli, datable to 1586, which has just now been printed for the first time.118 Additionally, there is an anonymous pastoral at the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice referred to as “Tragicomedia pastorale,” written in the 1590s, whose author, it has been 113. The Gelosi, for example, “used no essential scenery in their performances: in the public stanzone they would play in front of drapes and at court they were quite happy to act in front of perspective scenery designed for a different play.” See Michael Anderson, “Making Room: Commedia and the Privatisation of the Theatre,” in The Commedia dell’Arte from the Renaissance to Dario Fo, ed. Christopher Cairns (Lewiston, NY, Queenston, ON, and Lampeter, Wales: Edwin Mellen Press, 1989), 86. But there is also the opposite case of pastorals or other dramatic plays that were performed but never published, as for example Barbara Torelli’s Partenia. On this topic, see Lisa Sampson, “ ‘Non lasciar così facilmente publicar le cose mie’: Manuscript Secular Drama in Sixteenth-Century Italy,” Italian Studies 66 (2011): 161–76. 114. See Pieri, La scena boschereccia, and Sampson, Pastoral Drama in Early Modern Italy, esp. 169–94. 115. Maddalena Campiglia, Flori (Vicenza: Perin Libraro and Tomaso Brunelli, 1588), now in English as Flori, A Pastoral Drama, ed. Virginia Cox and Lisa Sampson, trans. Virginia Cox (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004). See also Lori J. Ultsch, “Epithalamium Interruptum: Maddalena Campiglia’s New Arcadia,” Modern Language Notes 120 (2005): 70–92. 116. For the circumstances leading to the publication of Amorosa speranza and for a reading of the play, see Finucci, “Valeria Miani and the Tragic Genre,” in Miani, Celinda, a Tragedy, 23–25, and Katie Rees, “Satyr Scenes in Early Modern Padua: Valeria Miani’s Amorosa speranza and Francesco Contarini’s Fida Ninfa,” The Italianist 34, no. 1 (2014): 23–53. 117. Isabetta Coreglia, Dori (Naples: Domenico Montanaro, 1634); and Coreglia, Erindo il fido. Favola pastorale (Pistoia: Il Fortunati, 1650). 118. Barbara Torelli Benedetti, Partenia, has been edited and translated by Lisa Sampson and Barbara Burgess-Van Aken as Partenia, a Pastoral Play (Toronto: Iter Inc. and Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2013).

Editor’s Introduction 33 hypothesized, may be Leonora Bernardi from Lucca.119 Finally, we know of three lost and incomplete pastorals composed at the Medici court in the 1590s by Laura Guidiccioni, together with the music director of the court at that time, Emilio de’ Cavalieri. More than new independent works, Guidiccioni’s “La disperazione di Fileno,” “Il satiro,” and “Il gioco della cieca” were adaptations of other writers’ pastorals set to music by Cavalieri and performed between 1588 and 1592.120 Another pastoral by Margherita Asinari Valperga, the daughter of the playwright Federico Asinari, is recorded by a contemporary poet, Muzio Manfredi, as having been composed after reading Torelli’s Partenia, but that too is now lost.121 The plot of Mirtilla offers a complicated, but well linked, set of three stories of shepherds and nymphs living in the woods. Each character starts out pining for the wrong partner or for a self-sufficient, solitary life, but each ends up marrying the correct person, because love is shown as conquering all. In muddling the more streamlined and outwardly tragic plot of its urtext, Tasso’s Aminta, Andreini consciously adds a light comic element, a novelty for women writers.122 The two nymphs Mirtilla and Filli love Uranio, but he loves a third nymph, Ardelia. 119. Leonora Bernardi’s pastoral is going to appear in print soon as Gentlewoman of Lucca, a Pastoral Tragicomedy, ed. Virginia Cox and Lisa Sampson, trans. Virginia Cox and Anna Wainwright (Toronto: Iter Press; Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, forthcoming). Cox’s The Prodigious Muse is a golden source of information regarding the production of women in the late 1500s and early 1600s. See especially the section “Arcadian Adventures: Women Writers and Pastoral Drama,” 92–118. We have to wait a few more years to see a tragedy or a comedy penned by a woman writer. In 1611 Valeria Miani published her tragedy, Celinda, and in 1641 Margherita Costa published her comedy, Li buffoni. Commedia ridicola (Florence: Amador Massi and Lorenzo Landi, 1641). For a modern edition of Li Buffoni, see Commedie dell’Arte, ed. Siro Ferrone, 2 vols. (Milan: Mursia, 1986), 235–359; as well, a bilingual edition (The Buffoons) will soon be published, edited and translated by Sara Diaz and Jessica Goethals (Toronto: Iter Press; Tempe: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, forthcoming). Her poetry has recently been published in a bilingual edition as Voice of a Virtuosa and Courtesan: Selected Poems of Margherita Costa, ed. Natalia Costa-Zalessow and trans. Joan Borrelli (New York: Bordighera Press, 2015). On the difficulty for women to publish in the tragic genre, see Valeria Finucci, “Valeria Miani and the Tragic Genre,” in Celinda, a Tragedy, 1–53. 120. Material on Laura Guidiccioni (1550–1597) is scant, as her dramma per musica are lost, but see MacNeil’s “Introduction” to Selected Poems of Isabella Andreini, 6–7. Guidiccioni was a friend of Andreini and she too participated in the festivities in Florence related to the wedding in 1589 of Ferdinando de’ Medici and Christine de Lorraine by composing the poetry for “Il ballo del Granduca,” performed in the last “Intermezzo” of the play, La pellegrina, by Girolamo Bargagli, with music by Cavalieri. Andreini’s touching verses to commemorate her death in Rime (1601) have already been referred to above. 121. See Manfredi, Cento lettere scritte da Mutio Manfredi, 76. The information is in Cox, The Prodigious Muse, 254. 122. Women writers who benefited in creating their own ironic and comic voice after the success of Mirtilla were, for example, Valeria Miani in her pastoral, Amorosa speranza, and Margherita Costa in her comedy, Li buffoni.

34 Editor’s Introduction Another shepherd, Iginio, loves Filli, but she refuses him, and thus he is determined to commit suicide. In the end, Filli recognizes his worth, and consents to marry him. Ardelia does not believe in the fulfillment of love and refuses all of Uranio’s advances, but ultimately she realizes the pitfalls of a Narcissus-like selfenamorment and consents to his affection. As for Mirtilla, she gives up Uranio and accepts Tirsi, a shepherd who until then preferred the pleasures of a content life in the woods than those coming from marital love. Convincing him of the happiness that affection brings is a fulsome speech by another shepherd, the happily married Coridone, who hails the “superhuman sweetness” that love produces, for “whoever flees her also flees / his own most precious and noble part,” and “just so well man / can live without her as she can / without man sustain her fragile life.”123 Andreini bathes the speech by Coridone with sensual methaphors, but still makes sex permissible only within the context of married love: I shall speak only of that sweet pleasure which has no limit, of that pleasure when lovers and spouses, after some sighs and some droplets of tears, upon the grass and the flowers feel secure, or in a dark cavern (of the delights of love a faithful minister), and then without fear, without reservation, each shows the other an open heart.124 There is another character portraying the low life of the senses: the goatherd Gorgo, whose main pleasure in life is to engorge himself, thus blurring the lines between being fed by love and being fed by food: Touch is what makes me feel supreme delight whenever I handle fat lambs and calves, and I say, “These will be good to feed my appetite.” But what shall I say about taste? Ah me, I cannot 123. “[A]ncora fugge / di sé la più pregiata e nobil parte,” and “Tanto l’uomo / può viver senza lei, quant’ella puote / senza l’uom sostener sua fragil vita.” In Mirtilla, 4.2.2215–16; and 4.2.2218–20. Pastoral plots became even more intricate in time, as in Guidobaldo Bonarelli’s Filli di Sciro, favola pastorale (Venice: Giovanni Battista Ciotti, 1607). 124. “[D]irò solo / di quel dolce piacere che non ha meta, / di quel piacer, quando gli amanti e sposi, / dopo qualche sospiro e qualche stilla/ di lagrimette, sopra l’erbe e i fiori / sicuri stanno od in spelonca opaca, / dei diletti d’amore / segretaria fedele, / e che senza timor, senza rispetto / mostra ciascuno a l’altro il core aperto,” 4.2.2313–22.

Editor’s Introduction 35 express a word of it, so great is the joy that I feel in merely thinking of the great pleasure one feels in drinking and in eating.125 Mirtilla is highly theatrical, with personalities clearly drawn and dialogues not exceedingly long, although still at times showcasing too many Petrarchan flourishes.126 The two prima donnas of the Gelosi, Andreini and Piissimi, play the main parts: Piissimi that of Ardelia, arguably the best role, Andreini that of Filli and most probably that of Venus in the Prologue.127Andreini knew that her text depended very much on her own acting skills and on those of her company to titillate the audience with repeated hints of sexual desire while keeping the pastoral eminently “safe.”128 Some of the characters in Mirtilla, such as Coridone, display an intellectual bent; as well, the nymphs Filli and Mirtilla are portrayed as entering into a singing contest that is outwardly modeled on Virgil’s classic third eclogue—a sure way to showcase the facility with which the actress Andreini could improvise verses and sing. In the end, love reigns supreme. Although, following the dictates of the genre, it is clear that an idyllic union in the woods is every nymph’s destiny, all female characters are allowed to choose their partner without bending to anybody else’s wishes, a clear change from the majority of comedies and tragedies of the time—and a thoroughly empowering choice for women. Also dramatically interesting is the portrayal of female friendship, since out of compassion and respect female characters forget their rivalry in love and choose to keep their bond of friendship while competing for the affection of the same man. Many pastoral works of the period have themes similar to Andreini’s, as for example Il sacrificio by Agostino Beccari (the first Italian pastoral play, performed in 1554 and printed the following year), and Aretusa by Alberto Lollio.129 125. “Il tatto è quello che mi fa sentire / sommo diletto mentre i grassi agnelli / toccando vado e le vitelle e dico: /queste fien buone all’appetito mio. / Ma che dirò del gusto? Ohimè, non posso / esprimerne parola, tanto è ‘l gaudio / ch’io sento a pensar solo al gran piacere / che si prova nel bere e nel mangiare” (3.1576–83). 126. On the presence of Petrarch in Andreini’s work, see Rosalind Kerr, “Isabella Andreini, Comica Gelosa 1562–1604: Petrarchism for the Theatre Public,” Quaderni d’Italianistica 27, no. 2 (2006): 71– 92. More generally, see Luigi Baldacci, Il petrarchismo italiano nel Cinquecento (Padua: Liviana, 1974). 127. See Franco Vazzoler, “Le pastorali dei comici dell’arte: la Mirtilla di Isabella Andreini,” in Sviluppi della drammaturgia pastorale nell’Europa del Cinque-Seicento, ed. Maria Luisa Chiabò and Federico Doglio (Viterbo: Centro studi sul teatro medioevale e rinascimentale, 1992), 281–99, at 284–85. 128. As well, Valeria Miani in Amorosa speranza suffuses her plot here and there with a somewhat erotic halo, but that is not the case, understandably, for a work by an author of a higher social class, such as Torelli’s Partenia. This play in fact was not even staged in the woods. 129. Agostino Beccari, Il Sacrificio, favola pastorale (Ferrara: Francesco di Rossi da Valenza, 1555); Alberto Lollio, Aretusa, commedia pastorale (Ferrara: Valente Panizza, 1564).

36 Editor’s Introduction Andreini’s nine pastoral eclogues, inserted in her Rime of 1601, also contain elements fully developed in Mirtilla, thus testifying to the varieties of approach to the genre with which she experimented on stage. The characters in the eclogues have common pastoral names, such as Amaranta (Eclogue 2), Nigella (Eclogue 5), Clori (Eclogue 6), Mirtillo (Eclogue 8), and Galatea (Eclogue 9), and the themes she celebrates are common to pastorals: unrequited love, voluntary chastity, bountiful nature, beauty and fear of its loss. The lyrics are sensual and dramatic, and “include elements of described or implied action, which suggests that they may have been composed as short performance texts, to be inserted as intermezzi within longer dramas,” another indication that Andreini always had the stage in mind in her written work.130 The indisputable pastoral play to imitate at the time was, as stated, Torquato Tasso’s Aminta.131 Andreini herself, it has been said, may have performed in a staging of Aminta a few years before the play’s publication, and taken on the cross-dressed role of the shepherd Aminta while the other prima donna within the Gelosi, Vittoria Piissimi, played the part of the nymph Silvia.132 Love as the universal force, which informs the first act of Tasso’s Aminta, echoes clearly in Act 1 and Act 4 of Mirtilla; the issue of attempted suicide and subsequent compassion, moreover, inform both works, although Andreini consistently makes the choice of shifting the potentially tragic elements embedded in Tasso’s pastoral toward the sensual. Mirtilla, however, also provides plenty of contrast with Aminta, because Andreini does not narrate events the way Tasso does, but plays them, and has the two main characters on stage at the same time. As in many pastoral plays, there is a central scene in Mirtilla in which a satyr is determined to rape a nymph.133 In Tasso’s play, the satyr catches the 130. Cox, The Prodigious Muse, 118. 131. Torquato Tasso, Aminta, favola boscareccia (Venice: Aldo Manuzio, 1581). On the popularity of Aminta through the centuries, see Lorenzo Carpanè, “La fortuna editoriale tassiana dal ‘500 ai giorni nostri,” Italianistica 24 (1995): 541–57; on its influence on the pastoral drama in general, see Louise George Clubb, “The Making of the Pastoral Play: Some Italian Experiments between 1573 and 1590,” in Petrarch to Pirandello: Studies in Italian Literature in Honor of Beatrice Corrigan, ed. Julius A. Molinaro (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1973), 45–72. 132. Or so reads Taviani in the verses of Andreini’s contemporary, Gerardo Borgogni: “Né qui si vide Aminta / ch’avea nel volto allor Filli dipinta.” In “Bella d’Asia,” 8. See also Franco Piperno, “Nuovi documenti sulla prima rappresentazione dell’Aminta,” Il castello di Elsinore 13 (2000): 37–38. Aminta was published in 1580 but was first performed in Ferrara in 1573. See Angelo Solerti, Vita di Torquato Tasso, 2 vols. (Turin: Loescher, 1895), 1:191. The idea, however, that Andreini actually performed in Aminta has now been forcefully put down as chronologically difficult by Stefano Mazzoni in “Isabella Andreini: Vicende sceniche e registri d’interprete,” in Isabella Andreini: Una letterata in scena, ed. Carlo Manfio (Padua: Il Poligrafo, 2014), 25–49. 133. The scene of the encounter between a satyr and a nymph was a popular one, given its potential for comic and tragic overtones, and we find it in a variety of authors, such as in Beccari in Il

Editor’s Introduction 37 nymph Silvia, ties her to a tree with her hair, then uses the belt that keeps her dress fastened to secure her hands to the tree. In doing so the nymph’s body is exposed to the viewer, “nude as when she was born” (“ignuda come nacque”).134 This woman in distress waiting to be ravished is described in vibrant Petrarchan verses that do not fail to mention her virgin breast (“sen virginale”) and tender legs (“tenere gambe”), at the same time that the word “rape” (“stupro”) is used not to highlight the scope of the scene but to describe the nymph’s captivity by hair and arm (“di quello stupro era ministro”).135 This rape is avoided providentially when Aminta, shy and modest (“tutto modesto”), runs to untie her.136 In Tasso the scene is recounted, thus evoking eroticism in the spectators while coyly hiding the misogyny that aestheticizes rape. As Silvia is untied, Tasso compares the knots in her hair with the love knots that Aminta feels in his heart, and keeps Aminta on the scene a while longer than necessary: “[He] raised his eyes, / desiring, longing for those lovely limbs, / which seemed so soft and white, as milk is seen / to tremble gently in the rush-wove cups.”137 However, like Angelica and Olimpia, two female predecessors in the abundant Renaissance literature of women waiting to be raped (they were tied naked respectively to a tree and to a rock in Ariosto’s Orlando furioso), Silvia feels still violated and tries to hide her shame by keeping her face down.138 We do not need Freud here to recall the importance in men’s imaginary of women’s hair and the psychoanalytical identification of flowing hair with pubic hair. But do women writers have the same reverent attitude toward women’s hair that male writers seem to have? In Mirtilla the satyr wants to catch Filli in order to rape her, and he states as much: sacrificio, Francesco Contarini in La fida ninfa (Padua: Francesco Bolzetta, 1598), and most famously in Giambattista Guarini in Il pastor fido (Venice: Giovanni Battista Bonfadino, 1590). The Gelosi had the script of this play in 1585. See Marzia Pieri, “Il pastor fido e i comici dell’arte,” Biblioteca teatrale n.s. 17 (1990): 1–15. Here the woman, Corisca, is able to extricate herself from rape, but she does so through cunning rather than fast thinking. The theme is also present in women writers, as in Miani’s Amorosa speranza. Among later pastorals there is also a gang rape on the part of satyrs in Angelo Ingegneri’s Danza di Venere, boscareccia singolare (Vicenza: Domenico Amadio, 1613). 134. I cite from the bilingual edition of Tasso’s Aminta, A Pastoral Play, ed. and trans. Charles Jernigan and Irene Marchegiani Jones (New York: Italica Press, 2000), 3.1.53. 135. “The lovely bands [hair], / which guarded once her virgin breast from view, / became an agent of the rape, for both her hands / were fastened by it to the cruel trunk / … / A supple limb / became a bond, which tightly held each of her tender legs,” Aminta, 3.1.56–63. 136. “O lovely Silvia, / forgive my hands, if they must dare too much / in drawing near the sweetness of your limbs, / for hard necessity moves them to act, / the need to loosen all these knots,” Aminta, 3.1.79–83. 137. Aminta, 3.1.73–76. 138. “She spoke no word,” Tirsi recounts, “disdainful and ashamed, she dropped her eyes / to earth and struggling sought to cover up / her smooth, soft breast, so far as possible, Aminta, 3.1.87–90.

38 Editor’s Introduction Aha, I’ve caught you! Now you won’t be able to flee.… From here you will not depart if to my pains you don’t give some mercy. And if you don’t to my burning heart give some relief, you ingrate, I intend to bind you nude to that hard oak, where in torment you will end your life.139 The scene is in the same position in Mirtilla as in Aminta, at the start of the third act. In Andreini’s play, however, the nymph knows that the best way for women to free themselves from unwelcome or dangerous situations is not to wait to be saved by a man but to try out their cunning and wit. Thus, Filli tells the satyr that she actually loves him, but had earlier shown herself as unavailable simply because of cultural dictates—that is the way women are supposed to respond to male advances. He asks for a kiss. She tells him that she will gladly kiss him, but that he is so strong that she fears his embrace could suffocate her. Instead she proposes to tie his hands to the tree for her own protection: But you, my heart grant me this one thing: that I may bind your arms so that you, from the delight that you will feel in kissing me, might not squeeze me so much that against your will I of you, and you of me would end up deprived.140 When she has him thus secured, she says that she is ready to kiss him, but to better reach him she will hold on to his beard: … But, my heart, you are so big that I cannot reach the desired goal and it is needful that with both hands I cling for a while 139. “V’è che ti giunsi, or non potrai fuggire. /…/ di qui non partirai s’a le mie pene / non dai qualche mercede. / E quando tu non voglia a l’arso core / dar qualche refrigerio, ingrata voglio / nuda legarti a questa dura quercia, / ove con strazio finirai tua vita,” Mirtilla, 3.2.1315–26. 140. “[T]u, cor mio, / concedimi sol questo, ch’io ti leghi / le braccia, perché tu da la dolcezza / che sentirai baciandomi, / tanto non mi stringessi, / che contra la tua voglia / io di te, tu di me restassi privo,” Mirtilla, 3.2.1381–87. The scene of tying the satyr to a tree also occurs in Beccari’s Il sacrificio, as well as in Giovan Maria Avanzi’s Il satiro (Venice: Giovanni Battista Sessa e fratelli, 1587).

Editor’s Introduction 39 to your beautiful beard this way. Bend down your head.141 Needless to say, the satyr winces in pain: Ah me! Be gentle. What do you think you’re doing? You’re ripping off my beard! Stop, stop! … Ah me, don’t pull so hard! Don’t twist my neck, ah me! Truly you’re hurting me.142 In Tasso, a woman’s hair, a common site of femininity, makes for an aestheticized representation—Silvia is helplessly tied with it to a tree trunk—and there is no mention of the possibility that the nymph may be in pain. For Andreini, the emphasis is on a man’s beard, that is, on a traditional sign of manhood, and here pain, rather than imagined as sublime, is the subject of a joke that defines the satyr as naturally savage. Andreini then adds two verses that poke fun at another male stereotype, that of the female breast as a site of beauty and pleasure: with impunity, Filli pulls and squeezes the satyr’s chest with the excuse that she is caressing him: “Oh what soft breast!” To which the satyr replies, wincing, “Don’t pinch so hard! Ah me, don’t do it!” And she retorts: “At last! I can’t hold back / from caressing you!”143 In bringing to the forefront another highly fetishized reminder of female sexuality, the breast, but reversing the gender of the object of attention, Andreini recontextualizes it as a non-signifier of value. The scene ends with Filli having freed herself through her quick thinking and humor, while the satyr remains tied to the tree as he reflects on the relationship between woman’s hair and his being in love, just as in Tasso. As these tightly-linked scenes demonstrate, imitation is always repetition with a difference; in the very act of replicating the author with whom she liked most to be associated, and in a part, moreover, with which she

141. “[C]or mio, / tu sei sì grande ch’io non posso aggiungere / al ben desiderato; ed è bisogno / che con ambe le man m’appigli un tratto / a la tua bella barba: / in questo modo, china bene il capo,” Mirtilla, 3.2.1428–33. 142. “Ohimè fa piano, che ti pensi fare? / tu mi strappi la barba; ferma, ferma. /…/ Ohimè non far sì forte; non mi torcere / il collo, ohimè, da ver, che mi fai male,” Mirtilla, 3.2.1434–40. The whole episode is reminiscent of a similar scene in Miani’s Amorosa speranza, in which the satyr is also tied to a tree, and in a second moment the nymph whom he wanted to violate, Fulgentia, cuts his beard and takes away one of his horns. On the violence that is enacted on this satyr, see Katie Rees, “Female-Authored Drama in Early Modern Padua,” Italian Studies 63, no. 1 (2008): 41–61, especially 50–51. 143. Filli: “Oh che mammelle morbide!” Satyr: “Non pizzicar sì forte, ohimé, non fare.” Filli: “Infine non mi posso contener / d’accarezzarti,” Mirtilla, 3.2.1442–45.

40 Editor’s Introduction was most familiar, Andreini puts gender into the equation and comes out with an entirely different scenario.144 It has been argued that the most interesting figure in the play is not the Mirtilla of the title, but Ardelia, modeled in part on Tasso’s Silvia. When Ardelia first appears at the start of the play, Uranio (who loves her because, he says, she is more beautiful than Filli) describes her by using Petrarch’s well established long canon of attributes, starting with hair so blonde that it can humiliate the sun, descending on lips that are like coral, teeth like lilies, breast like unripe apples, hand long and white, and leg straight and slim. Uranio also finds remarkable the way Ardelia looks around, as well as her words full of wisdom, and her laughter, thus adding a comic element to what is usually presented as a voyeuristic scene (1.1. 352–391). More generally, Ardelia is modeled on Ovid’s Narcissus, given the extended section of her narcissistic mirroring in a fount.145 Here again, what Tasso adumbrated by having the episode recounted by another character (in this case, Dafne), Andreini stages.146 Ardelia’s narcissistic gaze would seem to present the usual objectified, self-absorbed Petrarchan woman, were it not that Andreini creates a space in which Ardelia can claim her autonomous desire. The result is that the woman who mirrors herself in the water is not eroticized through the perspective of an admirer; in addition, the comic supplement of the tears that make it difficult for the nymph to see and admire herself in the pool lightens up the moment: Ah me, ah me! For my greater suffering, while I weep over my pain, the weeping itself 144. The scene of the satyr’s attempted rape has been the most examined in the Mirtilla. See Maria Galli Stampino, “Pastoral Constraints, Textual and Dramatic Strategies: Isabella Andreini’s La Mirtilla and Torquato Tasso’s Aminta,” Italian Culture 22 (2004): 1–19; Meredith Ray, “La castità conquistata: The Function of the Satyr in Pastoral Drama,” Romance Languages Annual 9 (1998): 312–21; Katie Rees, “Satyr Scenes in Early Modern Padua”; and Françoise Decroisette, “Satyres au féminin dans la pastorale italienne de la fin du XVIe siècle,” in La campagna e la città: Letteratura e ideologia nel Rinascimento. Scritti in onore di Michel Plaisance, ed. Giuditta Isotti Rosowsky (Florence: Cesati, 2002), 149–82. More in general, see Ornella Garraffo, “Il satiro nella pastorale ferrarese del Cinquecento,” Italianistica 14 (1985): 185–201. For a brilliant expanded reading of this topic, see Jane Tylus, “Colonizing Peasants: The Rape of the Sabines and the Renaissance Pastoral,” Renaissance Drama 23 (1992): 113–38. 145. Narcissism, that is, the thrust for self-knowledge and the illusion of fulfilling self-love, whether in the male or female version, were common themes in the period and often present in the Andreini clan. Francesco Andreini composed a verse pastoral on the subject, L’alterezza di Narciso [The Pride of Narcissus] (Venice: Giacomo Antonio Somasco, 1611). See Mauro Calcagno, From Madrigal to Opera: Monteverdi’s Staging of the Self (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012), 12. And in its female version, Andreini’s son, Giovan Battista, wrote Amor nello specchio (Paris: Nicolas della Vigna, 1622), staging a woman falling in love with her mirror. 146. Among other contemporary women writers who used the theme of Narcissus, see Maddalena Campiglia for the character of Urania in her Flori, 200–2, and Isabetta Coreglia for the character of Rosalba in her Erindo il Fido.

Editor’s Introduction 41 increases my pain, since by disturbing the water it prevents me from enjoying myself.147 In the original myth, the oracle had predicted that Narcissus would die the moment he came to know himself, but Ardelia will escape from this fountain and will recognize her folly. At the very end, therefore, Andreini makes sure that her character behaves like a woman, although not a submissive one, and has her suddenly fall in love with her suitor, Uranio. The scene comes too fast, to be sure, and Ardelia’s choice of the man whom she had repeatedly rejected in the past is insufficiently foregrounded. Still, even here, Andreini bucks the tradition by having Uranio reassure Ardelia that she can keep her own individuality during their marriage: “in enjoying me, you will enjoy yourself.”148 The same is true for the other two nymphs in the play: Mirtilla puts aside her love for Uranio and moves her affection to Tirsi, not because he has promised her economic security, but because she understands the seriousness of his love when she saves him from throwing himself off a cliff in the mountain (“If you truly intend / to make the plunge, I want / this bosom of mine to be the precipice,” 5. 3016–16); likewise, Filli accepts Igilio because he too is determined to commit suicide if he cannot have her, and she rescues him (“Stop, Igilio, don’t do it!,” 5. 2776). It is women’s “tender” hearts, then, and full assurance that their men are pledged to them as they are, that is, as independent and willful, that makes them commit to a life together. In the decades after her death, Andreini’s memory was preserved in Italy and France through her Lettere and her Fragmenti; now—and deservedly so—it is through Mirtilla. The mere historical fact that this was the first pastoral authored by a woman to be published is only part of the story: Mirtilla remains unique in that it was performed numerous times before publication, and thus it became utterly playable, unlike many of the contemporary closet dramas. Andreini defined her message as playwriter through the two characters she chose to bring to the stage: that of the clever and eloquent Filli, who projected an image of self-reliant womanhood, and that of Venus, who supervised at the end the new order for men and women—contented nuptials—against the disruptions caused by her son Cupid. As a virtuosa of the stage and the recipient of cult-like praises well before the time of publication of her play, we can surmise that Andreini the actress enchanted her audience with her sensibility, rapid-fire delivery, and witty repartees. 147. “[M]entre piango il mio mal, il pianto istesso / è del mio mal ministro, / poiché turbando l’acqua / mi toglie il goder di me medesma,” Mirtilla, 4.4.2586–90. On this theme in Andreini, see Daniela Mauri, “La Mirtilla di Isabella Andreini,” 204–5. Ardelia’s self-reflection has often been read as expressing lesbian desire. See, for example, Maria Luisa Doglio, “Introduzione” to Andreini, La Mirtilla, 14. 148. “[C]he me godendo goderai te stessa,” Mirtilla, 5.5.2863.

42 Editor’s Introduction As for Andreini the writer, no matter how often she chose to blur gender boundaries in her letters and in her acting, a female-friendly agenda is clearly spelled out in Mirtilla: women may need to marry in order to keep their reputation and a respectful place in late sixteenth-century Italian society, she offers, but they should be allowed to choose their partner; women do live in a world where they are sexually in danger, especially when they appear too self-reliant, she asserts, but they may be able to overcome this victimization by using their wit, ingenuity, and intelligence. Andreini’s Mirtilla functions in a world in which neither fathers nor gods have much power, unlike Guarini’s Pastor fido, and women help each other rather then betray their relationship for a man. This world may have existed only in the neverland of the pastoral stage, but it presaged changes that have indeed come along and have enhanced women’s status in the following centuries. In this sense Andreini truly is, as her husband proclaimed, the sovereign among women (“Monarchessa delle donne”), “true ornament of the age so fortunate to have you.”149

Note on the Italian Text The present transcription, the first published writing by Andreini (“la prima fatica dell’ingegno mio che sia venuta in luce,” as the author states in the dedicatory letter), is based on the 1588 edition of Mirtilla, Pastorale d’Isabella Andreini, Comica Gelosa, that was published in Verona by Girolamo Discepolo in 1588, in an octave edition that contains 65 (recto and verso) pages. The cover shows the figure of “Industria,” wearing a helmet and armor and supported by a cloud, pulling a scantily veiled “Fortuna,” who like Venus seems to emerge from the foam of the sea, while the motto, “Fortuna forti sublevanda Industria,” frames the oval. This aphorism, “Fortune must be liberated with strong commitment,” typically accompanies all Discepolo typography.150 And I would add it perfectly fits Andreini’s life and work trajectory, since by everybody’s acknowledgement she did make her own luck as playwright, poet, and actress by dint of industry or diligence. No manuscript version of Mirtilla has surfaced.

149. Francesco Andreini, Le Bravure del Capitano Spavento, in Marotti and Romei, La commedia dell’arte e la società barocca, 234. 150. Or, to translate it somewhat differently, “a strong person raises fortune through industry.” The motto is illustrated in a woodcut by Giulio Bonasone, Fortuna forti sublevanda Industria. See Marco Revelli, “Forma del tempo e filosofia della storia,” Teoria politica 7.2 (1991): 21–50. I would like to thank Cheryl Lemmens for this reference.

Editor’s Introduction 43

Figure 2. Title page of Mirtilla, Appresso Girolamo Discepolo, 1586, with autograph dedication to Antonio Beffa Negrini. Two versions of the text were consulted. The first, numbered 2095, is housed in the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense of Milan in the Raccolta Drammatica Corniani Algarotti. This copy (Figure 2) belonged to Andreini, and in fact she donated it as per her handwritten inscription, which appears at the bottom: “Dono dell’Auttrice at Ant(oni)o Beffa Negrini.”151 I also consulted the slightly 151. Antonio Beffa Negrini (1532–1602) was a historian, occasional poet, and notary. He was a friend of Torquato Tasso, with whom he exchanged sonnets, and of a group of intellectuals from Mantua. He published “Rime all’illustre signora Lodovica Data Tiraboschi,” republished in Piacenza in 1799, and

44 Editor’s Introduction subsequent printing, still in 1588, of Mirtilla Pastorale d’Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa, printed by Sebastiano Dalle Donne and Camillo Franceschini Compagni in Verona (Figure 3). This version has 63 (recto and verso) pages and lacks the drawing of Andreini’s face that accompanies the print by Discepolo. It is also housed at the Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense of Milan in the Raccolta Drammatica Corniani Algarotti, and is numbered 2139. I also took into account the “corrected’ edition of 1589 by Francesco Dalle Donne and Scipione Vargnano.

Figure 3. Title page of Isabella Andreini, Mirtilla, Verona, Sebastiano Dalle Donne & Camillo Franceschini Compagni, 1588. a number of historical accounts on Mantua and the Gonzaga, now lost. See Carla Molinari, “Torquato Tasso, i Gonzaga e Francesco Osanna,” in Torquato Tasso nelle edizioni Osanna (Mantua: Comune di Mantova, 1995).

Editor’s Introduction 45

Note on the Transcription The transcription follows the text, written in a Tuscan-based Italian, as closely as possible, and changes were made exclusively to enhance reading or to correct printer’s mistakes. As in many Italian Renaissance plays, the text consists of unrhymed seven- and eleven-syllable verses. I have specifically chosen to maintain the printer’s layout for the purpose of aligning the Italian text with its English version. Following modern usage there has been conservative intervention in the following: the letters v and u have been distinguished, and the letter j, when in initial position or intervocalic, has been changed into i (varji is now vari); 2. punctuation has been added or removed when necessary; 3. et has been changed into e; 4. words spelled inconsistently or misspelled have been corrected; 5. consonants have often been doubled (imagine becomes immagine) and vice-versa, following today’s conventions, but always conservatively; 6. accents and apostrophes have been modernized (ré is now re, à is now a; hò is now ho), and abbreviations have been transcribed in full; 7. t followed by a vowel has been changed into z (gratie is now grazie, silentio is now silenzio); iu at the beginning of a word is now giu (iustitia is giustizia); 8. capitalization follows now standard practice, except with the word “Amore” when it refers, even indirectly, to Cupid; 9. modern spelling has been used very conservatively for some of the most common words in the text (prencipe is now principe; omai is ormai, a dio is now addio); 10. the letter h has been removed, when unnecessary, at the beginning and in the middle of words (dishonor is now disonor; hora is now ora, trahendo is now traendo); 11. adverbs and some names have been tied (as in benché, poiché, invece), and prepositions have sometimes been tied as well. 1.

Valeria Finucci

46 Editor’s Introduction

Note on the Translation This translation of La Mirtilla is based on the 1588 Discepolo edition, and on Maria Luisa Doglio’s 1995 edition. The primary concern has been to convey accurately the meaning of the original text. The attempt to follow the structure of the verses for the sake of poetic elements has been balanced throughout by a desire to make the play eminently readable. Accordingly, not only the word order in many places, but also the punctuation has been changed. In addition, some stage directions have been added. There were none in the sixteenth-century printed edition. Julia Kisacky

ISABELLA ANDREINI

MIRTILLA PASTORALE • MIRTILLA, A PASTORAL

Mirtilla pastorale d’Isabella Andreini, Comica Gelosa In Verona, Appresso Sebastiano dalle Donne, & Camillo Franceschini Compagni, 1588 Dedica

Alla illustrissima ed eccellentissima Signora, la signora donna Lavinia de la Rovere Marchesa del Vasto Signora mia colendissima, Io cominciai quasi da scherzo, illustrissima ed eccellentissima Signora, ad attendere agli studi della poesia e di tanto diletto gli trovai, ch’io non ho mai più potuto da sì fatti trattenimenti rimanermi, e come dal cielo mi sia stato negato ingegno atto a sì alto e nobile esercizio, non per questo mi son io sgomentata, anzi mi sono ingegnata d’assomigliarmi a quelli che nati e allevati nell’Alpi nevose o campi sterili, non però lasciano di coltivarli a tutto lor potere per renderli più che possano fecondi. È l’ingegno umano cosa troppo divina, e coloro che nell’ozio intrepidi lasciano così raro dono perire, non meritano tra gli uomini essere annoverati, però che trapassando la vita loro con perpetuo silenzio, a guisa che le bestie fanno, non sono buoni ad altro che a consumar quello che dalla natura o dalla terra è prodotto. Da sì fatta maniera di vita e costumi desiderando io d’allontanarmi, seguitai gli incominciati studi; onde m’avvenne alli giorni passati di comporre una pastorale la quale io, per avventura troppo ardita, mando ora fuori con la scorta del nome di Vostra Eccellenza illustrissima. Desiderando che ciò mi giovi a mostrarle la devozione e riverenza ch’io le porto, non intendendo che l’autorità del suo divino nome la difenda, perciò che essendo questa la prima fatica dell’ingegno mio che sia venuta in luce, desidero sentirne liberamente l’openione di ciascuno, per potere i difetti di questi e degli altri miei scritti emmendare. Accetti pertanto Vostra Eccellenza illustrissima questa mia pastorale che ora le appresento, con quella istessa umanità ch’ella più volte s’è degnata (contra ogni mio merito) di prestar grato silenzio alle mie vive parole, e per non infastidirla umilmente me le inchino, baciandole con ogni riverenza le degnissime mani e pregandole da Dio ogni suo maggior contento e felicità. Di Verona il dì 24 di febraro 1588. Di Vostra Eccellenza illustrissima umilissima serva e devota Isabella Andreini Comica Gelosa 48

Mirtilla, a Pastoral by Isabella Andreini, an actress in the Gelosi Company, printed in Verona by Sebastiano Dalle Donne, & Camillo Franceschini Compagni, 1588 Dedication

To the most illustrious and most excellent Signora, the Signora Lady Lavinia della Rovere, Marchioness del Vasto My most honorable Signora, I began almost as a joke, O most illustrious and most excellent Signora, to attend to the study of poetry, and so much delight have I found there that I have never since been able to refrain from such entertainments. And although heaven has denied me an intellect apt for so lofty and noble an exercise, not for this have I been daunted. On the contrary, I have striven to emulate those people born and raised in the snowy Alps or sterile fields, who do not cease from cultivating them with all their might, to make them as fertile as they can. The human intellect is a divine thing, and those who fearlessly allow so rare a gift to perish in idleness are not worthy to be counted as men, since, by passing through their lives in perpetual silence in the fashion of beasts, they are good for nothing but to consume what by nature or by the earth is produced. Wishing to distance myself from such a manner of life and customs, I pursued the studies I had begun; and so in these past days I came to compose a pastoral which I, perhaps too daring, now send forth with the escort of the name of Your most illustrious Excellence. I hope this might serve to show you the devotion and reverence I bear you. I do not intend for the authority of your divine name to defend it, since (as this is the first effort of my intellect to come to light) I wish to hear freely everyone’s opinion of it, in order to be able to emend the defects both of this and of my other writings. Therefore, Your most illustrious Excellence, accept this pastoral of mine, which I now present to you, with that same humanity with which many times you have deigned, unworthy as I am, to give agreeable silence to my living words. In order not to bother you, humbly I bow to you, kissing reverently your most worthy hands and praying God for your greatest contentment and happiness. From Verona, the 24th of February 1588 Your most illustrious Excellence’s most humble and devoted servant, Isabella Andreini, actress of the Gelosi company 49

Interlocutori Amore e Venere Uranio pastore Igilio pastore Coridone pastore Tirsi pastore Opico pastore Filli ninfa Mirtilla ninfa Ardelia Satiro Gorgo

fanno il prologo innamorato d’Ardelia innamorato di Fillide [Filli] innamorato di Nina, che non si vede cacciatore vecchio innamorata d’Uranio innamorata d’Uranio ninfa di Diana innamorato di Filli capraio

50

Cast Love and Venus Uranio, a shepherd Igilio, a shepherd Coridone, a shepherd Tirsi, a shepherd Opico, a shepherd Filli, a nymph Mirtilla, a nymph Ardelia, a nymph Satyr Gorgo

recite the prologue in love with Ardelia in love with Fillide [Filli] in love with Nisa, who does not appear onstage a hunter an old man in love with Uranio in love with Uranio of Diana in love with Filli a goatherd

51

Prologo Amore e Venere Venere Pur m’è stato concesso amato figlio di ritrovarti; or di’ per qual cagione ti partisti di grembo a la tua madre? Amore Io certo mi godea dolce riposo nel tuo bel sen là su nel terzo cielo, e lieto mi vivea poi che nel mondo lasciato avea foco leggiadro e santo, acciò fusse il mio bene a l’uman seme, a le fiere, agl’augelli, ai boschi e a l’onde compartito e diffuso; e mentre intento aspettava portarne immensa lode, in ricompensa dai mortali, udii de’ forsennati amanti, e le querele e i pianti. E perché l’importune e meste voci non turbassero più l’orecchie mie, discesi in terra ad acquetar le loro vane e torbide menti. Venere O caro figlio, ond’avvien che mai sempre alte querele s’odono contra te? Ti chiama ognuno tiranno, micidiale, empio e fallace; dicon che sei di sdegno e di furore, di crudeltà, di doglia e di vergogna, sola radice, e che da te sospetti nascono, ingiurie, tradimenti, guerre, frodi, ribellioni, inganni e morti. Sento ancor dir, per tua vergogna e scorno, che per te furon miseri e dolenti di Piramo e di Tisbe i caldi amori; e che restossi il notator d’Abido preda del mare, e l’infelice amante 52

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Prologue Love and Venus Venus At last it has been granted me, beloved son, to find you again. Now tell me: for what reason did you leave the lap of your mother?1 Love I certainly enjoyed a sweet repose in your lovely company up there in the third heaven;2 5 and I lived in joy because in the world I had left a fire lovely and holy, so that my benefit to humankind, to beasts, to birds, to the woods, and to the waves might be distributed and spread. Yet when I listened, 10 expecting to receive for it immense praises as recompense from mortals, I heard from crazed lovers both complaints and weeping. So that the importunate and sorrowful voices 15 would no longer disturb my ears, I descended to earth to quiet their vain and clouded minds. Venus O dear son, however does it happen that constantly loud complaints are heard against you? Everyone calls you a tyrant, murderer, cruel, and deceptive. They say you are of anger and of madness, of cruelty, of suffering, and of shame the sole root; and that from you suspicion is born, and insults, betrayals, wars, cheats, rebellions, deceptions, and deaths. I hear it said as well, to your shame and ignominy, that Pyramus and Thisbe’s impassioned loves because of you were miserable and sorrowful;3 and that the swimmer of Abydus ended up the prey of the sea, and his unhappy lover 53

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54 ISABELLA ANDREINI di Sesto per seguirlo a morte corse. Soggiungon ch’Alcione e che Ceice miseri per te pure uscir di vita, e che per te la greca donna afflitto lasciò il suo sposo, ond’arse Troia antica; e che Filli dolente, avendo invano Demofonte aspettato, al fin, di speme priva, col laccio uscì di vita; e peggio dicono ancor che per te sol s’accese l’incestuoso e isfrenato ardore di Mirra verso ‘l padre; e le fraterne fiamme infame di Bibli e di Canace; e che fu sol per te cruda Medea; e che Scilla troncasse al proprio padre il biondo crin fatale, e che Pasife per te sol partorì l’orrendo mostro che fu del ventre suo vergogna e peso, ed Ercole, che già resse le stelle, sostenne la conocchia e torse il fuso: e più direi, ma l’onestà mi chiude la bocca, onde mi taccio e di Tereo e di Semiramis e di tant’altri infami e disonesti avvenimenti.

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Amore Sappi diletta madre 55 ch’oscuro velo ingombra sì le menti dei miseri mortali, che di tanti lor mali non veggon la cagion, né miran come non Amor, ma furor è che gli offende, 60 e mentre son da te stato lontano, sconosciuto tra lor per isgravarmi di queste false accuse ho dimorato: e quel malvagio, che di me prendendo la forma, ognor gli inganna 65 ho discoperto loro, avendo ardire il temerario ed empio di farsi anch’egli figlio di Venere e di Marte, quasi il ciel producesse un sì rio germe. 70

Mirtilla 55 from Sestus, in order to follow him, raced to her death.4 They add that Halcyon and Ceyx also, because of you, wretchedly lost their lives;5 and that because of you the Greek woman left 35 her husband afflicted, so that ancient Troy burned;6 and that grieving Phyllis, having in vain awaited Demophon, in the end, of hope deprived, by means of a noose left her life.7 Worse yet, they say that because of you alone that ardor, 40 which was both incestuous and unrestrained, ignited in Myrrha for her father,8 and also the infamous fraternal flames of Byblis9 and of Canace;10 and that only because of you Medea was cruel;11 and that Scylla cut her own father’s 45 12 fateful blond hair; and that Pasiphaë because of you alone birthed the horrendous monster that was her belly’s shame and burden;13 and Hercules, who previously upheld the stars, held the distaff and wound the spindle.14 50 And more I would say, but decency closes my mouth, so I am silent regarding both Tereus15 and Semiramis,16 and so many other infamous and dishonest events. Love Know, beloved mother, 55 that a dark veil so encumbers the minds of miserable mortals that of many of their misfortunes they do not see the cause, nor do they perceive how it is not Love but Furor that harms them. 60 While from you I have been far away, I have sojourned unrecognized among them, to clear myself of these false accusations. The fact that that wicked one, by taking on my form, constantly deceives them, 65 I have revealed to them. He has the temerity, that bold and impious fellow, to pass himself off as another son of Venus and Mars, as if heaven would produce so wicked a seed.17 70

56 ISABELLA ANDREINI Nacque il bugiardo di lascivia e d’ozio, e di vani pensieri fu poi nudrito: egli si finge Amore per ingannar le genti e d’arco s’arma e di faretra, e non so come l’ali s’è pur formate e vola e in ogni cosa mente la mia figura; se non ch’io ho gl’occhi e veggio; e se bene egli ha gl’occhi, non ha l’uso degl’occhi e in tutto è cieco. E per tutt’ove il mio celeste foco e ‘l mio nettare spargo, il rio sottentra, e con larve mentite vi mesce il suo veleno e in disoneste tempre gli strugge, e promettendo lunga pace e conforto, gli invaghisce prima di piacer falso, e poi ch’al suo volere gli ha tratti, fra timor sempre e fra speme gli tiene involti e di dolor gli pasce, poi disperati gli conduce a morte. Questi è quel crudo di pietà nimico, vago sempre di lacrime, e che sempre del mal si gode ov’io del ben mi pasco. Egli dubbiosa gioia e dolor certo apporta; e io le mie dolcezze dono e vere e certe e di soave ambrosia pasco l’anime. Insomma io sono Amore ed egli un cieco error che la ragione uccide e lascia al cieco senso il freno.

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Venere O trascurata mente de’ mortali, che quel furor, che non ha fine o modo, 100 credono Amor, e dovrian pure almeno scorger i tuoi seguaci, che sono verità, prudenza e fede, timor, onor, vero contento e pace, onestate e fermezza, 105 con sicura speranza, saggio e santo piacer d’onesto foco, che con la face d’Imeneo s’accende; ma i suoi abominevoli seguaci

Mirtilla 57 The liar was born of Lasciviousness and Idleness, and with vain thoughts he was thereafter nourished. He pretends to be Love to deceive people. With a bow he arms himself, and with a quiver; and (I don’t know how) wings too he has formed for himself and he flies. In every feature he counterfeits me, except that I have eyes and see, and although he has eyes, he has not the use of his eyes and is completely blind. Everywhere that my celestial fire and my nectar I disperse, the wicked one takes my place, and with lying shams he mixes in his poison, and in dishonest ways he destroys them. By promising lengthy peace and comfort he charms them at first with false pleasure. Then, once to his will he has drawn them, always between fear and hope he keeps them entangled, and with suffering he feeds them. Then he conducts them, despairing, to death. He is the cruel one, pity’s enemy, desirous always of tears, and he always enjoys suffering, whereas happiness nourishes me. Dubious joy and certain pain he brings. I my delights give, both true and certain, and with sweet ambrosia I feed souls. In short, I am Love,18 and he a blind error who kills reason, and releases blind sensation’s restraints.

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Venus Oh careless minds of mortals,19 who believe Furor (who has neither end nor manners), 100 to be Love! Yet they should at least discern your attendants, which are truth, prudence, and faithfulness, fear, honor, true happiness, and peace, honesty, and constancy, 105 with certain hope, the wise and holy pleasure of an honest flame which by Hymen’s torch is kindled.20 But his abominable attendants

58 ISABELLA ANDREINI sono errori, furori, odii, disdegni, rabbia, fraude, menzogna, pazzia, sfrenato ardire, disperazione, inganno, e guerra e morte. Egli, se ben ha l’ali, a terra vola, né mai si leva, e mancan le sue forze allor che manca la mortal bellezza. Ma tu con l’ali tue al cielo porti i tuoi seguaci, e ‘l tempo a le tue forze non può far danno, né la morte istessa, poiché non ami tu beltà caduca, ma celeste e divina. E che bisogna ragionar più de la disuguaglianza che tra voi è? Dirolla in un sol detto. Tu solo sei la vita in questa vita d’ogni cosa creata, egli la morte. Ma godo, poiché fatto hai lor palese quai le tue forze sien, qual tu ti sia: acciò che da qui innanzi Amore, amore sempre sia detto, e non s’attribuisca quello a te che il furor pazzo ed errante tra i mortali produce. Amor si lodi come vero custode de le genti e donator di gioia e di piacere.

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Amore Tu sai, mia genitrice, che fu sempre mia legge e mio costume 135 di non lasciar perire i miei fidi seguaci e anco di punire gli alteri spreggiator de le mie forze. Or sappi ch’io tornando 140 a rivedere il cielo, ritenni alquanto in questa parte il volo; dove con gran dolore e meraviglia, e bestemmiar e dispreggiar sentimmi da un superbo pastor nomato Tirsi 145 e da una ninfa che si chiama Ardelia. Or qui m’arresto per punirli, e quando saran contra di me più contumaci,

Mirtilla 59 are errors, frenzies, hate, anger, rage, fraud, lies, insanity, unrestrained boldness, desperation, deception, war, and death. Although he has wings, upon the earth he flies, nor does he ever rise, and his strength fades when mortal beauty fades. But you with your wings to heaven carry your followers, and time cannot harm your strength, nor can death itself, since you do not love beauty that is fleeting, but rather celestial and divine. And what more needs to be said about the inequality that exists between you? I will say it in a single word; you alone are the life in this life of every created thing; he the death. But I am pleased, since to them you have made it plain which are your forces and what your nature is, so that henceforth Love, love may always be called, and they won’t attribute to you what Furor, mad and erring, among mortals produces. May Love be praised as the true guardian of the people, and the giver of joy and pleasure.

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Love You know, my mother, that it was always my law and my custom 135 not to allow my faithful followers to perish, and also to punish the haughty disdainers of my power. Now know that I, returning 140 to see again the heavens, delayed somewhat in this area my flight. Here, with great sadness and wonder, both cursed and scorned I heard myself by a proud shepherd named Tirsi, 145 and by a nymph who is called Ardelia. Now here I have stopped to punish them, and when they against me are most contumacious

60 ISABELLA ANDREINI e men se ‘l crederan, farò pentirli di lor temerità. Tu cara madre meco trattienti in queste selve intanto che segua al mio voler conforme effetto. Qui staremo invisibili tra loro, e quando sarà tempo, il duro core pungerò lor con questo aurato strale; onde l’un arda e non ritrovi loco per amor di Mirtilla, e l’altra avvampi per sua pena maggior di se medesma.

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Venere Sei tu forse sdegnato contra questi insensati, 160 che non si sono avvisti del poter degli dei? Vuoi forse far di loro aspra vendetta? Amore Saria contrario effetto a l’esser mio, quand’io, che sono Amore, odiassi amando 165 e volessi vendetta che sol l’odio mio nemico desia: non si conviene a me, che sono Amore, a lo sdegno dar loco, che sovente estingue il mio gran foco. 170 Venere Che fia dunque di loro, amato figlio? Amore Dopo che Tirsi avrà compreso a pieno il mio valore e non avrà più speme di fruir di Mirtilla, che d’Uranio innamorata ogn’altro odia e disprezza, lascerò che ‘l furor l’induca ad atto di voler con la morte uscir di doglia: ma perché finalmente non consento ne l’altrui morte, levarò la forza al mio nemico e piegherò Mirtilla a le sue voglie e farò che non ami

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Mirtilla 61 and least expect it, I will make them repent of their temerity. You, dear mother, stay with me in these woods until there is a result in conformity with my will. Here we will stay invisible among them, and when it’s time, their hard hearts I will prick with this golden arrow, so that the one shall burn and find no rest for love of Mirtilla, and the other shall burn, to her greater pain, for herself.

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Venus Are you perchance angry with these fools, 160 who are unaware of the power of the gods? Do you want perhaps to take on them a harsh vengeance? Love That would be an effect contrary to my essence: that I, who am Love, should hate in loving, 165 and should wish for vengeance, which only Hate, my enemy, desires. It is not appropriate for me, who am Love, to give way to anger, which often extinguishes my great fire. 170 Venus What then shall become of them, beloved son? Love Once Tirsi understands fully my power and no longer hopes to enjoy Mirtilla (who, of Uranio enamored, hates and despises every other man), I shall let furor induce him to the act of attempting through death to escape his suffering. But because in the end I do not consent to people’s deaths, I shall remove the strength from my enemy. I shall bend Mirtilla to his desires and make it so that she does not love

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62 ISABELLA ANDREINI Uranio, che lei fugge per seguire Ardelia, la qual voglio che d’Uranio, spento il proprio suo amore, divenghi sposa. Farò poscia che Igilio, 185 volendo incrudelir contro se stesso, desti per questo mezo nel bel seno di Filli alta pietade; ond’ella in tutto Uranio lasci e a lui sol si doni. E Coridon sarà sempre felice 190 con la sua Nisa, poiché miei devoti furon mai sempre; e così soddisfatto a le divine leggi avrò del mio gran regno. Venere Così dunque facciam, diletto figlio, e diportianci in queste qui d’intorno selve vicine, finché tempo sia d’esseguir quanto brami. Amore O madre mia, se queste meraviglie saranno udite poi da qualche sciocco saran credute favole; e nel vero saran pur vere cose perché non san quel che sa fare il cielo, e che ‘l far che sì tosto divenga amante un cor disamorato, e che un’altra invaghisca di sé stessa, miracoli non sono ai sommi dei, che pon far ciò che vogliono. Venere Sì, figlio.

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Mirtilla 63 Uranio, who flees her to follow Ardelia; I intend that of Uranio (once her self-love’s extinguished) she will become the wife. Then I shall make it so that Igilio, in wishing to harm himself, shall awaken by this means in the fair bosom of Filli noble compassion, so that she will completely leave off Uranio, and to him alone she will give herself. And Coridone will forever be happy with his Nisa, since my devotees they have always been. Thus I will satisfy the divine laws of my great kingdom. Venus Then let us do just as you say, beloved son, and let us enjoy ourselves in these surrounding nearby woods, until it is time to accomplish all you wish. Love O my mother, if these marvels are heard of later by some fool, they will be held to be fables (when in truth they will nonetheless be true things), because they do not know what heaven can do, and that making so quickly a lover out of an unloving heart, and causing a woman to become infatuated with herself, are not miracles to the highest gods, who can do whatever they want. Venus Yes, my son.

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Atto Primo SCENA PRIMA Uranio e Tirsi pastori Uranio Chiaro sol, quando mai uscirai tu da l’umido tuo letto, che misero e dolente al tuo ritorno non mi ritrovi, come al tuo partire mi lasci? Ahi stelle inique, ahi fato avverso congiurati al mio mal, quando mai furo tante miserie in un sol petto accolte?

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Tirsi Chi consente al suo mal, come tu fai, sol di se stesso e non d’altrui si doglia. Tu sei cagione Uranio del tuo danno e del continuo affanno; tu folle, tu sol vuoi 220 finir miseramente i giorni tuoi. Uranio Sì come non elessi d’amar chi m’odia, così ancor non posso lasciar di seguir quella, che ingrata ognor mi fugge, e fuggendo mi strugge, troppo è felice quel pastor che puote amare e non amar quand’egli vuole. Tirsi Il voler nostro è come quel liquore che porge vita a una fiammella accesa, che s’egli manca, è forza ancor che manchi la fiamma. Or se tu vuoi che ‘l tuo gran foco finisca, non gli dar più nutrimento. Uranio Come può ‘l voler mio voler mai questo? 64

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Act One SCENE 1 The shepherds Uranio21 and Tirsi Uranio Bright sun, when if ever will you rise from your humid bed and not find me upon your return as miserable and sorrowful as at your departure you leave me? Aiee iniquitous stars, aiee adverse fate, conspirators in my misfortune! When if ever were so many miseries in a single heart gathered?

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Tirsi If a man consents to his misfortune, as you do, only about himself, and not about others, should he complain. You are the cause, Uranio, of your suffering and your continuous distress. You madman, you have determined 220 to end in misery your days. Uranio Just as I did not choose to love one who hates me, no more can I leave off following that woman who (the ingrate!) constantly flees me, and by fleeing destroys me. How happy is that shepherd who can love and not love whenever he wills. Tirsi Our will is like that liquid that gives life to a small kindled flame; if it fails, perforce the flame also fails. Now if you want your great fire to end, give it no more nourishment. Uranio How can my will ever will this thing? 65

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66 ISABELLA ANDREINI Tirsi Libero è il voler nostro e può volere pur, malgrado d’Amor, quel ch’egli vuole.

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Uranio È vero Tirsi, e lo confesso anch’io che ‘l voler nostro è libero, ma quando Amor ne’ cori nostri con mille e più radici 240 abbarbicato vive, egli tanto ci oprime, che la ragione in noi debole è si, che quasi nulla puote; e tanto il crudo lusinghier ci alletta, 245 che lieti nei martiri e ne le pene viviamo e in che modo liberar ci possiam mal conosciamo. Tirsi Fuggi, che co ‘l fuggir si vince Amore. Uranio E dove fuggirò? Nel cielo forse? 250 Egli nel cielo alberga e fa tremare Giove tonante e gli altri eterni dei. Ne l’aria forse? Egli ne l’aria a volo si lieva e con la face ardente infiamma i semplici augelletti; 255 forse dirai che in qualche opaca selva di ricovrarmi io tenti. Non sai che non è selva cotanto orida e folta, ch’egli non la penetri 260 col suo vivace foco? E che sia vero le crude tigri ircane, i leoni superbi di Nemea, e di Lernea le velenose serpi, e quante fiere scorron per li boschi 265 chiara ne fanno e indubitata fede, venendo per Amor spesso a contesa. Nel profondo ocean fuggirò forse?

Mirtilla 67 Tirsi Free is our will, and it can will precisely, despite Love, whatever it wants.22

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Uranio It is true, Tirsi. I too confess it; our will is free. But when Love in our hearts a thousand or more roots 240 sends down, and he settles in, so much does he oppress us that reason in us is so weak that it is almost powerless. So much the cruel flatterer allures us 245 that cheerfully among torments and pains we live, and in what way we can free ourselves we barely know. Tirsi Flee, for with flight one can defeat Love. Uranio And where shall I flee? To heaven, perhaps? 250 In heaven he dwells, and makes Jove the thunderer23 tremble, and the other eternal gods. To the air, perhaps? Into the air in flight he rises, and with his burning torch he enflames the simple little birds. 255 Perhaps you will say that in some darksome forest I should attempt to take shelter. Don’t you know that there is no forest so horrid and dense that he cannot penetrate it 260 with his lively fire? And that this is true the cruel Hyrcanian tigers,24 the proud lions of Nemea, and Lerna’s venomous serpents,25 and as many beasts as course through the woods 265 pledge their clear and undoubted word, by coming often for the sake of Love into contention. Into the deep ocean shall I flee, perhaps?

68 ISABELLA ANDREINI Ahimè che i pesci, ancor che sien ne l’acqua, schermo non ponno aver del suo gran foco. 270 Altro dir non mi puoi, Tirsi mio caro, se non ch’io vada tra i dannati spirti. Ahi, che né quivi ancor troverei scampo contra ‘l fanciul che tutto ‘l mondo vince, poiché l’istesso re dei laghi Averni 275 ardendo per Proserpina ci mostra, che nel suo regno ancor non può fuggirsi d’Amor l’alta possanza. E qual più certo segno si puote aver de la sua forza, se perdonar non volse 280 a la sua genitrice e a se stesso? Dunque ben creder puoi, che invan si tenta fuggir da la sua mano, poiché non solo in cielo, in terra e in mare mostra immenso il potere, 285 ma co ‘l suo gran valore questo nume invincibile e tremendo l’inferno ancor mirabilmente sforza. Tirsi Voi sciocchi amanti, voi lo figurate un dio 290 per aver degna scusa al fallir vostro. Non sai tu che gli dei, misero e stolto, governan giustamente il tutto, ed egli regge il suo regno sempre ingiustamente? Amore altro non è che un furor cieco, 295 un ben dannoso, un malsicuro appoggio, tiranno ingiusto alfin de’ vostri cori. Il ben ch’egli v’addita è finto, e ‘l male purtroppo vero; e s’egli pur talvolta promette qualche ben, tosto vi toglie 300 la speme di fruirlo: onde maggiore si fa la doglia, e più cresce l’affanno. Questi sono i piacer, questi i contenti che voi provate amando, per un lieve piacere 305 mille gravi tormenti, e per poca dolcezza molto amaro;

Mirtilla 69 Alas! Even fish, although they are in the water, can have no protection from his great fire. Nothing else can you tell me, Tirsi my dear, if not that I should go among the damned spirits. Aiee! Not even there would I find an escape from the boy who all the world overcomes, since the selfsame king of the lakes of Avernus, in burning for Proserpina, shows us that not even in his kingdom can one flee Love’s great power.26 And what more certain sign can one have of his strength, if he did not choose to exempt his own mother and himself?27 Therefore you can well believe that in vain one attempts to flee from his hand, since not only in heaven, on earth, and in the sea does he demonstrate his immense power, but also with his great prowess this deity, invincible and tremendous, marvelously conquers even hell.28

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Tirsi You foolish lovers, you imagine him as a god 290 in order to have a worthy excuse for your own failures. Don’t you know that the gods, you poor fool, govern everything justly, and he rules his realm always unjustly? Love is nothing other than a blind furor, 295 a harmful pleasure, an insecure support— an unjust tyrant, in the end, over your hearts. The good that he points out to you is false, and the evil unfortunately true; and even if he sometimes promises some good, soon he takes away 300 your hope of enjoying it. In this way greater he makes the sorrow, and the distress grows more. These are the pleasures, these the joys that you experience in loving: for one slight pleasure 305 a thousand severe torments, and for a little sweetness a lot of bitterness.

70 ISABELLA ANDREINI né mai provate un bene senza tormenti e pene: onde ben posso dir ch’ogni piacere, 310 ch’Amor vi fa gustare, altro non sia che diletto fugace e dolor fermo, dubbio ben, certo male, onor celato e disonor palese, fede perfida e frale, 315 sollecito furor tenace e saldo, pigra ragion, senso veloce e presto, incertissima gioia, e certissima noia. Uranio Cieca, cieca è la mente di color, 320 che dicono che Amore non è possente nume; s’egli non fusse, come mai potrebbe tener un senza cor molt’anni in vita e farlo in sé morire 325 e viverne in altrui? Esser più dove egli ama, che ‘n quel loco dove dimora? E finalmente quale maggior certezza aver si puote mai de la sua deità, che per servirlo 330 non curiam di noi stessi? Tirsi O misera farfalla, tu ti raggiri a la tua fiamma intorno, e vuoi con biasmo e danno finir la vita tua; e pur potresti 335 far lieti i giorni tuoi con l’ubidirmi abbandonando Amore; ma se t’aggrada pur l’essere amante, ama la vaga Filli, che per te (lassa) more; 340 e lascia di seguire (se vuoi pur ch’io ti chiami accorto e saggio) Ardelia, che ti fugge e fugge ogn’altro.

Mirtilla 71 Nor do you ever experience a joy without torments and pains. Therefore I can well say that every pleasure 310 that Love makes you taste is no other than a fleeting delight and a lasting sorrow, a doubtful good, a certain evil, concealed honor and evident dishonor, faith perfidious and frail, 315 prompt furor tenacious and firm, sluggish reason, sensation fast and quick, extremely uncertain joy and extremely certain trouble. Uranio Blind, blind is the mind of those who say that Love is not a powerful deity. If he were not, how ever could he keep a man without a heart alive for many years, and make him die in himself and live in another? Be more where he loves than in that place where he dwells? And finally, what greater certainty can one ever have of his godhood, when in order to serve him we do not take care for ourselves? Tirsi O wretched butterfly, you circle around your flame, and you want with blame and harm to end your life; and yet you could make delightful your days by obeying me and abandoning Love. But if it still pleases you to be a lover, love beauteous Filli who (alas!) for you is dying, and (if indeed you want me to call you perspicacious and wise) leave off following Ardelia, who flees you and flees every other man.

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72 ISABELLA ANDREINI Uranio Per certo vo’ più tosto per Ardelia morire 345 che per altra gioire, che sia di lei men bella. Non sai Tirsi, non sai ch’Ardelia, ch’ognor m’arde, è così bella che di stupore e meraviglia pieno 350 lascia colui che fisa in lei lo sguardo? Ella ha le chiome sue sì bionde e terse ch’invidia fanno al solar raggio e scorno, la fronte è di ligustri, e di rose le guancie, e di corallo 355 le labbra amate, di bianchezza i gigli vincon gli eguali e ben composti denti, d’ebano l’inarcate e giuste ciglia, gli occhi sì chiari e lucidi che ‘l sole vincon d’assai, il collo tondo e bianco 360 che seco il latte perde, il seno è fatto di schietto avorio con due poma acerbe che tremolar si veggon sotto un velo a lo spirar di quella dolce bocca, al cui soave fiato 365 d’odor cedano i venti che da l’Arabia vengono; e tra le due vallette ove confina la bella bocca, ancor che sien di neve, si sta con l’esca e col focile Amore 370 ivi nascoso al varco, or questo core or quello dolcemente infiammando. Lunghe e rotonde son le belle braccia, lunga la bianca mano, 375 il corpo schietto e di misura onesta, la gamba dritta e snella, il piè piccolo e svelto; ma che dirò de’ guardi, i quali quanto più parchi sono, con maggior possanza 380 accendon l’alma di cocente ardore? Le parole son poi sì accorte e sagge, che sentir non si possono che ‘l core

Mirtilla 73 Uranio Most certainly I want sooner to die for Ardelia 345 than to rejoice for another, who would be her inferior in beauty. Don’t you know, Tirsi, don’t you know that Ardelia, who constantly burns me, is so beautiful that with amazement and wonder filled 350 she leaves whoever fixes upon her his gaze? She has tresses so blonde and shiny that they cause envy in the solar ray, and humiliation. Her forehead is like a ligustrum flower;29 rosy are her cheeks, and coral 355 her beloved lips. In whiteness lilies are defeated by her regular, well-proportioned teeth, ebony by her arched and even eyebrows; her eyes so clear and bright that the sun they far exceed; her neck so round and white 360 that in comparison milk loses out. Her bosom is made of pure ivory, with two unripe apples which are seen to quiver under a veil at the exhaling of that sweet mouth, whose gentle breath 365 in perfume defeats the winds that from Arabia come.30 And between the two little valleys which border her beautiful mouth, even though they are snowy— there stays, with his tinder and steel, Love, 370 hidden, lying in wait, now this heart, now that one sweetly enflaming. Long and round are her beautiful arms, long her white hand, 375 her body pure and well-proportioned, her leg straight and slim, her foot small and swift. But what shall I say of her regard (which, the rarer it is, with that much greater power 380 it ignites the soul with burning ardor)? And then her words are so perspicacious and wise that one cannot hear them without one’s heart

74 ISABELLA ANDREINI preso non resti e vinto; ma dove lascio il riso, 385 che qualor si dimostra tra rosate labra mi fa vedere in terra il paradiso? Onde giudico Ardelia, piena sì di beltade, 390 ma priva di pietate. Tirsi Voi miserelli amanti giudicate non già secondo il vero, ma secondo il cieco affetto, ch’a servir v’induce crudele e falsa ninfa. 395 Ma poiché sì cortese t’ho ritrovato nel farmi sapere de la tua ninfa le molte bellezze, deh fammi anco palese quando di lei t’innamorasti e come 400 restasti preso all’amoroso laccio. Uranio Negar non ti saprei cosa sì giusta; allor che noi pastori, nel bel fiorito aprile, coroniamo le mandre 405 di verdeggianti rami, ponendo su la porta una corona di fiori e frondi riccamente adorna; e che ciascun l’armento e la sua greggia parimenti corona di bei fiori; 410 e con fumo di puro zolfo gira d’intorno agli animal, per levar loro ogni possibil male; e che i gioghi e gli aratri, i vomeri, le zappe e i rastri ancora 415 d’odoriferi fior tutti adorniamo; allor che le capanne con le sonore canne facciamo risonare; allor che tutti gli animali si mostrano contenti, 420

Mirtilla 75 ending up captured and defeated. But where do I leave her smile 385 which, whenever it shows itself between rosy lips, makes me see, on earth, paradise?31 Therefore I judge Ardelia full, yes, of beauty, 390 but lacking in pity. Tirsi You miserable lovers judge not indeed according to truth, but according to blind affection, which induces you to serve a cruel and false nymph. 395 But since so courteous I have found you in making me aware of your nymph’s many beauties, come! To me make it also clear when you fell in love with her, and how 400 you ended up caught in Love’s snare. Uranio I would not know how to deny you a thing so just. At that time when we shepherds, in lovely flowering April, crown our flocks 405 with luxuriantly green branches, placing over the door a crown with flowers and fronds richly adorned; and when each of us his herd and his flock alike crowns with beautiful flowers, 410 and with the smoke of pure sulfur circles around his animals to lift from them every possible harm; and when the yokes and the plows, the plowshares, the hoes, and the rakes as well 415 with scented flowers we all adorn; when our huts with sonorous reeds we make resound; when all the animals show themselves content, 420

76 ISABELLA ANDREINI nonché i saggi pastori, per la solennità di sì gran festa, festa sacrata ogn’anno a Pale nostra dea; allor dico fui fatto 425 preda, lasso, d’Amore; e questo fu nel gire al sacro tempio, dove raccolti fummo da venerando e vecchio sacerdote, di bianca veste adorno 430 e di verde ghirlanda coronato, il qual con lieto viso, con puro e santo zelo all’oriente volto, una candida agnella 435 uccise e le sue calde interiora nel foco, ch’ivi ardendo portava con la fiamma al ciel gli odori, che ‘l ricco arabo suole raccor dai fortunati arbor sabei, 440 gettò, chinando a terra le ginocchia pietose e riverenti, poi volti gli occhi al cielo, chiese per noi perdono a l’alma Pale, se per disaventura o per follia, 445 o noi o ‘l nostro armento turbato avesse o prato o fonte o bosco a lei sacrato, e con l’istessa voce chiese per grazia e dono che fascino, baleno, 450 arte maga, invid’occhio turbar mai non potesse nostra lanosa greggia e nostro armento: e con pietoso accento pregò che custodisse i nostri cani, 455 di lor fidata scorta, acciò di latte, di lana e bella prole abondassero sempre, né giamai a la capanna alcun di noi tornasse piangendo e sospirando 460 con la sanguigna pelle

Mirtilla 77 let alone the wise shepherds, for the solemnity of so great a holy day, a holy day consecrated every year to Pales our goddess—32 at that time, I say, I was made 425 the prey, alas, of Love. And this was while going to the sacred temple, where gathered we were by a venerable old priest with a white vestment adorned, 430 and with a green garland crowned. He with a happy face, with pure and holy zeal, to the East turned; a white she-lamb 435 he killed, and her hot entrails into the fire threw. In burning, it carried with its flame to heaven the odors that the rich Arab is accustomed to gather from the fortunate Sabaean trees.33 440 Bending to earth his pious and reverent knees, then directing his eyes to heaven, he asked pardon for us from bountiful Pales, if through mischance or through folly 445 either we or our herds had disturbed either meadow or spring or woods sacred to her. With the same tone he asked as a grace and a gift that no enchantment, lightning strikes, 450 magical art, or envious eye might ever disturb our woolly flocks and our herds. In a piteous tone he prayed that she would guard our dogs, 455 the flocks’ faithful escort, so that with milk, wool, and fine offspring they might always abound; nor ever to his hut might any one of us return weeping and sighing, 460 with the bloody hide

78 ISABELLA ANDREINI di pecora e di capra o di giovenco tolta a pena di bocca al lupo ingordo, ma fusse il numer suo tanto al ritorno la sera ai nostri alberghi, 465 quanto al partir ne lo spuntar del giorno; finito questo, fuor del sacro tempio uscimmo dove in bella schiera accolte molte ninfe vedemmo in un bel prato, le quai di passo in passo 470 gian vaghi fior cogliendo. Tra queste Ardelia vidi, ahi lasso, e posso dire che in un punto la vidi e in un punt’arsi. E quel che più m’accese 475 di lei, fu ch’io sentii ch’ella si dolse con le compagne sue del crudo fin dell’innocente agnella che quel giorno immolossi, e dissi allora tra me: “S’ella si duole 480 d’un animal, che per onor di Pale in sacrificio s’offre, che farà poi vedendo un uom che per lei muora?” Certo, diss’io, così cortese come 485 bella la troverò; ed ella allora quei bei soli affissando ne’ cupidi occhi miei, e lampeggiando un dolce riso parve, parve che ‘l tutto confermar volesse, 490 ond’io da questo mosso, e da quella beltà, che non ha pare, la mi posi ad amare: ed è passato il sol già quattro volte per i dodici alberghi, 495 dal dì ch’ella m’accese e ‘n dolci nodi strinse, con le dorate chiome, questo per lei piagato e arso core; or hai sentito a pieno 500 l’istoria del mio male. Né soverchio m’è parso il raccontarti

Mirtilla 79 of a sheep or goat or yearling calf just removed from the mouth of a greedy wolf; but that the herd’s number might be the same at our return in the evening to our lodgings , 465 as at our departure at the break of dawn. With this finished, out from the sacred temple we went. There, in a fair company assembled, many nymphs we saw in a fair meadow, who step by step 470 lovely flowers went gathering. Among these, Ardelia I saw (alas!), and I can say that in one moment I saw her, and in the same moment I burned.34 What most set me afire 475 about her was that I heard her grieve with her companions for the harsh end of the innocent lamb which that day was immolated. I said then to myself, “If she grieves 480 for an animal that in honor of Pales as a sacrifice is offered, what then will she do upon seeing a man who for her is dying? Certainly,” I said, “as courteous as 485 she is beautiful I will find her.” And she then those beautiful suns fixed on my greedy eyes, and flashed a sweet smile—it appeared, it appeared that all this she meant to confirm, 490 such that I, by this moved, and by that beauty which has no peer,35 set myself to love her. The sun has already passed four times through the twelve houses36 495 since the day she set me afire, and in sweet knots bound with her golden tresses this heart, for her sake wounded and burned.37 Now you have heard in full 500 the story of my misfortune. Nor did it seem excessive to me to recount to you

80 ISABELLA ANDREINI quella solennità che allor si feo, ch’io dolente d’Amor vittima fui, sapendo come tu sei giorni innanzi, 505 nel saltar d’un gran fosso ne cadesti, percotendo d’un piede in una pietra; e fu sì grande la percossa tua, che molti giorni poi ne rimanesti infermo; 510 eccoti detto a pieno quello che non vedesti. Tirsi M’è stato caro certo l’udir quel che non vidi; e dal tuo dire ho chiaramente conosciuto come 515 in un bel modo invero Amor t’attese al varco, e in più bel modo poi, di libero ti fe’ divenir servo. Ma temo che sì come t’accendesti 520 ne la stagion che solo i fior produce, così sol fiori avrai del tuo lungo servire. Uranio Deh, se tra tanti fiori potessi aver quel fiore che tanto bramo, mi chiamerei felice; ma sì gran ben non lice forse sperare ad un pastor sì misero.

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Tirsi Sì dolce Uranio parli, ch’io non mi sono avvisto, 530 che mentre odo il tuo dire e pur teco ragiono d’amor, vorace tarlo del tuo misero core, vanno fuggendo l’ore, e io non vado 535 ai soliti piaceri: dunque mi parto; addio, rimanti lieto.

Mirtilla 81 those solemnities which at that time were performed, when a suffering victim of Love I became, since I know how, six days beforehand, 505 while leaping over a big ditch you fell, striking your foot against a stone, and so great was the impact that for many days afterward you remained infirm. 510 There it is; I’ve told fully what you did not see. Tirsi I have appreciated, certainly, hearing what I did not see. From your telling I have clearly recognized how skillfully in truth Love lay in wait for you, and even more skillfully then from a free man he made you become a servant. But I fear that, just as you kindled in the season that produces only flowers, likewise, only flowers you will have for your long service. Uranio Ah, if among so many flowers I might have that flower I so much desire, I would call myself happy!38 But so great a joy is not fitting, perhaps, to hope for, for a shepherd so wretched.

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Tirsi So sweetly, Uranio, do you speak, that I did not realize 530 that while I hear you talk, and while with you I discourse of love (the voracious worm in your miserable heart), the hours are fleeing and I am not going 535 to my usual pleasures. Therefore I shall depart. Goodbye, be happy.

82 ISABELLA ANDREINI Uranio Voglio teco venire, aspetta Tirsi, chi sa forse potrei teco venendo veder la non men cruda 540 che bella Ardelia mia.

SCENA SECONDA Filli ninfa Filli Mentre talora fra me stessa penso al mio stato già lieto al par d’ogni altro, e ora più d’ogn’altro d’affanno pieno e di noiose cure, 545 dolor m’affligge e ange, e la disperazion m’induce (ahi lassa) a desiar la morte. O più d’ogn’altra sfortunata Filli, voi pur sapete, o boschi, 550 valli, selve e campagne qual sia la vita mia, poiché sì spesso mi sentite lagnare, e i venti ancora lo san, che per udir l’aspra mia pena, si fermano sovente: 555 io sfortunata allora, che le stelle fanno ornamento al bel notturno cielo; e che Cinzia si posa ne le braccia de l’amato garzone, e che la notte spiega l’oscuro velo; 560 e che ‘l sonno e ‘l silenzio porge ai mortali stanchi i dovuti riposi; io me’n vo sola senza temer de le notturne larve l’orrido incontro, e misera e perduta 565 per gli ermi boschi e pei solinghi campi, indarno Uranio chiamo e mentre chieggio al ciel s’ei mi sarà spietato sempre, dai cavi sassi accresce il mio tormento Eco, ch’al mio parlar risponde sempre. 570

Mirtilla 83 Uranio I wish to come with you; wait, Tirsi. Who knows? Perhaps I could, in coming with you, see my no less cruel 540 than beautiful Ardelia.

SCENE 2 The nymph Filli Filli39 When sometimes privately I think about my condition, formerly as happy as anyone else’s, and now more than anyone else’s with anguish filled, and with distressing cares, 545 sorrow afflicts and torments me, and desperation induces me (alas!) to wish for death. O Filli, more unfortunate than any other woman! Indeed you know, O woods, 550 valleys, forests, and fields, what my life is like, since so often you hear me lament, and the winds as well know it, for in order to hear of my bitter pain they often come to a halt. 555 I am unfortunate when the stars make an ornament in the beautiful night sky, and Cynthia places herself in the arms of her beloved young man,40 and the night spreads out its dark veil, 560 and sleep and silence provide to weary mortals their rightful repose. I go about alone, not fearing with nocturnal shades a horrid encounter. Miserable and lost, 565 through deserted woods and through lonely fields, in vain Uranio I call; and while I ask heaven if he will be pitiless to me forever, from hollow stones Echo increases my torment, for to my speech she always responds.41 570

84 ISABELLA ANDREINI Così turbo a la notte in gravi omei il suo fido silenzio; e mentre piango sento i notturni augelli, che stridendo m’apportan segno di futuro male; e vivendo in tal morte, ecco le stelle 575 veggio sparire ad una ad una, e sola restar nel cielo l’amorosa stella; la qual, mentre da me tardi si parte, umilmente prego ch’al mio male qualche termine ponga, se non ch’io 580 diverrò di me stessa acerba Parca. E mentre così parlo, ella se’n fugge, sprezzando i preghi miei; intanto sorge dal mar la vaga Aurora, cinta di rose il rugiadoso crine, 585 e quanto il ciel di più bei fior dipinge e più le cose allegra, tanto al mio tristo core la fiera doglia accresce; perché mi par che quanto 590 ha di dolore il mondo tutto in quest’alma misera s’annidi, così le notti, e così i giorni interi consumo in doglia e in pianto. Già le fronzute selve, 595 e ‘l garrir degli augelli, il mormorar de’ fonti, e ‘l dolce sussurrar dei lievi venti tra il verde crin dei mirti e degli allori e ‘l grato odore e caro 600 del fiorito terreno m’apportavano al cor somma dolcezza, ov’or nulla mi giova; poiché per lunga esperienza (ahi lassa) ho conosciuto, o dispietato Uranio, 605 che del mio mal ti godi e ti nutrisci e brami pur ch’io muora; e più ti piace la morte mia che gli olmi a le ritorte viti; e tu sai pur crudele, 610 che non amano tanto la rugiada

Mirtilla 85 Thus I disturb with grave laments the night’s faithful silence, and while I weep I hear the nocturnal birds which in screeching bring me omens of future pain. While living in such a death, behold! the stars 575 I see disappear one by one. Alone there remains in the sky the amorous star,42 to whom, since from me late she departs, humbly I pray that to my pain some end she will set, or else I 580 43 will become for myself the bitter Fate. And while I speak thus, she flees away, disdaining my prayers. Meanwhile there rises from the sea the lovely Aurora.44 Girded with roses are her dewy locks, 585 and when she the sky with more beautiful flowers paints, and the more she makes things happy— just so much in my sad heart the fierce pangs she increases, because it seems to me that as much 590 suffering as is held in the world, all in this miserable soul shelters … In this way the nights and in this way entire days I consume in pangs and in weeping. Formerly the densely-leafed forests, 595 the chirping of birds, the murmuring of springs, the sweet whispering of light winds among the green foliage of myrtles and of laurels, and the odor welcome and dear 600 of the flowery soil, used to bring to my heart supreme sweetness; whereas now nothing cheers me, since through long experience (ah me, alas!) I have found, O pitiless Uranio, 605 that my pain you enjoy and feed on. Indeed you wish me to die, and more my death pleases you than elm trees do the twisted vines. And you know also, cruel one, 610 that morning roses love not the dew

86 ISABELLA ANDREINI le mattutine rose, quanto Filli ama Uranio crudele. Dunque verseran sempre amaro pianto gli occhi miei lassi, e la dolente bocca trarrà dal mesto cor sospiri ardenti, fin ch’io misera giunga a l’ultim’ora.

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SCENA TERZA Filli ninfa e Igilio pastore Igilio Né più bel raggio mai d’occhi sereni, né più candida man, né più bel crine arse, avvinse e piagò libero core, di quello ond’io restai, per te dolce mia Filli, arso, avvinto e piagato; Filli di te cosa più bella mai non potea nel suo regno Amor mostrarmi; e chi brama vedere d’Amor la face, l’arco e le saette e Venere e le Grazie e finalmente tutto ‘l bel di natura insieme unito, la bocca dolce e ‘l bel sereno sguardo di te mia Filli miri e viva poi, se può, senza sospiri. Invidio l’erbe, i sassi, i fior, le frondi, che sono tocche da lei e ognor bramo cangiarmi in fior, non sol per adornare di lei le trecce o ‘l delicato seno, ma per pigliar da lei grazia e odore: oh s’io fussi erba o sasso, che dal suo candido piè toccato fussi un giorno, vincerei di letizia ogn’altro amante. E se fronde venissi, che per suo scherzo o gioco da la morbida man toccato fussi, sarei felice e fortunato a pieno. Deh s’io potessi in pianta trasformarmi,

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Mirtilla 87 as much as Filli loves the cruel Uranio. Therefore always my weary eyes shall pour out bitter tears, and my suffering mouth shall draw out from my sad heart ardent sighs, until, wretched me!, I reach my final hour.

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SCENE 3 The nymph Filli and the shepherd Igilio Igilio [enters, unaware of Filli’s presence] Never a more beautiful ray from serene eyes, never a whiter hand, never more beautiful tresses burned, charmed, and wounded a free heart, than those by which I remained for you, my sweet Filli, burned, charmed, and wounded. Filli, a more beautiful thing than you never in all his kingdom could Love show me. Whoever wishes to see Love’s torch, bow, and arrows, and Venus and the Graces,45 and in sum everything beautiful in nature together united, your sweet mouth and fair serene regard, my Filli, let him behold; and let him live thereafter (if he can) without sighing. I envy the grass, the stones, the flowers, the fronds that are touched by her. Constantly I wish to change into a flower, not only to adorn her tresses or her delicate breast, but from her to acquire grace and perfume. Oh, if only I were grass or a stone which by her white foot were touched one day, I would be more joyous than any other lover! And if into fronds I turned, which for her joking or in play, by her soft hand were touched, I would be happy and lucky in full. Oh, if I could transform myself into a plant

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88 ISABELLA ANDREINI frondosa si, ch’ella sprezzando ogn’altra, venisse a l’ombra mia per riposarsi, io non invidierei quel platano famoso, che fece ombra ad Europa e al gran Giove. 650 Oh s’io potessi un fonte divenire, non perdendo per questo il senso umano, e che tu Filli mia venissi a rinfrescar le belle membra ne l’onde mie, la fonte, che Diana 655 vede sovente ignuda, non potrebbe agguagliarsi di gioia al mio felice stato. Ma s’io non posso in fiore, in erba, in sasso, in fronde, in pianta o in fonte trasformarmi, 660 potess’io almen cangiarmi in una fiera, in una fiera che da te seguita fusse per mia ventura, che se cosa vietata accresce sempre il desiderio in noi, 665 vorrei da te fuggire, sol per indurre in te desio maggiore di seguitarmi e tormi al fin la vita; e ben sarei felice, se quella bianca e delicata mano 670 del mio viver mortal troncasse il filo. Filli O dispietato Amore, ecco colui che per tua colpa m’ama; e io per tua cagione, ohimè, non posso renderli il cambio di cotanta fede: e per maggior mia doglia mi conviene amar chi m’odia e servir chi non prezza il mio fido servire e l’amor mio. Igilio O me felice, or ecco, che senza trasformarmi in altra forma, veggio l’amata Filli, ecco la bella fiamma che mi sface;

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Mirtilla 89 so leafy that she, disdaining all others, came to my shade to rest, I would not envy that famous plane tree that shaded Europa and great Jove.46 650 Oh, if only a spring I might become (while yet not losing my human wits), and you, my Filli, might come to refresh your beautiful limbs in my waters, that spring which often 655 sees Diana nude could not equal in joy my happy state.47 But if I cannot into a flower, grass, or a stone, into fronds, a tree, or a spring transform myself, 660 if only I might at least change into a beast, a beast which by you was pursued as my good fortune; for if a forbidden thing always increases desire in us, 665 I would like from you to flee, only to induce in you a greater desire to chase me and to wrest from me in the end my life.48 And I would be quite happy if that white and delicate hand, 670 severed my mortal life’s thread. Filli [aside] O pitiless Love, behold the man who through your fault loves me, and because of you, ah me!, I cannot give him what’s due to such great faithfulness. And for my greater grief I must love someone who hates me, and serve one who does not appreciate my faithful service and my love. Igilio [aside] Oh happy me! Now here she is. Without transforming myself into another form, I see my beloved Filli. Here is the beautiful flame that undoes me.

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90 ISABELLA ANDREINI voglio accostarmi e dire: pietade al mio languire. Filli Io voglio qui fermarmi perch’io veggio ch’egli arde di desio di parlar meco; e vo’ mostrare a lui quella pietade del suo mal, ch’io vorrei ch’altrui mostrasse a me del mio dolore; e bene imparo, ahi lassa, a le mie spese, a mostrarmi cortese.

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Igilio Gentilissima Filli, pietà di me tuo sfortunato servo. Filli Se da l’opere nostre si può vedere il core, 695 credo che tu conosca, Igilio, quanto mi spiaccia e mi rincresca non poterti dare del tuo servir giusta mercede; ma non posso dispor di quelle cose che per colpa d’Amor non son più mie. 700 Io d’altrui sono e non posso esser tua che mia né anco sono. Igilio Com’esser può, che essendo amor comune, non sia comune ancor quel desiderio ch’egli con la sua face accende in noi? Ed è pur vero, e con mio mal lo provo, o dolce albergo d’ogni mio pensiero, fa forza a te medesma, e mi concedi parte de la tua grazia, acciò che Amore non vada altero de la grave pena ch’ognun di noi sostiene: abbi a memoria che d’ogni cosa è copioso il mondo, fuor che di puri e non infinti amanti; e poiché in me conosci tanta fede, quant’è bellezza in te, non voler ch’io mieta de l’amor mio sì tristo frutto.

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Mirtilla 91 I will approach and say, “Have pity on my languishing.” Filli [aside] I’ll stop here, because I see that he burns with the desire to speak to me. I want to show him that pity for his pain, which I would like another man to show me for my suffering. Well do I learn (alas! to my cost) to behave courteously.

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Igilio O most kind Filli, have pity on me, your unfortunate servant. Filli If through our actions one can see our hearts, 695 I believe that you know, Igilio, how sorry I am, and how much I regret not being able to give you for your service a just reward. But I cannot dispose of those things which through the fault of Love are no longer mine. 700 I am another’s and I cannot be yours, for I am no longer my own. Igilio How can it be, that with our love shared, nonetheless not shared is that desire that he with his torch kindles in us? And yet it’s true, and with my pain I prove it. O sweet home of my every thought, force yourself, and grant to me part of your grace, so that Love may not gloat over the deep pain that each of us bears. Remember that in everything the world abounds, except in pure and not deceitful lovers. Since in me you recognize as much fidelity as there is beauty in you, don’t allow that I harvest from my love such wretched fruits.

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92 ISABELLA ANDREINI Filli Teco doler mi posso del tuo male ma già non posso, come ben vorrei, darti cortese aita; o fiera sorte soccorrer ti vorrei, né so in qual modo. Igilio Vedi s’è grande la miseria mia, leggiadra Filli, ch’io sento maggior dolore, per vederti pietosa del mio male, che non farei se tu crudel mi fussi. Cessa dunque, cor mio, d’esser pietosa in così fiera guisa. Filli Non ti dispiaccia, Igilio, ch’io ti mostri l’affetto del mio cor, e a grato prendi ch’io dolor senta, non potendo amarti, né voler più da me di quel ch’io posso. Igilio Grazie ti rendo del cortese affetto; ma poiché da sì chiara e alma luce, onde vorrebbe uscir la vita, n’esce la morte, posso ben, misero, dire che per me la pietà fatta è crudele, ma non potrà mai far maligna sorte, ch’al par de la mia vita ognor non t’ami.

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Filli E io voglio pregarti, che non t’incresca s’io 740 non posso darti il premio di quell’amor che di portarmi affermi; riconsigliati dunque, o caro amico, e come saggio rimedia al tuo male. Io, se piacesse al ciel di farmi libera, 745 ben ti farei conoscer che sì come ne l’uno ti consiglio, ne l’altro lieta ti soddisfarei:

Mirtilla 93 Filli With you I can grieve for your pain, but indeed I cannot, as much as I would like to, give you courteous help. O harsh fate! I would like to succor you, but I know not how to. Igilio See how great is my misery, lovely Filli, for I feel greater sorrow at seeing you pitiful toward my pain, than I would if you were cruel to me. Cease therefore, my heart, from being pitiful in so harsh a manner. Filli Don’t be sorry, Igilio, that I show you the affection of my heart; and appreciate that I feel sorrow at not being able to love you. Don’t ask more from me than I can do. Igilio Thanks I give you for your courteous affection. But since from so clear and bountiful a light, from which life would like to come forth, there comes forth death, I can indeed (wretched me!) say that for me pity is made cruel. But never will malign fate be able to make me not love you always, as much as my own life. Filli And I want to entreat you not to be sorry if I cannot give you the prize for that love which you affirm you bear me. Take better counsel therefore, O dear friend, and, like a wise man, find a remedy for your suffering. If it pleased heaven to set me free, indeed I would make you know that just as in the one case I advise you, in the other happily I would satisfy you.

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94 ISABELLA ANDREINI ma non posso star teco più lungamente, Igilio, 750 poiché questi occhi miei chiedono il loro soave cibo e dolce nutrimento. Mi parto dunque per veder s’Amore vuol esser sì pietoso al mio desire com’egli è stato al tuo, rimanti in pace. 755 Vo per veder s’io posso parlar, sì come ho molte volte fatto, co ‘l mio crudel Uranio; ma prego la mia sorte che mi conceda grazia di trovarlo 760 diverso da l’antico suo costume. Igilio Va’ pur Filli, cor mio, va’ dove vuoi; io prego Amore e ‘l cielo che si mostri propizio a’ tuoi desiri; misero Igilio, in che fortuna sei? Bramerai tu che Filli trovi de’ suoi martir pietoso Uranio? Ahi, se mentre ch’ei l’odia e ch’ei la fugge ella lo segue e ama, che fia poi se gl’avverrà ch’ei non la fugga e l’ami? Qual parte rimarrà del cor di Filli ch’esser possa d’Igilio? Ohimè, ch’io temo, che s’ei s’affissa un dì ne’ suoi bei lumi e le soavi sue parole ascolta, ei non divenga amante; allora Igilio sarai fuor d’ogni speme, allor vedrai ne l’altrui sen la tua leggiadra ninfa, ah, non mi serbi il cielo a sì noiosa vista. Prima con le sue man questi occhi chiuda morte ch’io veggia mai quello, a cui sol pensando, sento farsi di ghiaccio il cor nel petto e ‘l sangue entro le vene: ma quel cieco fanciul, cui tanto aggrada il discorde voler, che in due cor mira, forse farà che Uranio

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Mirtilla 95 But I cannot stay with you any longer, Igilio, 750 since these eyes of mine are asking for their noble food and sweet nutriment. I depart therefore, to see if Love intends to be as pitiful to my desire as he has been to yours. Stay in peace. 755 I go to see if I can speak, just as many times I have done, with my cruel Uranio, but I pray my fate to grant me the grace of finding him 760 different from his longstanding custom. Igilio [to Filli] Go by all means, Filli, my heart; go where you wish. I pray Love and heaven to show themselves propitious to your desires. [alone] Wretched Igilio, what sort of fortune is yours? Will you wish that Filli may find Uranio compassionate toward her torments? Aiee! If while he hates her and flees her, she follows and loves him, what will result then if it should happen that he not flee her, and love her? What part shall remain of the heart of Filli, that might be Igilio’s? Ah me! I fear that if he gazes one day into her beautiful eyes, and listens to her sweet words, he would become her lover. Then, Igilio, you will be out of all hope; then you will see in another’s arms your lovely nymph. Ah, may heaven not preserve me for so distressing a sight! Sooner with his own hands let these eyes be closed by death, than that I ever might see that sight. Merely in thinking about it, I feel turn to ice the heart in my breast and the blood inside my veins. But that blind boy, who is so pleased to observe discordant desire in two hearts, perhaps he will make Uranio

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96 ISABELLA ANDREINI arda per altra ninfa e sprezzi Filli, ond’io non rimarrò di speme privo.

Fine del Primo Atto

Mirtilla 97 burn for another nymph and scorn Filli, so that I shall not remain hopeless.

End of Act One

Atto Secondo SCENA PRIMA Ardelia ninfa Ardelia Or che ingemmate son le valli e i colli 790 di fior bianchi, vermigli, azzurri e gialli, voglio sedendo a questa chiara fonte, che co ‘l suo grato e dolce mormorio m’invita a riposar le stanche membra, tessere ai crini miei vaga ghirlanda, 795 sì ch’ogn’altra d’Ardelia i fiori ammiri con pensiero immutabil d’osservare la pudicizia mia cotanto cara a quella casta diva che co ‘l bel lume suo rischiara l’ombre 800 e inargenta le campagne e i boschi a lei sacrati; or siedo: oh che bei fiori! Or ben potrò comporne così bella ghirlanda che n’avranno invidia l’altre compagne mie; ma perché stanca alquanto 805 mi sento dal seguire un capriolo che m’ha di strali vota la faretra prima vo’ dar quest’occhi in preda al Sonno; cortese dio, tranquillità del mondo, riposo dei viventi, amico Sonno, 810 lascia ti prego le cimerie grotte dove lieto soggiorni e dentro agl’occhi miei vieni a posarti. O de l’amica notte fido compagno, vieni 815 a chiudermi le luci, poiché l’amico tuo fido Silenzio meco si trova; qui non mugghia toro non bela capra, non abbaia cane; qui non ulula lupo, 820 qui non stride cicala, qui non gracida rana, qui non s’ode l’augel nunzio del giorno, 98

Act Two SCENE 1 The nymph Ardelia Ardelia Now that bejewelled are the valleys and hills 790 with flowers white, vermilion, azure, and yellow, while I sit by this clear spring, which with its welcome and sweet murmuring invites me to repose my tired limbs, I shall weave for my hair a lovely garland,49 795 so that all other women will admire Ardelia’s flowers with the immutable thought of observing my modesty, which is so dear to that chaste goddess who with her beautiful light brightens up the shadows, 800 and silvers the countryside and the woods that to her are consecrated.50 Now I sit. Oh, what beautiful flowers! Now indeed I can form them into so beautiful a garland that it will incite envy in my other companions. But because somewhat tired 805 I feel from pursuing a roebuck that emptied of arrows my quiver,51 first I shall give these eyes in prey to Sleep. Courteous god, tranquility of the world, repose of living creatures, friendly Sleep, 810 leave, I beseech you, the Cimmerian grottoes where in delight you dwell, and into my eyes come settle.52 O friendly Night’s faithful companion, come 815 close my eyes, since your faithful friend Silence53 is here with me. Here no bull bellows, no goat bleats, no dog bays, here no wolf howls, 820 here no cicada screeches, here no frog croaks, here no bird is heard announcing the day. 99

100 ISABELLA ANDREINI qui non s’ode altra cosa che ‘l mormorio di questa chiara fonte, 825 la qual mentre sì dolce infra le pietre si va rompendo, imita quasi il suono de le notturne cetre de’ pastori. Deh, se cortese il ciel mai non ti neghi la tua leggiadra moglie, a me concedi 830 dolce riposo; non sai quante e quante volte ne le diurne ore m’hai dato quel ch’ora ti domando? Spargi dunque di nuovo gli occhi miei di caro oblio e con le tue negre ali 835 coprimi tutta, che più cara assai mi fia per la stanchezza l’ombra tua che quella chiara luce ch’ora veggio. Ma folle, mentre parlo interrompo il Silenzio, 840 e, se pur senza lui nulla tu puoi, forz’é ch’io taccia; o venti, o piante, o cavi sassi, ove si vive Eco, nulla ridite di quel che udito avete. 845 Amico Sonno e caro, ecco che ‘l braccio pongo su l’erba e sopra ‘l braccio il capo appoggio, acciò presto mi doni il solito riposo. 850

SCENA SECONDA Ardelia e Mirtilla ninfe Mirtilla Già posto il freno a’ suoi lievi destrieri, sorgea di grembo a Teti il biondo Apollo, già scacciava l’Aurora, e già faceansi d’oro le cime de’ più alti monti, quando bramosa di novelli fiori da l’albergo fedel feci partita: e sedendo in un prato a pié d’un colle,

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Mirtilla 101 Here one hears nothing other than the murmur of this clear spring 825 which, while so sweetly among the stones it plashes, imitates almost the sound of the nocturnal lyres of the shepherds. Please, since courteous heaven never denies you your lovely wife,54 to me grant 830 a sweet repose; don’t you know how many, many times during the daylight hours you have given me what now I ask of you? Therefore spill again over my eyes droplets of dear oblivion, and with your black wings55 835 cover me all over, for far dearer to me in my weariness will be your shadow than that bright light which now I see. But what folly! While I speak I interrupt Silence. 840 If indeed without him you can do nothing, perforce I must be silent. O winds, O plants, O caverns, wherever lives Echo, repeat nothing of what you have heard. 845 Friendly Sleep, and dear, behold. My arm I place on the grass, and on top of my arm my head I lay, so that soon you might give me my accustomed repose.56 850

SCENE 2 The nymphs Ardelia and Mirtilla Mirtilla [enters, unaware of Ardelia’s presence] Already having reined in his light destriers, blond Apollo was rising from Tethys’s lap;57 he was already chasing away Aurora, and already the peaks of the highest mountains were turning gold, when I, desirous of fresh flowers, from my faithful dwelling departed. I sat in a meadow at the foot of a hill

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102 ISABELLA ANDREINI dal qual scendeva un’acqua viva e pura, che sembrava a vederla liquido argento che fuggendo gisse, 860 con torti passi per quel prato adorno di mille fiori e mille, [mi godea degli augelli il dolce canto]; e stando in tal piacere vidi (ahimè) vidi Uranio 865 che la sua bianca greggia conducea ad un pasco vicino, e non sì presto lo vider gli occhi miei che dentro il core restò piagato e arso; allora invece di coglier fiori, i’ colsi ortiche e stecchi; 870 e per rose odorate pungenti spine nel mio seno posi. Tu solo Uranio fosti che di tenace nodo l’anima mi legasti, 875 allor che dolcemente con la dotta zampogna accompagnavi i tuoi [soavi] accenti ai quali, mentre pascea la tua lanosa e grassa greggia le ruggiadose erbette, rispondeva 880 da questi cavi sassi Eco infelice. Da indi in qua mai non conobbi pace, anzi in sospiri, in pianti e in fiamme ardenti travaglia ognor questa mia grave spoglia: né Amor giamai, d’ogni mio mal radice, 885 mi dà forza e vigore di scemar tanto ardore; e se ben gli occhi miei versano sempre amaro pianto, non per questo ponno spegnere in parte l’amoroso foco: 890 ciò vietano i sospir de’ quali il vento sempre l’accende con maggior possanza; così consumo la mia stanca vita, così tutta diventa al foco fiamma, tutta vento ai sospir, tutt’acqua al pianto; 895 così lagrime amare verseran sempre gli occhi, sospir la bocca e foco e fiamma il core.

Mirtilla 103 from which descended a stream lively and pure, that seemed (to look at it) liquid silver that fled, 860 with meandering steps, through that meadow adorned with thousands and thousands of flowers. I was enjoying the birds’ sweet song.58 And while I was feeling such pleasure, I saw—ah me!—I saw Uranio, 865 who his white flock was leading to a nearby pasture. No sooner did my eyes see him than inside me my heart was wounded and burned. Then, instead of gathering flowers, I gathered nettles and sticks; 870 and in place of scented roses, sharp thorns onto my breast I placed. You alone, Uranio, were the one who with a tenacious knot bound up my soul, 875 when sweetly with your expert bagpipes you accompanied your gentle59 singing, and to your words, while your fat and woolly flock was feeding on tender dewy grasses, unhappy Echo 880 from these caverns responded. From then till now, never have I known peace. Rather, with sighs, with weeping, and with burning flames I torment constantly my leaden body. Never does Love, of my every pain the root, 885 give me the strength and vigor to diminish so much ardor. Although my eyes constantly pour out bitter tears, not for this can they extinguish even partially my amorous fire; 890 this is forbidden by the sighs whose breeze always fans it on to greater power. Thus I use up my weary life. Thus, from the fire I become entirely a flame, entirely wind from the sighs, entirely water from the weeping. 895 Thus bitter tears will always pour out from my eyes, sighs from my mouth, and fire and flames from my heart.60

104 ISABELLA ANDREINI Deh, dolce Uranio mio, vieni a colei che sì t’apprezza e ama; vieni ormai 900 a colei che t’adora, a cui dispiace, fuor che i begli occhi tuoi, quant’ella vede; qual prova ingrato di mia salda fede, più di tentar, più di veder ti resta? Deh, perché ai preghi miei 905 sì dispietato sei? Ardelia Ohimè, qual mesto suono conturba il mio soave, almo riposo? Mirtilla, sei tu quella che traendo dal profondo del cor dogliosi accenti e focosi sospir si lamenta?

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Mirtilla Quella son io, che di mestizia avanzo l’alme dolenti che han perduto il giorno. Ardelia Questo forse t’avviene per troppo amare? Mirtilla Ahi lassa, ben è vero 915 che d’ogni mio tormento n’è sol cagione Amore. Ardelia O di Venere iniquo ed empio figlio, che di perpetua doglia empi le menti e i petti di coloro 920 ch’a le promesse tue d’effetto vote follemente dan fede: per tutte queste piante leggo, infelice amante, chiaro e notabil segno che in seguirti 925 altro pur che dolor non si ritrova: questa nemica fiamma de’ mortali arde, strugge, consuma ogni piacere, onde senza intelletto giudico chi lo segue. 930

Mirtilla 105 Oh, my sweet Uranio, come to her who so prizes and loves you! Come at last 900 to her who adores you, who dislikes (except for your beautiful eyes) everything she sees! You ingrate, what more proof of my firm faithfulness is needed for you to test, for you to see? Oh, why to my entreaties 905 are you so pitiless? Ardelia Ah me, what sad sound disturbs my gentle, nourishing repose? Mirtilla, are you the one who, drawing from the depths of her heart words of suffering and fiery sighs, is lamenting?

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Mirtilla I am that one, for in sadness I surpass the grieving souls who have lost the daylight.61 Ardelia Does this happen to you, perhaps, for loving too much? Mirtilla Alas, indeed it’s true 915 that of all my torments the sole cause is Love. Ardelia O you, Venus’s cruel and iniquitous son! With perpetual suffering you fill the minds and the hearts of those who in your bootless promises foolishly trust. On all these trees I read, you unhappy lover, a clear and notable sign that in following you nothing else but sorrow is found.62 This inimical flame burns, destroys, and consumes every pleasure of mortals; hence, witless I deem whoever follows him.

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106 ISABELLA ANDREINI Mirtilla Deh, graziosa Ardelia non esser tanto ardita, che tu ti faccia lecito d’offendere l’invincibil fanciul de la dea Venere: non dir che privi di giudizio sieno coloro che lo seguono, che forse potresti un giorno divenir sua serva. Ardelia Più tosto tornerà l’antico caos che in me s’annidi mai pensier d’amore: e se per mia sciagura a lui soggetta divenissi giamai, la mia triforme dea, la mia gran Cinzia, di lui fiera nemica, tosto mi leveria da la sua mano. Mirtilla O folle, tu non sai ch’ella se stessa liberar non poteo? Dicalo Endimione, che fu da lei sì caldamente amato, e Pan, dio de pastori, che per un vello di candida lana, caramente la tenne infra le braccia. Dunque non ti dar vanto di resister a lui, che i più superbi e dispietati cori ha vinti e domi; ma tu non vedi, Ardelia, ecco il mio sole.

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Ardelia Che parli tu di sole? Mirtilla Di quel pastor ch’è sole agli occhi miei. Chiaro sol che mi sface, che scende da quel colle; il vedi ancor Ardelia? Ardelia Il veggio certo. 960

Mirtilla 107 Mirtilla Come, gracious Ardelia, don’t be so rash as to think it permissible to offend the invincible child of the goddess Venus. Don’t say that lacking in judgment are those who follow him, for perhaps you could one day become his servant. Ardelia Sooner the ancient chaos will return,63 than ever in me a thought of love shall settle. If (to my misfortune) I ever became to him subjugated, my triform goddess, my great Cynthia, his fierce enemy, would soon wrest me from his hand.64 Mirtilla O fool, don’t you know that she was unable to liberate herself? Let Endymion say it, who was by her so passionately loved,65 and Pan, the god of shepherds, who for a fleece of white wool held her warmly in his arms.66 Therefore do not brag that you could resist him, for the proudest and most pitiless hearts he has defeated and tamed. But don’t you see him, Ardelia? Here is my sun.

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Ardelia What are you saying about the sun? Mirtilla About that shepherd who is the sun to my eyes. The bright sun that undoes me, who is descending from that hill. Do you see him yet, Ardelia? Ardelia I see him, certainly.67 960

108 ISABELLA ANDREINI Mirtilla Quell’è il mio sol. Ardelia

Che vogliam far?

Mirtilla Io voglio che ti nascondi dopo quella quercia, se brami di servirmi, e io porrommi dietro a quest’olmo. Ardelia E poi? Mirtilla Stammi ad udire, tu vedi che ver noi ratto ne viene; vo’ dunque che noi stiamo ascose e quete fin ch’egli arrivi, e s’egli parla voglio che lo stiamo ad udire; tu non ti palesare fin ch’io non mi discopro; s’egli poscia verrà per ragionarti, come suole, fingi sprezzarlo.

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Ardelia Dico che da vero lo sprezzarò, perché lo sprezzai sempre come fiero nemico del mio bene; ma tu perché vuoi questo? Mirtilla Perch’io spero 975 che la tua crudeltade e la mia fede gli faccino cangiar pensiero e voglia; eccolo giunto, è già vicino a noi: ascondiamoci tosto. Ardelia Ecco m’ascondo.

Mirtilla 109 Mirtilla That is my sun. Ardelia

What shall we do?

Mirtilla I want you to hide behind that oak tree, if you wish to be of service to me, and I will put myself behind this elm. Ardelia And then? Mirtilla Wait to hear me. You see that towards us rapidly he comes. So, I want us to stay hidden and quiet until he arrives here, and if he speaks I want us to stay to listen. Don’t show yourself until I reveal myself. If he then comes to converse with you, as he usually does, pretend to disdain him.

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Ardelia I say that truly I will disdain him, because I have disdained him always as a fierce enemy of my happiness. But why do you want this? Mirtilla Because I hope 975 that your cruelty and my faithfulness will make him change his mind and his desire.68 Look, he’s arrived, he’s already near us. Let’s hide quickly. Ardelia Here, I’m hiding.

110 ISABELLA ANDREINI Mirtilla E io qui mi porrò: cortese Amore concedimi che questo giorno sia fin del mio mal, principio del mio bene.

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SCENA TERZA Uranio, Ardelia e Mirtilla Uranio Pensi pur Tirsi, faccia e dica quanto vuol, ch’unqua non potrà da l’amor mio levarmi, ohimè, che solo il può far morte; e se dopo la morte amar si puote, né anco la sua forza avrà mai forza di spegner ne l’oblio questa mia fiamma, la qual sì dolcemente mi consuma, che d’ardere e languir mi glorio e vanto; e so che la beltà de la mia dea è tal ch’Amore in lei posto ha ‘l suo nido e di sua mano ordisce de le sue bionde treccie i cari nodi con le quai lega a mille amanti il core. Sono gl’occhi e le ciglia le sue saette e l’arco che mai non scocca invano; la spaziosa fronte è il varco ov’egli fa continue prede, le sue rosate labra son le fiamme con le quai sempre accende ogni più freddo core; l’eburneo petto e le mammelle sono la sua forte prigione, ed egli stesso per maggior gloria e vanto de la mia bella Ardelia, è di lei prigioniero e da lei vinto. E di qui nasce ch’egli non ha contra di lei potere alcuno; ond’ella lieta vive e altri ancide e de l’altrui martir si gloria e ride.

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Mirtilla 111 Mirtilla And I here will place myself. Courteous Love, grant me that this day may be the end of my pain, the beginning of my happiness.

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SCENE 3 Uranio, Ardelia, and Mirtilla Uranio [enters, unaware of Ardelia and Mirtilla] Let Tirsi think, let him do and say whatever he wants; he can never from my love release me, ah me!, for only death can do so. 985 And if after death one can love, not even its strength will ever have the strength to extinguish in forgetfulness this flame of mine, which so sweetly consumes me that in burning and in languishing I glory and brag. 990 I know that the beauty of my goddess is such that within her Love has placed his nest, and with his hand he weaves her blonde tresses into the dear knots with which he binds a thousand lovers’ hearts.69 995 Her eyes and her brows are his arrows and his bow, which he never shoots in vain. Her broad forehead is the ambush site where he constantly catches his prey. 1000 Her rosy lips are the flames with which he always kindles all the coldest hearts. Her ivory chest and her breasts are his strong prison, and he himself, 1005 to the greater glory and boast of my beautiful Ardelia, is her prisoner, and is by her defeated. From this it derives that he has against her no power at all; 1010 hence she lives happily and kills others, and at their torments she glories and laughs.

112 ISABELLA ANDREINI Mirtilla O Mirtilla dolente, pur hai di nuovo udito la cagion del suo male; 1015 ma prego il mio dolor che ‘n tanta guerra qualche tregua mi dia; pace non chieggio, poiché a misera amante tanto chieder non lice, ma voglio farmi ardita 1020 per soccorrer me stessa. Il ciel ti faccia lieto, o de l’anima mia parte più cara. Uranio Lieto sarei se mai non ti vedessi. Ardelia Voglio scoprirmi anch’io, 1025 per osservar quel che Mirtilla brama. Uranio Parmi sentir la voce di colei che tanto amo e onoro. Ed eccola; o fortuna, quando mai la vidi ch’ella disdegnosa il piede 1030 altrove non volgesse? Da ch’io l’amo non scorsi mai tanta pietade in lei del mio martire, e poi ch’ella non parte, anzi mostra voler che seco parli, accosterommi arditamente a lei. 1035 Ben trovata sostegno di mia vita. Ardelia Più tosto sosterrei di sostenere tutti i martir del mondo che d’esser tuo sostegno. Mirtilla Deh Uranio ascolta me, che t’amo quanto amano l’alghe e l’onde i muti pesci.

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Mirtilla 113 Mirtilla [aside] O sorrowful Mirtilla, once again you have heard the cause of your pain. 1015 But I beseech my suffering that in so great a war some truce it might give me; peace I do not request, since a wretched lover may not ask so much. But I shall make bold 1020 to succor myself. [to Uranio] May heaven make you happy, O you, my soul’s dearest part. Uranio Happy I would be if I never saw you. Ardelia [aside] I shall reveal myself too, to accomplish what Mirtilla wishes.

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Uranio I seem to hear the voice of the woman I love and honor so much. And here she is! Oh good fortune! When ever have I seen her, when disdainfully her foot 1030 was not heading elsewhere? In all the time I’ve loved her I have never discerned so much pity in her for my torment; and since she is not leaving, but rather shows a desire for me to speak with her, I will boldly approach her. 1035 It’s a pleasure to see you, support of my life. Ardelia I would sooner support supporting all the torments of the world than be your support. Mirtilla Oh, Uranio, listen to me, for I love you as much as the mute fishes love the seaweed and the waves.

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114 ISABELLA ANDREINI Uranio Deh Ardelia ascolta me, che t’amo quanto aman l’api ingegnose i vaghi fiori. Ardelia Pastor lasciami star, ch’io t’odio quanto odiano il lupo le belanti agnelle.

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Uranio Ninfa lasciami star, che t’odio quanto odian gli augelli le viscose panie. Mirtilla Non ha tanti colori primavera, quanti sono i martiri che tormentan per te l’anima mia.

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Uranio Non risplendon nel ciel tante fiammelle la notte, quanti sono i mali che per te patisco ogn’ora. Ardelia Tanti augelli non van per l’aria a volo, quante sono le noie 1055 che per te sento quando t’odo e veggio. Uranio Tanti strai non avventa il crudo Amore, quanti sono i tormenti che con l’odiata tua vista mi dai. Mirtilla Il veltro segue il lupo, io lassa seguo te che mi fuggi e co ‘l fuggir m’uccidi. Uranio Il lupo segue gli agni, io lasso seguo l’orme beate e care del tuo piede.

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Mirtilla 115 Uranio Oh, Ardelia, listen to me, for I love you as much as the ingenious bees love the charming flowers. Ardelia Shepherd, let me be, for I hate you as much as little bleating lambs hate the wolf.

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Uranio Nymph, let me be, for I hate you as much as birds hate the sticky birdlime. Mirtilla The Spring has not so many colors as the number of the afflictions that for your sake torture my soul.

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Uranio In heaven not so many little flames shine at night, as are the pains that for you I suffer constantly. Ardelia So many birds go not through the air in flight, as are the vexations 1055 that I feel about you when I hear and see you. Uranio So many arrows cruel Love does not let fly, as are the torments that with the hateful sight of you you give me.70 Mirtilla The greyhound pursues the wolf; wretched me, I pursue you who flee me, and in fleeing you kill me. Uranio The wolf pursues the sheep; wretched me, I pursue the dear and blessed tracks of your foot.

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116 ISABELLA ANDREINI Ardelia Fuggono le colombe dai rapaci augelli, e io da la tua vista fuggo.

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Uranio Fuggono dai cani le paurose lepri, e io vie più fuggo Mirtilla e odio. Mirtilla Se m’accetti per tua, donar ti voglio un velo ove vedrai con bel lavoro del miserello Adon la fiera morte: e Venere vedrai, che infuriata, per far vendetta del suo bene estinto, manda a le selve i pargoletti Amori, e par che dica: “Qui presa menate la dispietata belva, acciò ch’io possa sfogar contra di lei l’irato core.” Uranio Se m’accetti per tuo, leggiadra ninfa, donar ti voglio un arco d’or fregiato ove vedrai da dotta mano impresso, di varii fiori e persa coronato, Imeneo con polita e bella guancia, che tien nella sinistra un vel purpureo e nella destra una facella accesa, e lo vedrai sì bello e ben composto, che sembra spirto aver voce e favella. Ardelia Se tu mi lasci stare Uranio ormai, donar ti voglio il mio Torrente fido, che tra quanti mi tengo amati cani, questo m’è assai più caro e più gradito, il quale con ragione invero porta di veloce torrente il nome altero; poiché fiera non è per questi boschi, sia pur quando si vuol fugace e presta, ch’egli correndo non la fermi o prenda, o sia nel bosco o corra ‘l monte o ‘l piano.

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Mirtilla 117 Ardelia Doves flee from birds of prey, and from the sight of you I flee.

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Uranio From dogs the fearful hares flee, and much more do I flee and hate Mirtilla. Mirtilla If you accept me as yours, I will give you a veil where you will see with beautiful workmanship unfortunate Adonis’s violent death;71 1070 and you will see Venus who, in her fury, to avenge her deceased beloved sends to the forests the youthful Cupids; and she appears to say, “Here captured bring the pitiless beast, so that against it 1075 I might give vent to my irate heart.” Uranio If you accept me as yours, lovely nymph, I will give you a bow decorated with gold. Therein you will see, by an expert hand engraved, with various flowers and sweet marjoram crowned, 1080 Hymen, with a polished and beautiful face, who holds in his left hand a purple veil, and in his right hand a lit torch;72 you will judge him so handsome and well-wrought that he seems to have a spirit, and a voice and speech.73 1085 Ardelia If you let me be, Uranio, at long last, I will give you my faithful Torrent, for among my so many beloved dogs this one is my dearest and most prized. In truth, he rightfully bears a hurtling torrent’s proud name, since there is no beast throughout these woods, no matter how fleet and quick it may be, that he in running could not stop it and catch it, whether in the woods he runs, or in the mountains or the plains.

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118 ISABELLA ANDREINI Uranio Se di noiarmi ormai resti, Mirtilla, donar ti voglio un vaso ove vedrai Giove da un canto trasformato in cigno che sta lieto nel sen de la sua Leda; e da l’altro il vedrai che per Calisto ha preso di Diana il viso e i panni, per il bel Ganimede il vedrai poscia da l’altra parte in aquila cangiato, e per Danae da l’altra in pioggia d’oro. Mirtilla Onde nascesti? d’un alpestre scoglio? Ti diedero le tigre ircane il latte?

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Uranio Or sei tu nata infra i gelati monti? Ti partorì, crudele, una leonza? Ardelia Or sei tu nato d’un aspide sordo che intender non mi vuoi? Dico che t’odio.

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Uranio Or sei tu nata per noiarmi sempre e stimolarmi ognor? Dico che t’odio. Mirtilla O più saldo che marmo al mio gran pianto. Uranio O più fredda che neve al mio gran fuoco. Ardelia O più noioso che cicala stridula, resta ne la malora, ch’io mi parto per non sentirti più, né per vederti. Uranio Ardelia tu mi fuggi, e credi forse co ‘l tuo fuggir di farmi

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Mirtilla 119 Uranio If at long last you cease annoying me, Mirtilla, I will give you a vase where you will see in one area Jove transformed into a swan, resting happily in the arms of his Leda; and in another area you will see him when for Callisto he took on Diana’s face and garments; for the handsome Ganymede you will see him then, in another section, into an eagle changed; and for Danae, in another, into a shower of gold.74 Mirtilla Where were you born? On an alpine cliff? Did Hyrcanian tigers give you milk?75

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Uranio Now, were you born among the icy mountains? Did a lioness, O cruel one, give birth to you? Ardelia Now, were you born of a deaf asp, since you refuse to understand me? I say that I hate you.

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Uranio Now, were you born to annoy me forever, and to irritate me constantly? I say that I hate you. Mirtilla O you, harder than marble before my great weeping! Uranio O you, colder than snow before my great fire! Ardelia O you, more annoying than a screeching cicada! Stay here with my ill will, for I am leaving in order not to hear you anymore, nor see you any longer. Uranio Ardelia, you flee me, and perhaps you believe with your flight you’ll make me

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120 ISABELLA ANDREINI finir i giorni miei; 1120 ma ‘l tuo pensiero è vano poiché l’immagin tua che meco resta, se ben da me t’involi, in vita mi mantiene; né lontananza o tempo 1125 può far ch’io ti disami, che non si toglie al core quel ch’a gli occhi si toglie. Deh, se può loco aver nel casto seno de’ miei gravi martir qualche pietade 1130 e se sperar dee mai fido servire qualche mercé, di me t’incresca. Volgi, volgi quei chiari lumi che ‘l cor di vivo foco accesso m’hanno; ah, se fuggendo le tue belle piante 1135 fusser punte da spini, di che doglia mi saresti cagione? Ferma adunque il piè troppo veloce a’ danni miei, non lasciar gli occhi miei privi de la lor luce, 1140 che di continuo pianto irrigheran l’afflitte guance e ‘l seno. Tu sola puoi campar la vita mia, che già veloce a morte se’n corre. Ah non son io 1145 già sì deforme, che a fuggir tu m’abbi, spietata Ardelia, ecco io ti serbo, ascolta, una candida cerva, un capro e un lupo avvezzo a star in un covile istesso co ‘l mio fido Melampo e con Licisca 1150 e fuor di suo costume con le pecore scherza e con gli agnelli; e se questo non basta, io ti prometto sacrificarti ancor, come a mia dea, e far d’arabi odor fumar gli altari. 1155 Deh, se pietosi preghi hanno in te forza, non mi fuggir crudel, non mi negare sì dolce vista ormai per cui respiro. Deh, s’a fede amorosa, amorosa pietà sperar si deve, 1160

Mirtilla 121 end my days. 1120 But you are mistaken, since your image (which stays with me, even when you steal yourself away from me), keeps me in life. Neither distance nor time 1125 can make me stop loving you, for you can’t remove from the heart what from the eyes you remove. Please, if there can be room in your chaste breast for some pity for my severe torments, 1130 and if faithful service should ever hope for some reward, have compassion on me. Turn, turn those bright eyes which in my heart a lively fire have kindled. Ah! If, while fleeing, the soles of your beautiful feet 1135 were pricked by thorns, what pangs would you cause me? Stop therefore your foot, too swift for my peace of mind. Don’t leave my eyes deprived of their light, 1140 for with continuous tears they will drench my afflicted cheeks and breast. You alone can save my life, which already races swiftly toward death. Ah, I am not 1145 by any means so deformed that you ought to flee me, pitiless Ardelia. Look, I reserve for you—listen!— a snowy white deer, a billy goat, and a wolf accustomed to staying in the same kennel with my faithful Melampo and with Licisca;76 1150 and uncharacteristically with sheep he plays, and with lambs. And if this is not enough, I promise you I’ll make sacrifices to you as well, as to my goddess, and I’ll make the altars smoke with Arabian scents.77 1155 Please, if pitiful entreaties have any influence on you, don’t flee me cruelly; don’t deny me at this point so sweet a sight for which I breathe. Please, if in return for loving faithfulness, loving pity is to be hoped for, 1160

122 ISABELLA ANDREINI dovria pur la mia fede sperar qualche mercede; ma tu, che mai nel core non ricevesti amore, sprezzi il mio male e godi di vedermi languire; eppure, ohimè, son di seguirti astretto.

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Mirtilla Deh perché segui, Uranio, chi ti fugge? Deh perché fuggi, Uranio, chi ti segue? Perché ami tu chi t’odia? 1170 Perché odi tu chi t’ama? Deh perché prezzi tu, misero amante, una donna crudel che ti disprezza? Deh perché sprezzi, discortese amato, una fedele amante che ti prezza? 1175 Deh, fuggi chi ti fugge, sprezza chi ti disprezza, accogli chi ti segue, rendi amor per amore, odio per odio. Sarà possibil mai che non ti pieghi 1180 a così giusti preghi? Non vedi che le stelle, l’aria, l’acqua, la terra e i più superbi venti al fin cangiano o stile o luogo o tempre? 1185 Tu sol qual duro scoglio, resti rigido sempre, immobil sempre; ma che scoglio diss’io? Poi che a l’onde del mare cede talor lo scoglio, 1190 e ‘l cava pur talor picciola stilla, e tu sempre più saldo ne la tua fiera voglia, ohimè, dimori, or vita, or morte mostrano le stelle, né sempre d’un color veste la terra, 1195 né sempre si dimostra il mar turbato, i venti or son crucciosi, or son benigni. E tutte l’altre cose quando propizie sono e quando avverse,

Mirtilla 123 indeed my faithfulness should hope for some reward. But you, who never into your heart have received love, despise my pain, and you enjoy seeing me languish. And yet, ah me!, to follow you I am constrained. Mirtilla Oh why, Uranio, do you seek the one who flees you? Oh why, Uranio, do you flee the one who seeks you? Why do you love the one who hates you? Why do you hate the one who loves you? Oh, why do you prize, miserable lover, a cruel woman who despises you? Oh, why do you despise, my discourteous beloved, a faithful lover who prizes you? Come, flee the one who flees you; despise the one who despises you; welcome the one who seeks you; give back love for love, hate for hate. How can it ever be that you don’t bend to such just entreaties? Don’t you see that the stars, the air, the water, the earth, and the wildest winds in the end change either their style, place, or temper? You alone, like a hard cliff, stay rigid always, immobile always. But was it a ‘cliff ’ I said? To the waves of the sea sometimes the cliff gives way, and at times is hollowed out by even a small droplet. But you become ever more set on your cruel course, ah me! Now life, now death the stars show, nor always in one color is the earth clothed, nor always is the sea rough; the winds now are wrathful, now are benign. All other things are sometimes propitious and sometimes adverse.

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124 ISABELLA ANDREINI ma ‘l tuo rigido core 1200 un perpetuo tenor di crudeltade meco mantiene, e tu sempre mi fuggi, sempre morte minaccia a la mia vita: e finalmente, crudo, ogni pensiero, ogni parola, ogn’opra 1205 e tutto quel che pensi e parli e fai, è sol per darmi innanzi tempo morte; ma sia come si vuol, voglio seguirti. Il Fine del Secondo Atto

Mirtilla 125 But your rigid heart 1200 a perpetual state of cruelty holds toward me, and you always flee me. Always you threaten death to my life. And finally, cruel man, every thought, every word, every action, 1205 and all that you think and say and do is only to give me a premature death. But however it may be, I intend to seek after you. End of Act Two

Atto Terzo SCENA PRIMA Satiro Satiro Già ne l’ampio del cielo quattro e sei volte la candida luna ha riempiute l’argentate corna e altre tante l’ha scemate e vote, dal dì che la spietata e cruda Filli mi pose al collo l’amoroso giogo. Filli, Filli, ben hai di sasso il core e di vento i pensieri e più pungente de le ortiche mi sei. Filli spietata, Filli, che Filli ingrata farò sempre sonar per questi monti, tu mi sei cruda e se ben cruda sei, assai più del mio cor t’amo, cor mio; e se ‘l ver non ti dico, io prego il cielo che mi faccia morire innanzi ai tuoi begl’occhi ch’io tant’amo. Ma che mi giova, ohimè, ch’io te lo giuri se tu ‘l mio dir non curi? O mal gradito Amore, almen mi rendi la cara libertà che tu m’hai tolta. Ora fuggendo il caldo, i pastorelli si stanno al rezzo, e la pasciuta greggia va ruminando l’erba, e gli augelletti cantano sopra i rami i loro amori; e per te le cave grotte, senza tosco i serpenti e senza fiertà stanno le fiere, e ne l’erboso fondo de’ correnti e fuggitivi fiumi, lieti i tremuli pesci stanno, e sotto le piante scherzano a l’ombra le leggiadre ninfe co’ lascivi silvani e co’ pastori. E tu, crudel, mi fuggi e forse stanchi, 126

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Act Three SCENE 1 Satyr Satyr78 Already in the expanse of the sky four or six times the white moon has refilled its silvery horns, and as many times it has reduced and emptied them, since the day when the cruel and pitiless Filli onto my neck set love’s yoke. Filli, Filli, truly you have a stony heart and flighty thoughts; and pricklier than nettles you are to me, pitiless Filli. Filli, ‘ungrateful Filli,’ I will make always resound through these mountains. You are cruel to me, and although you are cruel, far more than my heart do I love you, my heart. If I am not telling you the truth, I pray heaven to make me die right before your beautiful eyes that I love so much. But what good does it do me, ah me!, to swear it to you, if you to my speech pay no attention? O disagreeable Love, at least give me back the dear freedom you took from me. Now fleeing the heat, the shepherds are staying in the shade, and the well-fed flock is ruminating on the grass, and the little birds are singing on the branches about their loves. Because of you grottoes are hollow, the serpents are without venom, and without ferocity the beasts remain; and in the weedy beds of the flowing and fugitive streams, happy the tremulous fish remain, and under the trees in the shade the lovely nymphs are playing with lascivious woodsmen and with shepherds. And you, cruel one, flee me, and perhaps you are tiring out 127

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128 ISABELLA ANDREINI nel seguir fiere fuggitive in caccia, le delicate tue tenere piante. Dimmi, ninfa, non men che bella, folle, 1245 che giova sempre aver ne’ boschi il core? Prendi riposo in queste braccia ormai, ma tu forse disprezzi queste membra perché robuste sono, orride e dure? Non sai che questa è propria nostra dote? 1250 E sì come voi ninfe siete belle quanto più delicate, così noi tanto più belli siam quanto più ruvidi: né sdegnar punto déi questi caprigni piedi, poiché con questi ogni veloce 1255 fiera trapasso; e se le corna altere di questa altera fronte ti dispiacciono, sovvengati che in ciel la vaga luna ha le corna ancor ella, e nondimeno fu caramente amata 1260 dal nostro agreste e semicapro dio. Bacco ha le corna anch’egli, e Arianna arse de l’amor suo, sprezzando ogn’altro. Se ti spiace il rossor di queste guance guarda, ben mio, che pur l’istessa luna 1265 rosseggia quando in oriente appare e quando vento a noi minaccia, il sole è rosso quando parimenti sorge dal mare e quando ancor nel mar si tuffa; s’anco ti spiace questo irsuto pelo, 1270 sappi, dolce mio ben, ch’Alcide invitto d’un orrido leon la pelle indosso portò sovente, e per lui Deianira tutta avvampava d’amoroso foco. Filli non mi sdegnar, vieni, che in dono 1275 avrai la testa e le ramose corna d’un vecchio cervo, vieni, almo mio sole, ma tu non curi i doni miei, né curi ch’io sia (lasso) per te qual nebbia al vento; me se non val l’amor, vaglia l’inganno. 1280 Io voglio pormi dietro a quel cespuglio, e s’ella a sorte, com’è suo costume, rivolgerà per questo prato il piede,

Mirtilla 129 (by chasing fugitive beasts in the hunt) your tender, delicate soles. Tell me, O nymph no less beautiful than foolish, 1245 what good does it do to have your heart always in the woods? Take your rest in these arms at long last. But perhaps you disdain these limbs because they are robust, bristly, and hard? Don’t you know that this is our very own endowment? 1250 Just as you nymphs are more beautiful when more delicate, just so we are more handsome when rougher. Nor must you disdain in the least these goatlike feet, since with these every swift 1255 beast I outrace. If the proud horns of this proud forehead displease you, recall that in the sky the fair moon has horns as well, and nonetheless she was dearly loved 1260 by our rustic, half-goat god.79 Bacchus has horns as well, and Ariadne burned with love for him, disdaining all others.80 If you dislike the redness of these cheeks, look, my dear, for that selfsame moon 1265 reddens when in the East it appears, and when with wind it threatens us; the sun is red when similarly it rises from the sea and also when into the sea it plunges. If you also dislike this hairy hide, 1270 know, my sweet dear, that undefeated Alcides a bristly lion’s skin on his back often wore, and for him Dejanira blazed all through with amorous fire.81 Filli, don’t disdain me. Come, for as a gift 1275 you will have the head and the branching antlers of an old deer. Come, my life-giving sun. But you care not for my gifts, nor do you care that (alas!) because of you I am like fog in the wind. But if love does not avail, let trickery avail. 1280 I will place myself behind that bush, and if she by chance, as is her custom, directs into this meadow her foot,

130 ISABELLA ANDREINI di queste braccia gli farò catena. E s’ella al mio voler non sarà presta, le farò mille oltraggi. Né sua bellezza voglio che le giovi, né gli alti gridi o ‘l domandar mercede.

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SCENA SECONDA Satiro e Filli Filli Parrà forse ad alcun che degna io sia d’ogni grave castigo, non amando 1290 chi ama me, no ‘l nego, ma che posso far io s’Amor non vuol ch’io pensi o faccia se non quel che a lui piace? Crudel Amor, tu solo ogni sembiante vile e schivo mi fai, 1295 fuor che la bella immagine di lui che fa questa mia vita amara e dolce. E ben conosco (ahi lassa) e ben m’avveggio che la doglia ch’io taccio è via maggior di quella 1300 che con la lingua esprimo; ma rimedia, cor mio, con la pietade al mal che tutto viene da la tua crudeltade. Quanto meglio ti fia l’esser lodato 1305 per donator di vita che l’esser biasimato per negator d’aita? Che scusa puoi trovare in tua difesa, Uranio mio, se forse non ti credi 1310 che l’uccider altrui gran laude sia? Io d’altro non ti prego se non che ti rincresca del mio male e che talora ascolti i miei lamenti. Satiro V’è che ti giunsi, or non potrai fuggire.

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Mirtilla 131 with these arms I will enchain her. And if she does not bow to my will quickly, I will inflict on her a thousand outrages. Nor do I intend for her beauty to do her any good, nor loud screams, nor asking for mercy.82

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SCENE 2 The Satyr and Filli Filli [enters, unaware of the Satyr’s presence] It will seem perhaps to some that worthy I am of every severe punishment for not loving 1290 one who loves me, I don’t deny it. But what can I do if Love wants me not to think or do anything but what he likes? Cruel Love, you alone make every countenance vile and repugnant to me, 1295 except for the beautiful image of the man who makes this life of mine bitter and sweet. And well do I know (alas!), and I am well aware that the pain that I am silent about is far greater than the pain 1300 that with my tongue I express. But cure, my dear, with your pity the anguish that all comes from your cruelty. How much better would it be for you to be praised 1305 as a giver of life than to be blamed as a denier of aid? What excuse can you find in your defence, my Uranio, if not perhaps that you believe 1310 that to kill people is very praiseworthy? I for nothing else beseech you but to feel regret for my anguish, and sometimes to listen to my laments. Satyr Aha, I’ve caught you! Now you won’t be able to flee.

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132 ISABELLA ANDREINI Filli Ahimè, ch’è quel ch’io sento? Chi mi tiene? Chi mi fa violenza? Satiro Ah dispietata, or non ti gioverà l’esser crudele, né l’adeguar nel corso i più veloci venti, 1320 di qui non partirai s’a le mie pene non dai qualche mercede. E quando tu non voglia a l’arso core dar qualche refrigerio, ingrata voglio nuda legarti a quella dura quercia, 1325 ove con strazio finirai tua vita. Filli Mercede, ahimè, mercede nume caprigno, ascolta prima le mie preghiere, deh, che gloria ti fia 1330 di vincere una ninfa ch’abbattuta è di già da tuoi begl’occhi. Satiro Vedi come mi beffa or s’io m’adiro? Filli Io giuro per le tue robuste braccia e per la vaga tua cornuta fronte, ch’io non ti beffo, né beffar ti voglio.

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Satiro Dunque, Filli, m’ami e dar mi vuoi del mio fido servir premio condegno? Filli Io t’amo certo, e qual ninfa ti vide giamai che non ardesse? Tu sei tale che chi ti mira e poi non t’ama, credo che sia composto di caucasea pietra.

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Mirtilla 133 Filli Ah me! What’s this I feel? Who holds me? Who with me is violent? Satyr Ah, pitiless one! Now it will do you no good to be cruel, nor to match with your swiftness the fastest winds. 1320 From here you will not depart if to my pains you don’t give some mercy. And if you don’t to my burning heart give some relief, you ingrate, I intend to bind you nude to that hard oak, 1325 where in torment you will end your life. Filli Mercy, ah me! Mercy, O goatlike divinity! Listen first to my prayers. Come, what glory would it bring you to defeat a nymph who has already been overcome by your beautiful eyes?

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Satyr [aside] Do you see how she tries to play a trick on me now when I am angry? Filli I swear by your robust arms and by your charming horned forehead that I’m not playing a trick on you, nor do I intend to do so.

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Satyr So, Filli, you love me, and you want to give me for my faithful service an appropriate reward? Filli I love you, most certainly; and what nymph who ever saw you didn’t burn for you? You are such that whoever gazes at you and then doesn’t love you, I believe they must be made of stone from the Caucasus.83

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134 ISABELLA ANDREINI Satiro E perché pazzerella taciuto hai questo e mi ti sei mostrata spiacevole e crudele? Filli Questo feci 1345 per far prova di te, dolce mia vita. Satiro Che segno mi darai che ciò sia vero, e che ragioni il cor come la lingua? Filli Se mi comandi, allor potrai vedere che da senno ti parlo e troverai gli effetti assai maggiori che non son le parole e le promesse.

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Satiro Per questa prima volta, finger mi voglio assai modesto amante e d’un sol bacio pago, 1355 se ben d’altro son vago. Da le dolci parole alme e gradite assicurato in libertà ti rendo, luce di queste luci, e per certezza da quel che tu mi hai detto, un bacio chieggo 1360 da quella vermigliuzza e bella bocca. E se la tua bontade mi concede ch’io possa ormai raccor lo spirto mio su quelle rose, ov’egli sempre alberga, mi fia più grato assai che non mi fora 1365 il nettare celeste. Filli Questa è per certo gran dimanda; e quanto è di pregio maggior, tanto potrai conoscer meglio il desiderio ch’io ho di servirti.

Mirtilla 135 Satyr And why, crazy girl, have you kept silent about this, and to me acted unpleasant and cruel?84 Filli This I did 1345 to test you, my sweet life. Satyr What sign will you give me that this is true, and that your heart reasons like your tongue? Filli If you command me, then you will be able to see that with all seriousness I speak to you, and you will find my actions far greater than my words and my promises. Satyr This first time I shall pretend I’m a very modest lover, and with a single kiss satisfied, although something else I desire. By your sweet words, life-giving and welcome, I am reassured, and your liberty I return to you, light of my eyes. As proof of what you have told me, a kiss I ask from that beautiful little vermilion mouth. And if your goodness grants me that I might at last gather up my spirit on those roses, where it always dwells,85 it would be far more welcome to me than celestial nectar.

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Filli This is certainly a lot to ask, and the greater its worth, the better you’ll be able to recognize the desire that I have to serve you.

136 ISABELLA ANDREINI Satiro Io so ch’è gran dimanda 1370 e certo che più degno dono non puote avere da la sua cara ninfa un fedel amator ch’un dolce bacio. Egli è tanto soave, 1375 che d’un dolce morire l’anima vaga ad incontrar se ‘n viene co’ dolci baci e doppia vita acquista mentre baciata bacia. Filli Dunque beata me, poiché concesso 1380 mi sarà tanto ben; ma tu, cor mio, concedimi sol questo, ch’io ti leghi le braccia, perché tu dalla dolcezza che sentirai baciandomi, tanto non mi stringessi, 1385 che contra la tua voglia io di te, tu di me restassi privo. Satiro Tu m’hai legato il core e puoi ben anco legarmi queste braccia; io mi contento. Filli Volgile al tergo, o felice legame, poiché t’è dato in sorte di legar sì robuste e belle braccia. E tu, fronzuta pianta, ben ti possa dir felice, poiché fermo terrai colui che tiene l’anima mia legata in sì bel nodo. Satiro Non stringer così forte. Filli Datti pace e soffri per un poco:

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Mirtilla 137 Satyr I know it’s a lot to ask; 1370 and certainly a worthier gift a faithful lover from his dear nymph cannot have than a sweet kiss. It is so pleasurable 1375 that the soul desirous of a sweet death comes to encounter it with sweet kisses, and a double life it acquires while, kissed, it kisses. Filli Then lucky me! Since granted to me will be so great a pleasure. But you, my heart, grant me this one thing: that I might bind your arms, so that you, from the delight that you will feel in kissing me, might not squeeze me so much that against your will I of you, you of me would end up deprived.

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Satyr You have bound up my heart, and you can just as well bind these arms of mine; I am content. Filli Put them behind you. O happy bond, since it is your lot to bind such robust and handsome arms! And you, leafy tree, indeed you can call yourself happy, since you will hold still the man who holds my soul bound in such a beautiful knot. Satyr Don’t pull it so tight. Filli Resign yourself and suffer for a little while,

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138 ISABELLA ANDREINI perché quanto più stretto ti lego, tanto più sicuramente ti bacierò dipoi. Satiro

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Orsù fa presto.

Filli Ecco ch’io ho finito. Satiro Adunque Filli non differir le contentezze mie più lungamente e tue; e poiché m’hai legato così stretto che scior non mi potrò per una scossa, concedimi quel ben che tanto bramo, poi ch’io mi struggo come agnel per fascino, solo aspettando il desiato fine. Filli Certo, che far dimora più non posso, né voglio ad abbracciarti, e dolcemente baciarti quelle labbra delicate che, se ben dritto stimo, vincono di dolcezza il mele ibleo.

1405

1410

Satiro Or che dirai tu allora 1415 che provato l’avrai? Filli Ohimè considera. Satiro Orsù via dunque. Filli L’avrai tu per male? Avrai schifo di me? Dimmel, ben mio.

Mirtilla 139 because the tighter I bind you, the more securely I will kiss you afterwards. Satyr

1400

Hurry, do it quickly.

Filli Here, I’ve finished. Satyr And now, Filli, don’t defer my joys any longer, and your own. Since you have bound me so tightly that I cannot release myself with a shake, grant me that favor I so desire, since I am consumed like a lamb by your charm, only awaiting the desired end. Filli Certainly, for no longer can I hold back (nor do I want to) from embracing you, and sweetly kissing your delicate lips which, if rightly I judge, outdo in sweetness the honey of Ibla.86 Satyr Now what will you say once you have tried it? Filli

Ah, me! Just imagine!

Satyr Hurry up! Go on, then! Filli Will you take it badly? Will you take an aversion to me? Tell me, my dear.

1405

1410

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140 ISABELLA ANDREINI Satiro Tu mi faresti dir qualche pazzia, or come posso avere 1420 schifo di te ch’al par de la mia vita ho cara e amo? Filli Tu sai che ‘l timore è proprio degli amanti, e non vorrei invece d’acquistarmi la grazia tua, privarmene per sempre.

1425

Satiro Ah non temer di quello di che temer non déi. Filli Di questo mi rallegro; ma, cor mio, tu sei sì grande ch’io non posso aggiungere al ben desiderato; ed è bisogno che con ambe le man m’appigli un tratto a la tua bella barba: in questo modo, china bene il capo. Satiro Ohimè fa piano, che ti pensi fare? Tu mi strappi la barba; ferma, ferma.

1430

1435

Filli Eccomi ferma; ma tu non ti muovere, acciò ch’io possa darti mille baci. O corna mie, voi mi feristi il core. Satiro Ohimè non far sì forte; non mi torcere il collo, ohimè, da ver, che mi fai male. Filli Perdonami, cor mio, ch’io non credeva di farti male; oh che mammelle morbide!

1440

Mirtilla 141 Satyr You would make me say something crazy! Now, how can I take 1420 an aversion to you, whom as much as my life I hold dear and I love? Filli You know that fear is characteristic of lovers, and I would not like, instead of acquiring your favor, to deprive myself of it forever.

1425

Satyr Ah, don’t fear what you need not fear. Filli At this I rejoice. But, my heart, you are so big that I cannot reach the desired goal, and it’s needful that with both hands I cling for a while to your beautiful beard this way. Bend down your head. Satyr Ah, me. Be gentle! What do you think you’re doing? You’re ripping off my beard! Stop, stop!

1430

1435

Filli Here, I’ve stopped. But you, don’t move, so I might give you a thousand kisses. O my horns, you wounded my heart! Satyr Ah me, don’t pull so hard! Don’t twist my neck, ah me! Truly you’re hurting me. Filli Forgive me, my heart, for I didn’t think I’d hurt you. Oh, what soft breasts!

1440

142 ISABELLA ANDREINI Satiro Non pizzicar sì forte, ohimè, non fare. Filli Infine non mi posso contenere d’accarezzarti. Satiro Oh che belle carezze! 1445 Filli Almen non ti sdegnar, vita mia cara. Satiro Baciami presto, che farem la pace; e se tu non mi baci, voglio darti cattiva vita, e troverommi un’altra ninfa amorosa. Filli Chiudi quella bocca, 1450 se non vuoi ch’io mi muoia di dolore. Satiro Non dar sì forte, ora che insania è questa che sempre mi fai male? Filli Ah discortese, dimmi ond’avvien ch’ogni cosa t’offende di quel ch’io fo? E pur n’è testimonio il ciel che tutto vien da troppo amore. Satiro Ti so dir ch’io l’ho concia. Filli

Oh che balordo!

Satiro Ella piange in diparte, per quanto posso immaginarmi.

1455

Mirtilla 143 Satyr Don’t pinch so hard! Ah me, don’t do it! Filli At last! I can’t hold back from caressing you. Satyr Oh, what fine caresses! 1445 Filli At least don’t get angry, my dear life. Satyr Kiss me quickly and we’ll make peace. If you don’t kiss me, I’ll ruin your life, and I’ll find myself another amorous nymph. Filli Shut that mouth, 1450 if you don’t want me to die of sorrow! Satyr Don’t hit so hard! Now what insanity is this, that you keep on hurting me? Filli Ah, discourteous man! Tell me: how comes it that everything I do offends you? And yet, heaven is my witness that it’s all from excessive love. Satyr [aside] Let me tell you, I’ve got her where I want her. Filli [aside] Oh, what an idiot! Satyr [aside] She’s crying nearby, for all I can tell.

1455

144 ISABELLA ANDREINI Filli Voglio mostrar d’esser afflitta, ohimè dolente. A che son io ridotta; l’idol mio si sdegna perché troppo l’accarezzo, che deggio dunque far? Che far poss’io? Satiro S’io non soccorro questa meschinella, di dolor certo finirà sua vita. Filli, non t’attristar, facciam la pace, e per segno di quella vieni ormai a baciare il tuo bene e la tua vita: non pianger più che tu sola sarai la mia vezzosa. Vieni dunque e baciami.

1460

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1470

Filli Ohimè, par che lo spirto si rinfranchi alla dolce armonia de le tue voci; e poiché mi rintegri nella tua grazia e vuoi ch’io baci quella cara e dolce bocca, 1475 voglio prima mangiare un poco di serpillo e voglio ancora che ti degni di mangiarne un ramuscello, acciò che i nostri fiati sieno più delicati. 1480 Orsù lo piglio, ed ecco ch’io son prima a farne il saggio, piglia il rimanente. Satiro Dammelo, io son contento. Filli Che te ne pare? Satiro Ohimè, che cosa è questa cotanto amara? Temo che mi beffi e mi vadi schernendo. Che serpillo è questo che m’hai dato?

1485

Mirtilla 145 Filli [aside] I shall pretend I’m distressed. [so Satyr can hear] Oh, wretched me! To what am I reduced? My idol gets angry because too much do I caress him. So what must I do? What can I do? Satyr [aside] If I don’t aid this wretched girl, from anguish she’ll certainly die. [to Filli] Filli, don’t be sad. Let’s make peace, and as a sign of it come at last to kiss your darling and your life. Don’t cry anymore. You alone will be my sweetheart, so come and kiss me.

1460

1465

1470

Filli Ah me, my spirit seems to regain strength at the sweet harmony of your words. Since you accept me back into your favor and you want me to kiss that dear, sweet mouth, 1475 first I shall eat a bit of wild thyme, and I want you as well to deign to eat a twig of it, so that our breath might be sweeter.87 1480 Come on! I’ve plucked it, and look: I am the first to try it; you take the rest. Satyr Give it to me; I’m content. Filli How do you like it? Satyr Ah me, what is this, so bitter? I fear you’re mocking and deriding me. What wild thyme is this that you’ve given me?

1485

146 ISABELLA ANDREINI Filli O malaccorto, or hai pure finalmente conosciuto ch’io mi beffo di te. Qual donna mai, benché diforme e vile, si compiacque d’amar sì mostruoso, orrido aspetto? Or vedi ch’io ti colsi; resta pure schernito, come merti, ch’io ti lascio. così volesse il ciel che fosti preda d’orsi rabbiosi e d’affamati lupi; perché innanzi mai più non mi venisse codesta tua sì brutta e a me tanto noiosa odiatissima sembianza. Satiro Filli, Filli, ove vai? Fermati, ascolta, slegami almeno, acciò ch’io non diventi de l’altre come te spietate ninfe scherzo, favola e gioco. Ohimè, che non può fare femina risoluta d’ingannare? Con quai lusinghe, ohimè, con quai parole m’ha ridotto costei a lasciarmi legar le braccia, come già mi lasciai legar l’anima e ‘l core da le sciolte sue chiome.

1490

1495

1500

1505

SCENA TERZA Gorgo capraio e satiro Gorgo Damon, guarda la greggia 1510 ch’io vado a la capanna a tor del pane, del cacio e de le pere e altro ancora per far vita serena, essendo ch’io altro diletto che mangiar non provo. Questi amanti vorrebbon farmi credere 1515 che non è cosa al mondo di più gusto né di maggior contento che l’amare

Mirtilla 147 Filli O you dimwit, only now have you finally realized that I’m mocking you! What woman ever, even if deformed and base, was pleased to love so monstrous and horrid a countenance? Now you see that I caught you! Stay by all means, derided as you deserve, for I am leaving you. May heaven send that you end up as prey to furious bears and ravenous wolves, so that never again before me might come this hateful face of yours, to me so ugly and so displeasing. Satyr Filli, Filli, where are you going? Stop! Listen! At least untie me, so I won’t become for the other (like you!) pitiless nymphs a joke, laughingstock, and plaything. Ah me, what can’t she do, a woman determined to deceive? With what flattery, ah me, with what words this woman has induced me to let my arms be tied, just as previously I let my soul and my heart be tied up by her unbound tresses.

1490

1495

1500

1505

SCENE 3 The goatherd Gorgo and the Satyr Gorgo [enters, unaware of the Satyr’s presence] Damon, watch over the flock, for I’m going to the cottage to get some bread, some cheese, and some pears, and more yet to make life serene, since I feel no other delight than in eating.88 These lovers would like to make me believe there’s nothing in the world tastier or more satisfying than loving

1510

1515

148 ISABELLA ANDREINI quand’altri è riamato; e tutto il giorno m’intronano il cervello e van dicendo che non dovea concedermi natura 1520 altro senso che ‘l gusto, poiché solo son dato al mangiare e al bere; e che quel del vedere è dato a noi, non solo per veder l’alte bellezze 1525 del cielo e de la terra, ma per vedere ancora la gran beltade di colei che s’ama, e per farli vedere per gli occhi aperto il core. 1530 E dicon che l’udito è cagion che si sente la soave armonia de l’amata sirena, per cui non hanno invidia 1535 a l’armonia celeste. Vogliono ancor che l’odorato serva non solo per goder de’ vari fiori di primavera, ma per goder anco degli odori soavi e delicati 1540 che spira il seno e la dorata chioma delle lor ninfe; e seguono che ‘l tatto ci diè natura per goder del molle e delicato sen di bella donna, per cui si possa mantenere al mondo 1545 l’umana prole; e non s’accorgon ch’io meglio di loro dispenso quei tesori che natura cortese e ‘l ciel mi diede; né come lor la maledico mai: perché s’avvien (sì come spesso avviene) 1550 ch’un amante si sdegni con l’amata, subito gl’occhi maledice e piange perché natura non l’ha fatto cieco, perché se visto non avesse il bello della sua ninfa, non l’avrebbe amata; 1555 se con parole altere ella lo scaccia esser sordo vorrebbe e maledice perché non nacque tale, e s’ei non puote

Mirtilla 149 when one’s love is returned. All day long they stupefy my brain, and they constantly say that Nature must not have granted me 1520 any other sense than taste, since I am given only to eating and drinking; and that sight is given to us not only to see the lofty beauties 1525 of the sky and of the earth, but to see as well the great beauty of the woman one loves, and to make her see through one’s eyes one’s open heart. 1530 They say that hearing enables us to perceive the sweet harmony of the beloved siren, such that they don’t envy 1535 the heavenly harmony. They declare also that the sense of smell serves not only to enjoy the various flowers of Spring, but to enjoy as well those odors sweet and delicate 1540 wafting from the breast and the golden hair of their nymphs. They further proclaim that touch was given to us by Nature to enjoy the soft and delicate breast of a beautiful woman, so that we might maintain humankind 1545 in the world. And they don’t realize that I better than they utilize those treasures that courteous Nature and heaven gave me, nor do I, like them, ever curse her. For if it happens (as it often happens) 1550 that a lover gets angry at his beloved, immediately his eyes he curses, and he weeps because Nature didn’t make him blind, because if he had not seen the beauty of his nymph, he would not have loved her. 1555 If with haughty words she chases him away, he would like to be deaf, and he curses because he was not born so. And if he cannot

150 ISABELLA ANDREINI sentir quell’aura delicata ch’egli dice che spira la dorata chioma, 1560 vorrebbe non aver tal senso, prima che restar privo del bramato odore; s’egli non può fruire i dolci baci e giunger mano a mano, il gusto e ‘l tatto parimenti aborre. 1565 E vaneggiando spesso, veggono il bene e pur del mal son vaghi; quest’occhi son cagion ch’io mi rallegro mentre veggio gran copia di vivande; e questo udito mi conforta mentre 1570 odo spesso parlar d’empire il ventre. Dell’odorato non ti parlo, avvenga che qualor sento il prezioso odore de l’arrosto fumante, i’ vo tutto in dolcezza. 1575 Il tatto è quello che mi fa sentire sommo diletto mentre i grassi agnelli toccando vado e le vitelle e dico: queste fien buone all’appetito mio. Ma che dirò del gusto? Ohimè, non posso 1580 esprimerne parola, tanto è ‘l gaudio ch’io sento a pensar solo al gran piacere che si prova nel bere e nel mangiare, onde senza ragion mi van biasimando questi semplici amanti, poi ch’io spendo 1585 in sì lodato e utile esercizio tutte le doti che mi diè natura. Anzi ella stessa (s’è pur saggia) deve obbligo avermi, poi ch’io mi affatico di mantenermi lungamente in vita 1590 co ‘l mangiare e co ‘l bere, e questi amanti, se sono amati, si consumano dietro alle lor ninfe, nel servirle sempre; o, se non sono amati, per dolore si dan la morte, onde nemici sono 1595 di lor stessi e di natura ancora, che lor non diè la vita perché quella togliessero a se stessi in vari modi. Ma poiché più giudizio ho io di loro,

Mirtilla 151 smell that delicate aroma that he says wafts from her golden hair, 1560 he would like not to have that sense, sooner than be deprived of the desired odor. If he cannot receive the benefit of sweet kisses and join hand with hand, taste and touch equally he abhors. 1565 Often, demented, they see what’s good, and yet it’s evil they yearn for. These eyes enable me to rejoice when I see a great abundance of food and this hearing comforts me when 1570 I often hear talk of filling one’s belly. Of smell I won’t speak to you, though whenever I breathe in the precious odor of a roast smoking, I melt with pleasure. 1575 Touch is what makes me feel supreme delight whenever I handle fat lambs and calves, and I say, “These will be good to feed my appetite.” But what shall I say about taste? Ah me, I cannot 1580 express a word of it, so great is the joy that I feel in merely thinking of the great pleasure one feels in drinking and in eating. Therefore baselessly they blame me, these simpleton lovers, since I employ 1585 in so praiseworthy and useful an exercise all the endowments given me by Nature. On the contrary, she herself (if she’s truly wise) must feel obliged to me, since I exert myself to prolong my life 1590 with eating and drinking. These lovers, if they are loved, wear themselves out following their nymphs, in serving them always. Or, if they are not loved, in their anguish they kill themselves; hence they are enemies 1595 of themselves and of Nature as well, who did not give them life so that they might take it from themselves in various ways. But since I have better judgment than they,

152 ISABELLA ANDREINI lieto me’n vado a la capanna mia per empir questo zaino di vivande e questo vaso del liquor di Bacco; liquor soave, per cui sempre il core giubila e lieto vive, il sangue brilla, gl’occhi si rasserenano, le guance stan colorite, e si raddoppian tutte le forze al corpo umano. Or dunque segua Amor chi vuole, che per me vo’ Cerere seguire e Bacco e i dolci frutti loro. Satiro Cortese agricoltor, se mai tempesta non guasti i tuoi bei campi, onde tu possa raccorne ai tempi la bramata messe, concedi a me, dolente semidio, qualche pietosa aita.

1600

1605

1610

Gorgo O poverello, qual tuo sì grave fallo 1615 t’ha qui condotto? Satiro Dispietato Amore e falsità di ninfa, onde ti giuro per l’onda stigia, che per l’avvenire, non solo non voglio amar più ninfa alcuna, ma tutte averle in odio, e disprezzare quel trafurello Amor che m’ha condotto con mio grave dolor, come tu vedi. Ma slegami, ti prego, cortese agricoltore, che le braccia mi dolgon sì, che poco più ne spasimo. Gorgo Vedi che Gorgo è qui venuto a tempo? Io ti scioglio le braccia e così prego il ciel che ti disciolga dai legami di quel tristo fanciul, dal qual deriva quant’ha di tristo il mondo.

1620

1625

1630

Mirtilla 153 happily I go off to my cottage to fill this knapsack with food and this jug with Bacchus’s drink. Sweet liquid, because of which always the heart rejoices and lives happily, the blood shines, the eyes return to serenity, the cheeks keep their color, and all the human body’s forces are redoubled. Therefore let whoever wants to, follow Love; as for me, I want to follow Ceres, and Bacchus, and their sweet fruits.89 Satyr O courteous farmer, may never a tempest ruin your fine fields, so that you may gather in good time the desired harvest. Grant to me, a sorrowful demigod, some compassionate aid.

1600

1605

1610

Gorgo O poor fellow, what weighty fault of yours 1615 has brought you here? Satyr Pitiless Love and a nymph’s falseness, such that I swear to you by the Stygian wave90 that in future not only shall I no longer love any nymph at all, but I’ll hate them all and despise that betrayer Love, who has led me to my great sorrow, as you see. Untie me, I beseech you, courteous farmer, for my arms ache so much that I’m nearly writhing from it. Gorgo Do you see that Gorgo has come here in good time? I’ll release your arms, and likewise I pray heaven to release you from the bonds of that wicked boy, from whom derives all that’s wicked in the world.

1620

1625

1630

154 ISABELLA ANDREINI Satiro Creder ben puoi, ch’io non vorrò più mai seguir colui che ‘l mondo chiama Amore, poiché ‘l suo dolce altro non è che amaro. Gorgo E io di nuovo a me medesmo giuro di non voler giamai altro seguire che di Bacco e di Cerere i piaceri.

1635

Satiro Fuggiam, fuggiamo Amore e la sua madre ancora, poi ch’essi d’ogni mal son la radice. Gorgo Seguiam, seguiamo Lieo 1640 e Cerere e Pomona, poiché per loro in festa, in gioco e in canto ognuno vive, si rallegra e gode. Satiro Andiam, ch’io vo’ donarti in ricompensa de l’avermi slegato 1645 una gran pelle d’orso, che l’altr’ieri mi diede un uom selvaggio, con le corna d’un cervo ch’egli avea ucciso di sua mano. Gorgo Io ti ringrazio di questo dono. Se tai cose fussero buone da satollarmi, forse l’accetterei. Io, se tu vuoi venire alla capanna mia, ti darò altro che pelle d’orso e che ramose corna. Satiro Gorgo, se tu non vuoi accettar questo dono, accetta almeno

1650

1655

Mirtilla 155 Satyr You can well believe that I shall nevermore follow him whom the world calls Love, since his sweetness is nothing other than bitterness. Gorgo And I again to myself swear never anything else to follow than Bacchus’s and Ceres’s pleasures.

1635

Satyr Let’s flee, let’s flee Love and his mother as well, since they are of every evil the root. Gorgo Let’s follow, let’s follow Lysius91 1640 and Ceres and Pomona,92 since because of them in feasting, in play, and in song everyone lives, rejoices, and takes pleasure. Satyr Let’s go, for I want to give you, in recompense for untying me, 1645 a big bearskin that the other day a wild man gave me, with the antlers of a deer that he had killed with his own hands. Gorgo I thank you for this gift. If such things were good to satisfy me, perhaps I would accept it. If you wish to come to my cottage, I will give you something other than a bearskin and branching antlers. Satyr Gorgo, if you don’t want to accept this gift, accept at least

1650

1655

156 ISABELLA ANDREINI il buon animo mio, poiché non posso altro donarti. Gorgo Orsù non più parole; se tu vuoi venir meco, andiamo, ch’io 1660 mi muoio de la fame e sento il corpo che si lamenta e le budella fanno un gran romore poi ch’io manco loro del solito tributo; voglio adunque di qui partirmi. Satiro Andiamo, anch’io partire 1665 quinci dispongo e fo di non tornare voto mai più dov’ebbi angoscia e scorno; e seguir voglio il mio compagno Bacco, Bacco signore e dio de l’allegrezza. Gorgo Andiamo, adunque. Satiro Andiam fratello, andiamo. 1670

SCENA QUARTA Filli e Mirtilla ninfe Filli Certo Mirtilla avrei prima creduto che fusse stato il sol privo di luce, che tu ti fussi al mio piacer opposta e mi volessi tor quella mercede ch’al mio servir, ch’a l’amor mio conviensi. Mirtilla Filli, quella mercé di che tu parli, non è più tua che mia. Amo Uranio, tu ‘l sai, e io no ‘l nego,

1675

Mirtilla 157 my goodwill, since I cannot give you anything else. Gorgo Come on, no more words! If you wish to come with me, let’s go, for I 1660 am dying of hunger, and I hear my body lamenting, and my guts are making a lot of noise since I am failing in their accustomed tribute. I shall therefore depart from here. Satyr Let’s go! I, too, to depart from here am disposed, and I vow never to return to where I suffered such anguish and scorn. I intend to follow my companion Bacchus, Bacchus the lord and god of good cheer.

1665

Gorgo Let’s go, then. Satyr Let’s go, brother, let’s go. 1670

SCENE 4 The nymphs Filli and Mirtilla Filli Certainly, Mirtilla, I would sooner have believed the sun would be deprived of light, than that you my pleasure would oppose, and that you would want to take from me that reward which to my service, to my love, is fitting. Mirtilla Filli, that reward of which you speak is no more yours than mine. I love Uranio; you know it; and I don’t deny it.

1675

158 ISABELLA ANDREINI e tu l’ami e no ‘l neghi; adunque è forza che sia tra noi aspra discordia e guerra.

1680

Filli Amor di compagnia non fu mai pago, come ben sai, Mirtilla; dunque convien che l’una a l’altra ceda. Mirtilla Orsù non più contesa; non sai tu Filli che parlato abbiamo de la nostra querela con Opico d’ogni altro il più saputo, al cui saggio sapere abbiam rimesso ogni litigio nostro? Ed egli vuol che ‘l canto nostro d’una di noi termini il pianto.

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Filli Non m’è di mente uscito quant’egli ci commise e maravigliomi che tanto egli dimori a venirci a trovar co ‘l suo stormento, 1695 tocco da lui con sì maestra mano; or voglia il ciel, che quando avremo noi co ‘l suo suono accordato il nostro canto, egli accordi le nostre amorose contese. 1700 Mirtilla Egli ci ha qui inviate e non può molto tardare: eccolo appunto.

SCENA QUINTA Opico pastore, Filli e Mirtilla ninfe Opico Il ciel vi salvi, graziosa e degna coppia, la cui beltade

Mirtilla 159 And you love him and don’t deny it. Therefore perforce there must be between us bitter discord and war.

1680

Filli With having company Love has never been satisfied, as well you know, Mirtilla. Therefore it’s necessary that one of us to the other give way. Mirtilla Come on, no more disputes! Don’t you recall, Filli, that we have spoken 1685 of our quarrel with Opico, of all men the wisest?93 Before his wise knowledge we laid out our every argument, and he wants our singing 1690 to end the weeping of one of us. Filli It has not slipped my mind what he ordered for us. I am amazed that so long he delays to come find us with his instrument, 1695 played by him with so expert a hand. Now may heaven will that once we have with his music harmonized our song, he will harmonize our amorous disputes. 1700 Mirtilla He sent us here, and he cannot long tarry. Here he is, in fact.

SCENE 5 The shepherd Opico, the nymphs Filli and Mirtilla Opico May heaven save you, gracious and worthy pair whose beauty

160 ISABELLA ANDREINI adorna queste selve e questa etade, come le stelle il ciel, le piagge i fiori.

1705

Filli Opico, il ben venuto. Mirtilla Se troppo più tardavi, aspra tra noi nascea nuova contesa. Opico Perdonatemi ninfe, che Selvaggio 1710 sì lungamente m’ha tenuto a bada: or fra voi mi ponete amorosette ninfe. Filli Eccoti posto. Opico Così ringiovenisco, o belle ninfe. Quanto invidio colui per cui languite: 1715 s’io fussi al par di lui giovine e bello, vorrei prima morire, che mai farvi languire; ma tempo è che s’adempia quanto abbiam stabilito. 1720 Or via rendete al suon concorde il canto, poi che noi siamo in sì bel loco a l’ombra, dove Flora tra i fiori in braccio al suo marito si riposa; ed ei per la dolcezza 1725 spira vento soave in queste fronde, e ‘l mormorar de l’onde farà tenore al suono di questo cavo legno. Or tu comincia Filli, 1730 e poi segui Mirtilla; cantate dunque a prova, che ‘l cantar a vicenda aman le Muse.

Mirtilla 161 adorns these woods and this age, as the stars do the sky, and the flowers the countryside.

1705

Filli Opico, welcome. Mirtilla If you much longer had tarried, between us would have arisen a harsh new dispute. Opico Pardon me, nymphs, for Selvaggio94 1710 at such length delayed me. Now position me between you, amorous young nymphs. Filli

Here you are, in position.

Opico Thus I am rejuvenated, O beauteous nymphs. How much I envy him for whom you languish! 1715 If I matched him in youth and good looks, I’d prefer sooner to die than ever to make you languish. But it is time that we carry out what we have planned. 1720 Now, come! To the music harmonize your song, since we are in so beautiful a place in the shade, where Flora among the flowers in the arms of her husband reposes; and he for the pleasure 1725 breathes out a gentle breeze in these fronds.95 The murmur of the waves will be the tenor for the sound of this hollow wood.96 Now you begin, Filli, 1730 and then you follow, Mirtilla. Sing therefore in competition, for singing in turn delights the Muses.97

162 ISABELLA ANDREINI Filli Dotta Calliopea, madre di quel buon trace 1735 ch’ogni’animal più fero e più fugace con la sonora voce a sé traea, inspira, o diva, a questa voce mia soave melodia. Mirtilla O de le Muse padre, 1740 vien oggi nel mio canto e nel mio core, nel mio cor che si sface de’ tuoi studi non men che de la face del mio nemico Amore. Così le prime sue membra leggiadre 1745 vesta la figlia di Peneo sdegnosa per esserti pietosa. Filli Quattro e sei pomi accolti in un sol ramo serbo a la mia capanna e gli destino al mio vago pastor che cotant’amo.

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Mirtilla Una fromba da me con bel lavoro fatta di seta e di fin or contesta, sarà don di colui che amo e adoro. Filli Quanti spargo sospiri e quanti lai, perché ‘l mio crudelissimo pastore pietoso del mio mal si mostri ormai.

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Mirtilla Chi non sa quante volte ho questi colli, per isfogar la mia angosciosa pena, fatti del pianto mio tepidi e molli? Filli Igilio mi donò due tortorelle l’altr’ieri, e Clori per invidia quasi morissi, tanto eran vezzose e belle.

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Mirtilla 163 Filli O learned Calliope, mother of that good Thracian who all the fiercest and most skittish animals with his sonorous voice drew to himself, inspire, O goddess, in this voice of mine a gentle melody.98

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Mirtilla O father of the Muses,99 1740 come today into my song and into my heart, into my heart which melts at your studies no less than from the torch of my enemy, Love. May the disdainful daughter of Peneus 1745 wear her former lovely limbs, to be pitiful to you.100 Filli Four or six apples gathered from a single branch I keep in my cottage, and I intend them for my charming shepherd, whom I love so much.

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Mirtilla A sling by me with fine workmanship made, of silk and fine gold interwoven, will be the gift for him whom I love and adore. Filli How many sighs I scatter about and how many lays, so that my most cruel shepherd might show pity for my pain at last.

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Mirtilla Who doesn’t know how many times, when I gave vent to my anguished pain, my tears have made these hills tepid and soft? Filli Igilio gave me two tender turtledove s the day before yesterday, and Clori for envy nearly died, they were so charming and beautiful.

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164 ISABELLA ANDREINI Mirtilla Due panieri di fior Alcon mi diede, e Amaranta già di sdegno folle volse, per non vederli, altrove il piede.

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Filli L’empir il ciel di strida, ohimè che vale e ‘l crescer acqua co ‘l mio pianto all’acqua, se non m’acquista fede al mio gran male? Mirtilla Amo Uranio crudele e non me’n pento, che la beltà, ch’a tutti gli occhi piace, mi fa lieta gioir d’ogni tormento.

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Filli La neve al sole si dilegua, e ‘l foco strugge la cera, e a me lo sdegno e l’ira d’Uranio il cor consuma a poco a poco. Mirtilla Giovan l’erbe agli agnelli, a l’api i fiori; a me sol giova contemplar d’Uranio nel vago viso i bei vivi colori. Filli Dimmi, ninfa, qual è quell’animale che ne l’acqua si crea, poi vive in fiamma e tuo sarà questo dorato strale.

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Mirtilla Dimmi qual pesce in ocean s’asconde che tremar face chi lo tocca a pena e due caprette avrai bianche e feconde. Opico Non più ninfe amorose, a me conviene terminar queste vostre 1785 amorose contese: lite non sia tra voi, dove è cotanta parità di valore; e io vi giuro

Mirtilla 165 Mirtilla Two basketfuls of flowers Alcon gave me, and Amaranta, already maddened with anger, in order not to see them, turned elsewhere her path.

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Filli Filling heaven with screams, ah me! What does it avail? And adding water (with my tears) to water, if it doesn’t gain me faithfulness for my anguish? Mirtilla I love cruel Uranio and I don’t repent of it, for beauty, which pleases all eyes, makes me happily enjoy every torment.

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Filli Snow in the sunlight vanishes, and fire destroys wax, and Uranio’s wrath and ire consume my heart little by little. Mirtilla Grasses are good for lambs; for bees, flowers. All that’s good for me is to contemplate Uranio’s charming face’s beautiful lively colors. Filli Tell me, nymph: which is the animal that in water is created, then it lives in flames? And this golden arrow will be yours.

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Mirtilla Tell me: what fish in the ocean hides, which makes whoever barely touches it tremble? And you will have two little goats, white and fertile. Opico No more, amorous nymphs! I must end these, your 1785 amorous disputes. Let there be no quarrel between you, where there’s such equal worth. I swear to you

166 ISABELLA ANDREINI per gli alti dei ch’a mio giudizio sete pari ne la beltà, pari nel canto. Ben vi dirò che faticate invano, poi ch’ognuna di voi Uranio segue e ama e pur v’è noto ormai ch’Ardelia egli sol ama, Ardelia cura: dunque non sia tra voi discordia, o figlie, ma lasciate d’amar chi voi non ama.

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Filli Ciò mi pare impossibile, né sono possente a far quel che non vuole Amore. Mirtilla Mentre avrò spirito e alma 1800 amerò solo Uranio. Opico Non voglio oppormi ai desideri vostri; ma poiché non potete o non volete restar d’amar chi voi non ama, almeno fate per amor mio, 1805 che tra voi non sia lite e procurate con la sola virtù, con le bell’opre di far unitamente de l’amor suo, de la sua grazia acquisto. Filli Mossa da le tue valide ragioni mi contento ubbidirti e ti prometto d’amar Mirtilla al par di me medesima; e prego il ciel che mi conceda (s’io degna ne son) di posseder il core d’Uranio, e se pur questo il ciel mi nega, l’amor d’Igilio il cor mi mova e cangi, ed entri Igilio ov’era prima Uranio. Mirtilla E io ti giuro, Opico mio, d’aver verso Filli gentil quella medesma

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Mirtilla 167 by the gods above that in my judgment you are matched in beauty, matched in song. Moreover I shall tell you that you exert yourselves in vain, since each of you follows and loves Uranio, and yet you know by now that he loves only Ardelia, he cares only for Ardelia. Therefore between you let there be no discord, O daughters, but leave off loving one who loves you not.

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Filli That seems impossible to me, nor am I capable of doing what Love forbids. Mirtilla As long as I have a spirit and a soul, I will love only Uranio.

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Opico I will not oppose your desires. But since you cannot or will not cease loving one who loves you not, at least for the love you bear me, do not quarrel with each other, and attempt with your virtue alone, with good works, to acquire both his love and his favor.

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Filli Moved by your valid arguments, I am content to obey you; I promise you I’ll love Mirtilla as much as myself. And I pray heaven to grant me (if I am worthy of it) possession of the heart of Uranio. Yet if heaven denies me this, may Igilio’s love move my heart and change it, and may Igilio take the place that formerly was Uranio’s. Mirtilla And I swear to you, my Opico, I’ll hold toward noble Filli that same

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168 ISABELLA ANDREINI amica intenzion ch’ella promette 1820 verso di me sì dolcemente; ed ecco che la mia mano a la sua mano congiungo per pegno de la fede; e prego anch’io le stelle o che ‘l mio ben mi si conceda (s’io ne son degna) o almen non mi si neghi 1825 di goder la mia prima libertade. Opico Son così giuste le domande vostre che vi potete ben rendere sicure d’impetrarle senz’altro. Ma gl’è tempo ch’io men’n vada a Dameta, che bisogno del mio consiglio avendo, m’aspetta al fonte, e voi restate in pace.

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Filli Opico ti ringrazio. Mirtilla E anch’io ti ringrazio, Opico mio. Filli Andiamo ancora noi, che gl’è ben tempo. Fine del Terzo Atto

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Mirtilla 169 friendly intention that she promises so sweetly toward me. Look, my hand to her hand I join as a pledge of my faithfulness. And I too pray to the stars either that my wish might be granted me (if I am worthy of it), or at least that it not be denied me to enjoy my former freedom. Opico So just are your requests that you can indeed be sure of obtaining them, without any doubt. But it’s time for me to go to Dameta, for, in need of my counsel, he awaits me at the spring. You, stay in peace.101

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Filli Opico, I thank you. Mirtilla And I too thank you, my Opico. Filli Let us go as well, for indeed it is time. End of Act Three

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Atto Quarto SCENA PRIMA Opico e Tirsi pastore Opico Or hai Tirsi notato de l’infelice Uranio il lagrimoso stato? Ch’appoggiato a quel tronco arido e secco, coi languidi occhi a terra 1840 immobilmente affissi, stavasi nel suo duol cotanto immerso che non pur non ci ha visti, ma né anco sentiti, se bene amicamente e assai forte 1845 salutato l’abbiamo. Tirsi Ho purtroppo compreso che l’infelice Uranio è mesto quale tortore ch’ha perduta la compagna; ma s’Uranio provasse anco una volta la millesima parte dei piaceri che nel cacciar si provano, gli uscirebbon di mente i sofferti martiri; né di seguir si curerebbe indarno la dispietata Ardelia, per cui temo ch’un dì non corra al fin de la sua vita. Opico Ti giuro, Tirsi, per questa mia chioma fatta per man del tempo, sì come vedi già squallida e bianca, che quando il vidi (ohimè) starsi a quel modo pensoso e muto, a gran fatica il pianto ritenni; e se ben sono spente in me tutte l’amorose fiamme, pur mi sovvene dei passati affanni 170

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Act Four SCENE 1 The shepherds Opico and Tirsi Opico Now Tirsi, have you noticed unhappy Uranio’s tearful state? Leaning on that arid, dry trunk, with his languid eyes upon the earth immovably fixed, he was in his sorrow so immersed that not only did he not see us, he didn’t even hear us, although amicably and rather loudly we greeted him. Tirsi Unfortunately, I understand that unhappy Uranio is as melancholy as a turtledove that has lost his mate. But if Uranio experienced, even one time, a thousandth part of the pleasures that in the hunt are experienced, he would forget all about the torments he’s suffered; nor would he care to pursue in vain the pitiless Ardelia. Because of these I fear one day he’ll reach the end of his life. Opico I swear to you, Tirsi, on my hair made by the hand of Time (just as you see) already unkempt and white, that when I saw him, ah me! standing in that way thoughtful and mute, with great effort from weeping I held back. And although all my amorous flames have gone out, yet it reminded me of my past sorrows 171

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172 ISABELLA ANDREINI ne l’età mia più verde e più fiorita; ma s’Uranio non ha provato ancora de la caccia i piaceri (che sol quest’esercizio potria, se ‘l ver discerno, 1870 dar bando forse all’amoroso foco, perché levando l’ozio ancor si leva tutta la forza onde ci atterra Amore) maravigliar non me’n poss’io che sono già vecchio, e tuttavia 1875 così fatti piacer non gustai mai; ma dimmi, caro Tirsi, come hai tu ne la caccia sì gran gusto? Tirsi Opico, ben si vede, che non provasti un tal piacere giamai, 1880 perché simil dimanda non m’averesti fatta: ma sappi che non è diletto al mondo che possa pareggiar quel de la caccia. O che piacere immenso 1885 allor prov’io, che in picciola barchetta con un compagno o due lieto me ‘n vado turbando ai pesci e agli augei palustri i lor dolci riposi, or con l’esca, or con gli ami, or con le reti, 1890 ond’è che mai ritorno noi non facciamo alle capanne nostre che la barchetta non sia tutta carca di bella e ricca preda; e s’io volessi descriverti i bei modi 1895 che in ciò da noi si tengono, so certo che, se ben vecchio sei, non lascieresti per qual altro si voglia questo dolce piacere. Opico Invero gentil cosa 1900 stimo che sia cotesta; ma non t’annoia, Tirsi,

Mirtilla 173 from my most youthful and blooming age. But if Uranio has not yet experienced the hunt’s pleasures (for only this exercise could, if I discern rightly, 1870 perhaps banish his amorous fire, because in removing idleness one also removes all the force with which Love casts us down), wonder at it I cannot, for I am already old, and still 1875 this sort of pleasure I have never tasted. But tell me, dear Tirsi, how is it you have for hunting so great a taste? Tirsi Opico, it’s easy to see you’ve never felt such a pleasure, 1880 because such a question you would not have asked me. I’ll have you know there’s no delight in the world that can equal that of the hunt. Oh, what immense pleasure 1885 I feel when in a little boat, with a friend or two, happily I go disturbing the fishes’ and the marsh birds’ sweet repose, now with bait, now with hooks, now with nets. 1890 So it is that never do we make our way back to our huts without our boat all full of fine and rich prey. And if I wished to describe to you the clever methods 1895 which in this we employ, I am certain that (although you are old) you would not leave off, for anything else whatsoever, this sweet pleasure. Opico Truly a noble thing 1900 I deem this. But doesn’t it bore you, Tirsi,

174 ISABELLA ANDREINI e non ti sazia mai? Non ha diletto alcun sì grande il mondo che talor non satolli. Tirsi Quando questo 1905 piacer m’annoia, immantinente piglio altre reti e me’n vado co’ gli stessi compagni in qualche solitaria valle; quivi tra fronde e fronde tendiam la nostra rete, 1910 sottile sì ch’occhio la scorge a pena; poi con zolle, e con sassi e con gridi gli augei mettiamo in fuga. I quai drizzando i paurosi voli, semplicetti se’n vanno 1915 ov’è teso l’inganno e con nostro piacer restan prigioni. Poscia, quando vediamo che la rete carca n’è sì che gli sostiene a pena, i capi a poco a poco 1920 allentiam de la fune, e quivi presi troviam diversi augelli in tanta copia che non sappiam dove riporgli, e spesso con la rete gli augelli avviluppati insieme 1925 portiamo al nostro albergo. Opico Egli è purtroppo vero che chi teme del mal più che non deve, invece di fuggirlo alcuna volta nel peggio intoppa; testimon ne sono gli augei di che tu parli, i quai temendo lieve rumore, inavedutamente per fuggirsi da quel corrono a morte; ma segui, se ti piace, che mi sembra d’esser presente a tutto quel che vai sì maestrevolmente descrivendo.

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Mirtilla 175 and doesn’t it sate you ever? No delight is so great in all the world that sometimes it doesn’t cloy. Tirsi When this 1905 pleasure bores me, immediately I take up other nets, and I go off with the same companions to some lonely valley. There between one branch and another we stretch out our net, 1910 so fine that the eye can barely discern it. Then with clods of earth, with stones, and with shouts, the birds we set in flight. They straighten their fear-wracked course and foolishly go 1915 where we’ve set the trap, and to our gratification they end up prisoners. Afterwards, when we see that the net is so full of them that it barely supports them, round their heads little by little 1920 we loosen the cords, and therein captured we find various birds in such great abundance that we don’t know where to put them. Often the net, with the birds tangled up together, 1925 we carry to our lodgings. Opico It is unfortunately true that he who fears an evil more than he should, instead of escaping it, sometimes stumbles into a worse case. Witness the birds of which you speak, which in fearing a slight noise, imprudently in fleeing from it run to their deaths. But continue, if you like, for I feel like I’m present at all that you are so masterfully describing.

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176 ISABELLA ANDREINI Tirsi Or senti, Opico mio, di qual maniera prendiam dolce solazzo e’n quanti modi facciam di vari augei diverse prede. Lunge dal mio tugurio 1940 quanto in sei colpi tirerebbe un arco, siede un’ombrosa valle che di bellezza non invidia a quella tanto famosa d’Ida, ove già le tre dee fur giudicate. 1945 Quest’è dintorno cinta di bei dipinti e mansueti poggi, tra i quali un più degli altri eminente si scopre: è sopra questo un leggiadro boschetto 1950 di sempre verdi lauri e d’odorati ginepri e di mortelle; quivi abbiam fabricata piccioletta capanna e ‘n torno a quella d’ogni pianta recisi abbiamo i rami; 1955 onde calando poi gli avidi augelli, né ritrovando ove posar il piede, si ponghin sopra le invischiate verghe quivi da noi, per arrestargli il volo, tra pianta e pianta in ordine disposte. 1960 Noi poi taciti e chiusi Nel piccolo alberghetto, fatto di molli giunchi, con ingannevol canto imitiamo la voce 1965 de’ tordi che passando si lasciano ingannar dal finto suono e con più lento volo vanno girando a la lor morte intorno. Noi poscia ad altri tordi, 1970 che vivi ad uso tal serbiamo in gabbia, la civetta mostriam, che non sì tosto è veduta da lor ch’alzan le voci, come soliti sono, o sia per tema o pur per odio, che né questo posso 1975 affermarti né quello.

Mirtilla 177 Tirsi Now hear, my Opico, in what manner we pass sweetly our time, and in how many ways we make of various birds diverse prey. As far from my hut 1940 as six shots of a bow lies a shaded valley that in beauty does not envy that so famous valley of Ida, where once the three goddesses were judged.102 1945 All around it’s encircled by beautiful, colorful, gentle hillocks, among which one more than the others juts up. Atop this one is a charming grove 1950 of evergreen laurels, scented junipers, and myrtle trees. There we have built a small hut. Around it we have lopped off every tree’s branches, 1955 so that when the birds wish to alight, finding nowhere else to set their feet, they settle down upon the poles smeared with birdlime which we, to stop their flight, have arranged between one tree and another. 1960 We then, quiet and closed-up in the little hut made of soft reeds, with a deceptive song imitate the call 1965 of the thrushes passing by. They are deceived by the falsified sound, and with a slower flight they go swirling round to their deaths. Thereafter to other thrushes, 1970 which for such usage we keep alive in cages, we show an owl, and as soon as it’s seen by them, they call out as they usually do (whether out of fear or even out of hate, for neither the former can I 1975 affirm, nor the latter).

178 ISABELLA ANDREINI Basta ch’allora i peregrini tordi incautamente al non pensato male corron con presto e furioso volo; e rideresti tu certo vedendo con quale e quanta lor vana fatica studian di liberarsi e mentre cercano di sviluppar i piedi intrican l’ali; onde poscia ciascun n’empie il suo zaino.

1980

Opico Simil a questi augelli 1985 sono gli incauti amanti, che lusingar si lasciano dal canto e da le soavissime parole de lor ninfe, e poi su le tenaci panie 1990 de la lor ferità perdon la vita. Ma se tra noi ci fusse qualche nuova Medea che mi ringiovenisse, io ti prometto ch’io vorrei del mio tempo alcuna parte 1995 spender in questi sì soavi giochi. Tirsi Taccio poi d’altri modi ch’usiamo nel pigliar diverse sorti d’uccelli e sol dirò di quel piacere che nel seguir si prova 2000 le timidette damme, e le paurose lepri, e i molli conigli, e i capri snelli, de’ quali altri con cani, altri con dardi, altri con lacci agevolmente prendo, Ma che dirò de l’atterrar un orso 2005 o con l’acuto spiedo un fier cinghiale? Certo potrebbe il sol tre volte e quattro tornar all’oriente prima ch’io potessi dir a bastanza del piacer ch’io provo 2010 ne la caccia, e son certo, se non mancano a l’aria augelli, pesci a l’acque e fiere al bosco, che in virtù de le mie reti,

Mirtilla 179 It is enough that then the wandering thrushes incautiously toward the unsuspected danger race with a quick and furious flight. And you would certainly laugh at seeing with how much and how many vain efforts they attempt to free themselves, and while they try to disentangle their feet, they entangle their wings. This way thereafter each of us fills up his knapsack with them.

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Opico Similar to these birds 1985 are incautious lovers, who let themselves be caught up in the singing and the ever-so-sweet words of their nymphs, and then upon the tenacious birdlime 1990 of their cruelty they lose their lives. But if among us there were some new Medea to rejuvenate me,103 I promise you I would like to spend some part 1995 of my time in these so-pleasant pursuits. Tirsi I’ll not even mention other methods we employ in taking diverse sorts of birds. I’ll speak only of that pleasure one feels in hunting 2000 the timid fallow deer, and fearful hares, soft rabbits, and nimble goats; all these—some with dogs, others with arrows, others with snares—easily I catch. But what shall I say of bringing down a bear, 2005 or with a sharp spear a fierce boar? Certainly the sun could three times or four return to the East before I might tell you enough about the pleasure I feel 2010 in the hunt. I am certain—as long as there are in the air, birds, fish in the waters, and beasts in the woods—that by virtue of my nets,

180 ISABELLA ANDREINI de gli ami, de le panie, de i lacci, de’ miei cani, de gli strali 2015 e di quest’arco che mi diede in dono la dea del primo cielo, non mi mancheran mai piaceri e giochi: quest’è quel arco onde non osa Amore accostarmisi punto, 2020 che teme rimaner ferito, invece di ferir me. Opico Non dir così figliuolo, non esser tanto ardito, che ‘l soverchio ardir conduce altrui sovente a morte. D’Icaro ti sovenga e di Fetonte. Ma non posso più qui fermarmi teco: ti lascio adunque, addio, Tirsi gentile. Tirsi Opico addio. Si crede questo vecchio, che dispregiando Amore, io faccia oltraggio a qualche dio, ma non son tanto ardito, né tanto temerario ch’io disprezzi gli dei. Gli onoro e colo, non lui, che non è dio. Ma chi veggio ver me venir sì lieto? Quest’è ‘l buon Coridon che, sopra l’uso del saper de le selve, i gran segreti scorge de l’ampio cielo; e ben ch’ei sia cittadino dei boschi, nondimeno agli studi giovevoli s’è dato, così del lavorar la terra come d’ogn’altra cosa che più a l’uom convenga.

SCENA SECONDA Coridone e Tirsi pastore Coridone Dio ti salvi, o buon Tirsi

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Mirtilla 181 my hooks, my birdlime, my snares, my dogs, my arrows, 2015 and this bow that was given to me as a gift by the goddess of the first heaven,104 I shall never lack for pleasures and pastimes. This is the bow on account of which Love dares not come near me at all, 2020 for he fears he’d end up wounded, instead of wounding me. Opico Don’t speak that way, son! Don’t be so rash, for overweening boldness often leads people to death. Remember Icarus, and Phaethon!105 2025 But I can no longer tarry here with you. I’ll leave you therefore; farewell, noble Tirsi. Tirsi Opico, farewell … This old man believes that in disparaging Love I outrage some god. But I am not so bold nor so rash as to despise the gods; I honor and worship them. Not him, for he is not a god. But whom do I see come toward me so happily? It is good Coridon who, beyond the usual knowledge of the forests, the great secrets discerns of the broad heavens. Although he is a denizen of the woods, nonetheless to useful studies he’s devoted, as much to working the earth as to every other thing that most befits a man.

SCENE 2 The shepherds Coridone and Tirsi Coridone May God preserve you, O good Tirsi.

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182 ISABELLA ANDREINI Tirsi O Coridon ben venga. Dove inviato sei? Coridone Egli è buon pezzo che per cercar de la mia bella Nisa da la capanna mia feci partita; Nisa da Coridone amata tanto, quanto da Nisa è Coridone amato.

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Tirsi Dimmi, chi tanto t’ha tenuto a bada? Coridone Tu solo. Tirsi

E come, s’ora a me ne vieni

Coridone Sappi che giunto qui vicino vidi Opico il saggio che si stava teco e fatto più vicino, intesi come tu ragionavi seco, e perché certo sono ch’egli non have per costume d’ascoltar cosa mai che non sia degna d’esser udita, desioso fatto d’udir cosa notabile, frenai i lunghi passi e appoggiato a un orno attentamente udii ciò che fu detto. E conosco e confesso veramente che diporti piacevoli e soavi sono quei de la caccia, ma rispetto a i piaceri amorosi son ombra, fumo, sogno, nebbia e vento. Tirsi S’ognun nel costui regno com’Uranio è felice, e se i piaceri ch’egli concede a voi sono come i suoi,

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Mirtilla 183 Tirsi O Coridon, welcome. Where are you headed? Coridone It’s been a good while since to seek out my beautiful Nisa from my hut I departed— Nisa by Coridone loved as much as by Nisa Coridone is loved.

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Tirsi Tell me, who so long has delayed you? Coridone You alone. Tirsi

How so, since just now to me you’ve come?

Coridone This is how: when I arrived nearby I saw that the wise Opico was with you. When I came closer I heard how you were conversing with him, and because I am certain that he has not the habit of ever listening to something unworthy of being heard, I wished to hear something notable. I stopped my hurried steps and, leaning on a flowering ash tree, attentively I listened to what was said. And I recognize and confess truly that recreations pleasant and sweet are those of the hunt; but in comparison to the pleasures of love they are shadows, smoke, dreams, fog, and wind. Tirsi If everyone in his realm is as happy as Uranio, and if the pleasures he grants you are like his,

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184 ISABELLA ANDREINI dolgasi ognun di voi che liberale de’ suoi beni vi sia; procuri ognuno 2070 di farlo avaro, o miserelli amanti, per un mentito sguardo, per un ciglio perfido e incostante, per un finto sorriso e per una soave paroletta, 2075 ma traditrice, perdere in un punto la cara libertà, l’arbitrio, il core, far delle proprie voglie tiranna una crudele, astuta, lusinghiera e falsa ninfa; 2080 o cieche menti, o pensier vani e folli. Coridone Deh scusa, Amor, costui che non conosce i doni del tuo regno: egli non dee saper che ‘l sommo Giove per goder le tue grazie in terra scese, 2085 mugghiò toro, arse fiamma e cantò cigno, fatt’aquila rapì, piovve fatt’oro e saltò fatto satiro: e insomma sotto diverse forme si nascose, poco curando la gelosa Giuno, 2090 per gustar le tue gioie e i tuoi diletti. Tirsi, confesso ben che alcuna noia sostien chi è d’Amor seguace e servo, ma le pene d’amor son tanto dolci che tormentando porgano conforto, 2095 e poco dolce molto amaro appaga. Tirsi Io non crederò mai che dolce frutto venga d’amaro seme. Coridone Se non ti rincrescesse l’ascoltarmi, forse ti renderei di ciò pentito. Tirsi Si pente sol chi erra, io non commetto alcuno errore, e però indarno tenti

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Mirtilla 185 let every one of you grieve that generous with his gifts he is to you; let everyone attempt to make him stingy. O wretched lovers! For a mendacious look, for a brow perfidious and inconstant, for a false smile, and for a little word sweet but treacherous, to lose in a moment one’s dear liberty, volition, and heart! To set up as a tyrant over one’s own wishes a cruel, crafty, flattering, and false nymph! O blind minds, O thoughts vain and mad! Coridone Please excuse, Love, this man who doesn’t know the gifts of your realm. He must not know that highest Jove in order to enjoy your favors to earth descended. He bellowed as a bull, burned as a flame, and sang as a swan. As an eagle he carried off his prey, he rained down as gold, and he leaped about as a satyr. In short, in various forms he concealed himself, little caring for jealous Juno, in order to taste your joys and your delights.106 Tirsi, I freely confess that some annoyance must be borne by whoever is Love’s follower and servant, but the pains of love are so sweet that even while causing torment they offer comfort, and a little sweetness compensates for a lot of bitterness.

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Tirsi I shall never believe that a sweet fruit might come from a bitter seed. Coridone If you didn’t mind listening to me, perhaps I would make you repent of it. Tirsi Only one who errs repents; I am not committing any error, and so in vain you try

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186 ISABELLA ANDREINI farmi pentir; ma compiacer ti voglio. Su dunque, narra ormai queste dolcezze piene di tanto assenzio e tanto fele.

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Coridone Pensi tu, Tirsi, che l’aver in copia lanosa greggia e l’esser abondante in tutte le stagion di fresco latte, l’aver paschi fioriti e più fiorito armento, 2110 feconde piagge e ben fronzute selve, vaghe colline e copiosi fonti e cani e servi, e tutto quello insomma che può fare un pastor lieto e felice, siano a i lor possessor di gran contento? 2115 Tirsi Non solo il penso, ma senz’altro il credo, poiché son le ricchezze una quiete de l’animo e del cor, senza la quale non si può mai saper che cosa è bene. Coridone E pensi tu che sia d’alma gentile felicità l’aver le Muse amiche, saper con dolce e dotta maestria dar fiato a le incerate inegual canne, cantar al suon di boscareccia avena soavi versi e l’insegnare a i sassi, ove sepolta stassi l’infaticabil Eco, di ridire gl’ultimi accenti? Pensi tu che sia di gran contento il saper con la falce troncare i rami secchi e infecondi, il saper quando e come si debba far gl’innesti; quando le viti maritar a gli olmi; quando sfrondar le piante, tonder la greggia; e quando premere le mamme tumide e cavarne il dolce latte e poi formarne il cacio;

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Mirtilla 187 to make me repent. But to indulge you I wish. Come on then, recount now these sweetnesses full of so much absinthe107 and so much bile. Coridone Do you think, Tirsi, that having a plentiful woolly flock, and that abounding in all seasons with fresh milk, having flourishing pastures and an even more flourishing herd, fertile countryside and densely leafed forests, lovely hills and plentiful springs and dogs and servants, and everything in short that can make a shepherd happy and cheerful, brings to their possessors great contentment?

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Tirsi Not only do I think so, but without any doubt I believe it, since riches are a source of tranquility in the spirit and the heart, and without this peace one can never know well-being. Coridone And do you think, for a noble soul it brings happiness to have the Muses as friends, to know how with sweet and learned skill to play the waxen unequal reeds,108 to sing to the sound of woodsy oats sweet verses, and to teach the stones (where buried lies unflagging Echo) to repeat one’s last notes?109 Do you think it brings great happiness to know how with the scythe to sever branches dry and infertile, to know when and how one ought to make grafts; when your vines to marry to elm trees; when to trim down your plants, to shear your flock; and when to squeeze the swollen udders and draw from them sweet milk and then turn it into cheese;

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188 ISABELLA ANDREINI e come fender con l’aratro adunco si dee la terra, e quando trarre il mele da l’api si convenga; e quando l’uve 2140 si debbon corre e spremerne il liquore? Credi tu, Tirsi, che sia gran contento saper sanar la greggia quando da la pruina gli vien scabbia o podagra 2145 e saperla dal fascino guardare? E saper con la falce troncar de’ verdi prati l’erboso frutto o dagli amati campi sveller l’inutil felce e la gramigna, 2150 e l’infelice loglio, ch’a le bionde spighe tanto è nocivo; e quando poi tagliar si den con più minuta falce? Deh dimmi, Tirsi, non è gran contento saper appieno il corso de le stelle, 2155 de’ pianeti la forza e perché il sole si corchi in grembo a Teti; perché vari la luna; perché la terra spesso s’interponga tra ‘l sole e la sorella; 2160 perché sien brevi e perché lunghi i giorni, allor che ‘l sol si scosta o s’avvicina; perché dal terzo ciel dolcezza piova; perché il pigro Saturno di veleno sia pieno e Marte di superbia e d’ira? 2165 Perché Giove benigno, e perché l’anno abbia tante stagioni e così varie? E finalmente non è gran contento saper investigar gli alti segreti di natura e del cielo e non sia cosa 2170 che si nasconda a l’intelletto nostro? Tirsi Certo sì, Coridon, poiché da i bruti ci distingue il sapere; e per la conoscenza al sommo Giove quasi veniamo eguali. 2175

Mirtilla 189 and how one must with the sharp plow cleave the earth, and when to take honey from bees is appropriate; and when grapes 2140 you must gather, and press out their juice? Do you believe, Tirsi, that it brings great happiness to know how to heal a flock, when from the hoar-frost they catch scabies or podagra,110 2145 and to know how from black magic to guard it? And to know how with the scythe to cut down the green meadows’ grassy growth; or from the beloved fields to eradicate useless ferns, weeds, 2150 and unwholesome cockle,111 which to the golden panicles is so harmful; and when afterwards one must cut them with a smaller scythe? Oh tell me, Tirsi, doesn’t it bring great happiness to know thoroughly the course of the stars, 2155 the planets’ forces, and why the sun lies down in the lap of Tethys?112 Why the moon changes? Why the earth often gets between the sun and his sister?113 2160 Why short and why long are the days, when the sun moves away or approaches? Why from the third heaven sweetness rains down? Why sluggish Saturn of poison114 is full, and Mars of pride and wrath?115 2165 Why Jupiter is benign?116 Why the year has so many seasons, and so varied? And finally, doesn’t it bring great happiness to know how to investigate the lofty secrets of nature and of the heavens? And that there can be nothing 2170 that can hide from our intellect? Tirsi Yes indeed, Coridon, since from the brute animals what distinguishes us is knowledge; and it’s by means of knowledge that of highest Jove we become almost the equals.

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190 ISABELLA ANDREINI Coridone O Tirsi, ancor che le ricchezze e ‘l senno sien gran doni stimati, non son tali però che co’ diletti d’amor vadan del pari; non hai sentito dire 2180 al vecchio Melibeo che ‘l pastor frigio negò di dar l’aurato pomo a Palla, ancor che saggia, e a Giunon regina, sol per donarlo a Venere amorosa? Saggio, che più prezzò di bella donna 2185 gli abbracciamenti e l’amorose gioie che ‘l profondo saper, che le ricchezze. Tirsi Io ho fin qui creduto che la caccia fusse d’ogni piacer piacer più dolce; e s’alcuno sentia che ragionasse d’altri diletti, io lo fuggiva, poco stimandol saggio; e questa è la cagione ch’io mai non posi mente al saggio ragionar di Melibeo: e finalmente ho fin ad or creduto ch’amor fusse la peste de’ mortali e non credea ch’alcuna gioia fusse o nel volto o nel sen di bella ninfa. Ma ‘l tuo parlar è sì soave e dolce che ‘l mio core ostinato alquanto molce. Coridone Tirsi, tanta dolcezza amore ha posto ne le ninfe leggiadre, che colui si può chiamare tre volte fortunato se fatto amante alcuna ne possiede. E credi che color che son chiamati a un tanto bene, il suo celeste seggio non invidiano a Giove? Amor mai non apporta danno alcuno ai mortali; Amor vita è del mondo e de i viventi vero custode; egli conserva e regge

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Mirtilla 191 Coridone O Tirsi, although riches and wisdom are deemed great gifts, they are not such however that the delights of love they might match. Haven’t you heard 2180 from old Melibeo117 that the Phrygian shepherd denied the golden apple to Pallas, despite her wisdom, and to Juno the queen, only to give it to amorous Venus?118 A wise man, for more he prized a beautiful woman’s 2185 embraces and love’s joys than profound knowledge or wealth. Tirsi I have up till now believed the hunt was of all pleasures the pleasure most sweet, and if I heard anyone who was speaking of other delights, I would flee from him, deeming him not very wise. This is the reason why I never paid attention to the wise talk of Melibeo. And finally, I have up till now believed that love was a plague on mortals, and I didn’t believe any joy was to be found in the face or the breast of a fair nymph. But your speech is so gentle and sweet that my obstinate heart is somewhat enticed. Coridone Tirsi, so much sweetness Love has placed in charming nymphs that a man can call himself triply fortunate if as a lover he possesses any of them. And you can believe that those who are called to so great a good don’t envy Jove’s celestial seat. Love never causes any harm to mortals. Love is the life of the world, and of the living the true guardian. He conserves and directs

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192 ISABELLA ANDREINI tutte l’umane cose, e la celeste sua face il tutto avviva. E sappi Tirsi, che per lui solo è così cara a l’uomo la donna; e chi lei fugge, ancora fugge di sé la più pregiata e nobil parte.

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Tirsi E non può dunque l’uom senza la donna al mondo mantenersi? Coridone Tanto l’uomo può viver senza lei, quant’ella puote senza l’uom sostener sua fragil vita. 2220 È così dolce e cara questa dal ciel donata compagnia, e sì soave è ‘l maritale ardore ch’insieme la mantiene, che l’un privo de l’altro 2225 o non vive o mal vive. Che più? Sentano ancor le piante istesse d’Amor l’alta possanza; ma perché amor non cresce senza la sua pregiata compagnia, 2230 tutte le piante che son senza il maschio, over senza la femina, son tardi; ciò chiaro mostra l’edera e ‘l cipresso, e l’amandola sola poco frutta: la palma senza il maschio suo non genera, 2235 ma se vicine son, l’una si piega con natural amor verso la cara sua dolce compagnia e fanno a gara il frutto; le ritorte viti s’abbraccian volentieri a l’olmo 2240 e al pioppo, suoi cari mariti; il mirto ama la bianca oliva; gli augei s’amano anch’essi: ama il colombo la sua cara colomba e così gli altri. Insomma il mar, la terra e ‘l ciel son pieni 2245 d’amore. Età non fu, non fu mai sesso che senza amor si fusse.

Mirtilla 193 all human things, and his celestial torch vitalizes everything. And know, Tirsi, that through him alone woman to man is so dear; whoever flees her, also flees his own most precious and noble part.

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Tirsi And therefore man cannot without woman maintain himself in the world? Coridone Just so well man can live without her, as she can without man sustain her fragile life. 2220 So sweet and dear is this heaven-bestowed companionship, and so gentle is the marital ardor that in unity maintains it, that one companion deprived of the other 2225 either doesn’t live or lives badly. What else? Even plants themselves feel Love’s lofty power; but because love doesn’t grow without precious companionship, 2230 all the plants without the male, or alternatively without the female, are sluggish. This is clearly shown by the ivy and the cypress, and the single almond tree bears little fruit. The female palm tree without its male does not produce; 2235 but if they are nearby, the one leans with natural love toward its dear, sweet companion, and they compete in fruiting. The twisted grapevines embrace willingly the elm 2240 and the poplar, their dear husbands. The myrtle tree loves the white olive. Birds love each other as well. The male dove loves his dear female dove, and the same for the other birds. In short, the sea, the earth, and the sky are full 2245 of love. No epoch has there been, never a sex that without love existed.

194 ISABELLA ANDREINI Ogn’animale, e con ragione e senza, per fruir le dolcezze d’amor, ardito sprezza ogni periglio e manifesta morte non ricusa. Ama dunque tu ancor, prova di quanto contento sia l’amar ninfa che t’ami; e con lei gire a queste valli intorno cogliendo fiori e tesserne ghirlande, e quanti fiori han le ghirlande inteste tanti baci a lei dare e da lei tanti averne. Prova di quanta gioia sia ‘l vedersi da leggiadretta man cinger le tempie di vaga ghirlandetta; deh, prova un poco di qual gioia sia sedersi a l’ombra de i fioriti poggi cantando or gli occhi or le dorate chiome di bella ninfa, e far sonar le sponde del suo bel nome, e come dolce sia ch’ella interrompa le parole spesso con cari e dolci baci; prova, deh prova, di qual gaudio sia trovarsi in antro di fresch’ombre grato, allor che ‘l sol co’ suoi cocenti raggi arde la terra, in grembo a vaga ninfa, che dopo mille amorosetti scherzi e parole soavi e sospir dolci, ti levi i panni acciò che l’aura grata co ‘l fresco ti ristori, e dolce canti amorosetti versi per allettarti al sonno, scacciando intanto l’importuna mosca; indi traendo dal suo bianco seno e da le treccie d’or novelli fiori, corona te ne faccia; e con un bianco velo, mentre soave dormi, or t’asciughi la fronte or scuota l’aure, finché poi desto in compagnia n’andiate al fortunato albergo traendo le notturne ore felici;

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Mirtilla 195 Every creature, both those with reason and those without, to enjoy the sweetness of love, boldly disdains every peril, and even an obvious risk of death it does not refuse.119 Therefore, you love too! Feel how delightful it is to love a nymph who loves you, and with her to go to these valleys roundabout, gathering flowers and weaving them into garlands, and as many flowers as are in the garlands interwoven, that many kisses to give her, and from her that many to receive. Feel how joyous it is to see one’s temples encircled with a lovely little garland by a charming, dainty hand. Come, feel a little of what joy it brings to sit in the shade of the flowery hillocks, singing now of the eyes, now the golden locks of a beautiful nymph, and to make the riverbanks resound with her fair name, and how sweet it is when she interrupts your words often with dear, sweet kisses. Feel, oh feel, what bliss it brings to be in a cave (for its cool shade welcome, at the time when the sun with its baking rays burns the earth), in the lap of a fair nymph. She after a thousand loving games and gentle words and sweet sighs, removes your clothes so that the welcome breeze with its coolness might refresh you, and sweetly sings loving verses to entice you to sleep, chasing away meanwhile the importunate flies. Then, drawing from her white bosom and from her golden tresses new flowers, a crown for you she makes of them. With a white cloth, while sweetly you sleep, now she dries your forehead, now shakes it for a breeze, until later you wake, and companionably you two go off to your blissful dwelling, passing the nighttime hours in happiness.

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196 ISABELLA ANDREINI poi co’ ’l nascente giorno far a i dolci piacer nuovo ritorno.

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Tirsi Se ben mi pare una incredibil cosa, che quel che tu racconti sia di tanto contento, nondimeno provo qualche piacer ne l’ascoltarti; di’ dunque, s’altro a dire in ciò ti resta.

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Coridone Credi, o mio Tirsi, che non è contento che si possa uguagliare a quel diletto, a quella gran dolcezza, a quella gioia che provano gli amanti, allor che senza sospetto e gelosia 2300 s’aman l’un l’altro. Tacerò del gaudio ch’essi nel cominciar provano mentre va crescendo d’amor la bella fiamma. Tacerò quel piacer, benché sia immenso, che si sente bevendo per le luci 2305 l’anima di chi s’ama; e taccio ancora quel diletto che mandano l’orecchie al cor sentendo amata voce e chiara. Lascio in disparte l’accoglienze grate, le lusinghe, i favori, i vezzi, i doni, 2310 e assai più dei doni i furti cari, e aggiunger man sì dolcemente a mano e mill’altri contenti; e dirò solo di quel dolce piacer che non ha meta, di quel piacer, quando gli amanti e sposi, 2315 dopo qualche sospiro e qualche stilla di lagrimette, sopra l’erbe e i fiori sicuri stanno od in spelonca opaca, dei diletti d’amore segretaria fedele, 2320 e che senza timor, senza rispetto mostra ciascuno a l’altro il core aperto, e svelati i pensieri e le passate pene van rimembrando, e per la gioia del ben presente ogni dolor s’oblia; 2325

Mirtilla 197 Then at the dawning of day, to those sweet pleasures anew you return.

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Tirsi Although to me it seems incredible that what you recount might bring so much happiness, nonetheless I feel some pleasure in listening to you. So keep talking, if you have more to tell of this.

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Coridone Believe, O my Tirsi. There is no happiness that can equal that delight, that great sweetness, that joy felt by lovers, when without suspicion or jealousy 2300 they love each other reciprocally. I shall be silent about the bliss they feel in the beginning, while love’s beautiful flame keeps growing. I shall be silent about the pleasure (although it is immense) you feel when drinking in through the eyes 2305 the soul of the one you love. I’ll be reticent as well about the delight sent by the ears to the heart upon hearing that voice beloved and clear. I leave aside the welcoming greetings, enticements, favors, caresses, gifts 2310 (and far dearer than the gifts, the thefts), and joining hand so sweetly to hand, and a thousand other delights. I shall speak only of that sweet pleasure which has no limit, of that pleasure when lovers and spouses, 2315 after some sighs and some droplets of tears, upon the grass and the flowers feel secure, or in a dark cavern (of the delights of love a faithful minister), 2320 and then without fear, without reservation, each shows the other an open heart. With their thoughts revealed, their past pains they recall, and in the joy of their current happiness all sorrow is forgotten. 2325

198 ISABELLA ANDREINI e se d’amaritudine e d’affanno piansero un tempo, or bagna il viso e ‘l seno di lagrime ciascun per la dolcezza de i loro amori. O quanto è poi soave quel mormorar che fan con bassa voce, quel sussurrar, quei baci or dati or tolti, quel affissar ne le due luci amate l’innamorate luci, e ne l’amata bocca mandar e de l’amata bocca de’ focosi sospir prender il vento; o parole, o sospir, o baci, o spirti caldi, dolci e soavi, amati e cari, ch’escono da le labra! O sopra umana dolcezza, o inestimabile piacere, o ben non conosciuto e non prezzato se non da chi lo prova, o quanto sono miseri quei pastori e quelle ninfe che non provan d’amor l’alte dolcezze, non s’avvedendo che la giovanezza fu data a noi dal cielo e da natura per impiegarla ne’ suoi dolci scherzi; e chi lascia passar de l’età sua senza il dolce d’amor l’aprile e ‘l maggio, in tempo si ravvede, ch’assai meglio fora poi non aver tal conoscenza. Dunque non è felicitade al mondo maggior di quella di due cori amanti cui marital amor lega e congiunge.

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Tirsi Deh non seguire più oltre, che m’hai tanto ammollito 2355 il duro cor, ch’io non so più qual fui, anzi ardo di desio di farmi servo di graziosa ninfa. Coridone O te felice quattro volte e sei, se sei disposto a sì lodata impresa! Ma voglio ormai partirmi per ritrovar la mia leggiadra Nisa,

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Mirtilla 199 If for bitterness or for grief they wept at one time, now they bathe their faces and breasts with tears for the sweetness of their amours. Oh, how sweet then is that murmuring of theirs with a soft voice, that whispering, those kisses now given, now taken, that fixing upon the two beloved eyes one’s enamored eyes; and into the beloved mouth sending, and from the beloved mouth taking, of fiery sighs the breath. Oh words, oh sighs, oh kisses, oh spirits hot, sweet and gentle, beloved and dear, that come out from the lips! Oh superhuman sweetness, oh inestimable pleasure, oh happiness unknown and unappreciated except by one who feels it! Oh, how miserable are those shepherds and those nymphs who do not experience love’s intense joys, not realizing that youth was given to us by heaven and by nature to be employed in its sweet games! Whoever lets pass without love’s sweetness his lifetime’s April and May, eventually realizes his error, and far better it would be then not to have such knowledge. Therefore, there is no happiness in the world greater than that of two loving hearts whom marital love links and joins.

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Tirsi Please, don’t go on anymore, for you have so softened 2355 my hard heart that I am no longer as I was. Instead, I burn with the desire to become the servant of a graceful nymph. Coridone O you, happy four times and six, if you are disposed to so praiseworthy an undertaking! But I wish at last to depart, to find again my lovely Nisa,

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200 ISABELLA ANDREINI la qual dovunque va col bianco piede nascer fa gigli e rose, Nisa mia vaga e bella, 2365 a l’apparir de’ cui begl’occhi ardenti si fermano i torrenti, fan letizia le valli e i colli e i prati; Nisa, che non è sol che di splendore l’uguagli, e non è fior che di bellezza 2370 la vinca; or dunque tu rimanti in pace. Tirsi Vanne lieto e felice; egl’è pur vero, e non lo credo a pena che l’accorto parlar di Coridone m’ha svegliata la mente che sopita è stata in fin ad or. Ma che beltade è questa? Che splendor gli occhi m’abbaglia?

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SCENA TERZA Mirtilla ninfa e Tirsi pastore Mirtilla Misera non so dove mi guidi la mia sorte. Io mi raggiro come incantato serpe che s’affanna 2380 per non andar là dove magico verso il tira. Può esser mai che se ‘l crudel Uranio sapesse come io vivo misera, o per dir meglio, 2385 come per lui mi moro, mi lasciasse morire? Ahi, che se ‘l vede purtroppo e non me ‘l crede! Tirsi Voglio tentar, se mi vien dato in sorte, di seco ragionar. Il ciel ti salvi bella ninfa, splendor di queste selve.

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Mirtilla 201 who everywhere she steps with her white foot leaves newborn lilies and roses. My Nisa, charming and beautiful! At the appearance of her beautiful blazing eyes torrents come to a halt; the valleys, hills, and meadows rejoice. Nisa—there is no sun which in splendor can equal her, and there is no flower that in beauty can best her. Now therefore may you stay in peace. Tirsi And you, fare well, in delight and happiness. It is indeed true (I hardly believe it!) that the perceptive speech of Coridone has awakened my mind, which slumbrous has been up till now. But what beauty is this? What splendor dazzles my eyes?

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SCENE 3 The nymph Mirtilla and the shepherd Tirsi Mirtilla [enters, unaware of Tirsi’s presence] Wretched me, I know not where my fate guides me. I turn round on myself like an enchanted snake that strives not to go where a magic spell draws it. Could it ever happen that if cruel Uranio knew how I live in misery, or to say it better, how for him I am dying, he might let me die? Aiee, what if he sees it all too well, and doesn’t believe it of me? Tirsi [aside] I will try my luck at conversing with her. [to Mirtilla] Heaven preserve you, beautiful nymph, splendor of these woods.

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202 ISABELLA ANDREINI Mirtilla Benvenuto pastor, qual tu ti sia. Tirsi Tirsi son io, del dotto Alcimedonte già figlio e di Licori ch’anzi tempo se n’andar lieti a più tranquilla vita, lasciando me d’ampie ricchezze erede; che quanta greggia in Aracinto pasce è tutta mia, che numerosa è tanto, che annoverarla occhio mortal non puote; e presso ad Erimanto in mille prati mi pasce e custodisce Alfesibeo un fortunato armento, onde giamai novello non mi manca e fresco latte. E se t’aggrada di saper quant’io agile sia, leggiadra ninfa, sappi che sì destro pastor, né sì veloce (né parlo cosa ignota) alcun non vive che nel corso m’agguagli o ne la lotta o nel lanciare il palo o vibrar dardo o con l’arco ferir selvaggia fiera o scagliar con la fromba i gravi sassi. Io canto come già cantava Mopso, il cui nome ancor vive per le selve, e tra le ninfe e tra i pastori è chiaro; e quella cetra, che ‘l mio caro padre lasciommi, tocco sì soavemente che lascian le Napee, lascian le Naiadi spesso i lor seggi e liete al suon ne vengono con umidetto piè danzando a gara. Or tu non mi sprezzar, ninfa gentile, gradisci questo cor che per te sola già tutto è pieno d’amoroso foco; e se Giove tonante e gli altri dei prezzano le primizie de’ pastori, anco tu prezzar déi, mortal mia dea, le primizie del cor ch’io ti consacro. Mirtilla Comprendo dal tuo dir, gentil pastore, come tu sei d’Amor nuovo seguace,

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Mirtilla 203 Mirtilla Welcome, shepherd, whoever you may be. Tirsi Tirsi am I, of the learned Alcimedonte, deceased, the son, and of Licori, who ahead of their time went on happily to a more tranquil life, leaving me of ample riches the heir. As many flocks as in Aracynthus graze are all mine, and numerous they are such that count them a mortal eye cannot.120 And near Erymanthus in a thousand meadows, a plentiful herd Alfesibeo pastures and watches over for me, so that never do I lack for new, fresh milk.121 And if you would like to know how agile I am, lovely nymph, be advised that so dexterous a shepherd, nor so swift (and I do not speak from ignorance), does not live who in running can equal me, or in wrestling or in spear-throwing or hurling darts, or with a bow in wounding wild beasts, or in casting with a sling heavy stones. I sing as formerly Mopso sang,122 whose name lives on throughout the forests and among nymphs and shepherds is renowned. And that lyre, which my dear father left me, I strum so sweetly that often the Napaeae and the Naiads123 leave their seats, and happily toward the sound they come with moist feet, dancing in competition. Now don’t you despise me, noble nymph. Welcome this heart that for you alone already is all full of amorous fire. And if Jove the thunderer and the other gods esteem the first fruits of shepherds, you also must esteem, my mortal goddess, the first fruits of the heart which to you I consecrate. Mirtilla I take it from your speech, noble shepherd, that you are of Love a new follower,

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204 ISABELLA ANDREINI onde non dei saper che dove Amore una volta ferisce, a questa piaga 2430 morte è sol medicina. Or sappi ch’io amo e osservo Uranio tanto crudo (misera) quanto bello; e chi volesse la bella immagin sua trarmi dal petto, bisogneria ch’egli potesse ancora 2435 trar le stelle dal ciel, levar la chiara luce del sole e rischiarar la notte. Onde accettar da te quelle primizie, che donar mi vorresti, Amor mi toglie; dunque lascia Mirtilla e altra segui. 2440 Tirsi Mirtilla, anima mia, che tanto merti, s’Uranio non apprezza l’amor tuo, donalo a me, che a me sarà più caro che non è questa vita. Mirtilla Vera serva d’Amore 2445 non può donar se non a un solo il core. Tirsi Sollo, ma se gradito da colui a cui donato fu non viene il dono, non torna in libertà, come era prima, del donator il dono? 2450 E se ben rifiutata sarà la grazia tua, nondimen’io accetterolla volentieri, o bella e graziosa ninfa, e se per tuo m’accetti, tu vedrai per l’allegrezza 2455 danzar la greggia mia e saltellar il mio cornuto armento. Mirtilla Quando del dono mio fusse avvenuto quel che mi narri, allor potrei concederti la grazia che mi chiedi, ma saprai ch’Uranio volentier accettò in dono

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Mirtilla 205 hence you must not know that where Love once wounds someone, for this wound death is the only medicine. Now be informed that I love and revere Uranio, as cruel (wretched me!) as he is handsome. Whoever wanted to draw out his fair image from my breast would need to be able also to draw the stars from the sky, to take away the bright light from the sun, and to brighten up the night. So, Love prevents me from accepting from you those first fruits which you would like to give me. Therefore, abandon Mirtilla and follow another.

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Tirsi Mirtilla, my soul (for so much you deserve), if Uranio does not appreciate your love, give it to me, for to me it will be dearer than my life. Mirtilla A true maidservant of Love cannot give, except to one alone, her heart. Tirsi I know. But if not welcomed is the gift by him to whom it was given, doesn’t the giver’s gift regain its freedom, which it had before? And if indeed refused is your favor, nonetheless I will accept it willingly, O beautiful and gracious nymph, and if as yours you accept me, you will see happiness set my flock dancing and my horned herd skipping. Mirtilla If with my gift it had happened as you narrate, then I could grant you the favor you ask of me. But know that Uranio willingly accepted as a gift

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206 ISABELLA ANDREINI l’arso mio cor, non già per conservarlo nel suo candido seno, ma per farne crudelissimo strazio; e s’egli il tiene, giusto è ben che a lui solo mi volga e lui sol ami; e s’io volessi amar te, non potrei di core amarti, poiché priva ne sono.

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Tirsi Mirtilla, morte mia, non dirò vita, patirai ch’io languisca 2470 sol per amarti al par de gli occhi miei? Non sai tu ch’è proverbio da natura dettato, ama chi t’ama? Mirtilla Ahi, s’ogni amato riamar dovesse per natural costume, io non sarei 2475 come tu vedi afflitta e malcontenta! Ben mi duol del tuo mal ch’io so per prova quant’è infelice e misero l’amante che non è riamato; ma sappi ch’altro oggetto 2480 non piace a gli occhi miei che ‘l vago Uranio; Uranio è che tien sol l’anima mia, ed ella altro ricetto né più soave carcere desia. E perché m’è di noia ogn’altra vista, 2485 da te mi parto e vo cercando lui. Tirsi Deh chi mi toglie di mirar, ahi lasso, la serena beltà? Chi mi disgiunge dal mio bel sole e chi me ‘l toglie e fura? Dunque mirar colei più non debb’io, che sola mi può far lieto e felice? Ahi com’aspra e pungente m’è stata, anima mia, la tua partita! O fuggitiva ninfa, aspetta almeno tanto che come dea t’adori, poi che sdegni come ninfa esser amata.

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Mirtilla 207 my burnt heart, not by any means to cherish it in his pure white breast, but to cause it the cruelest torments. And if he holds it, it is indeed right that to him alone I turn and him alone I love. Even if I wished to love you, I could not with all my heart love you, since I am deprived of it. Tirsi Mirtilla, my death (I shall not call you life), will you tolerate that I languish only for loving you as much as my own eyes? Don’t you know the proverb by Nature dictated: “Love the one who loves you”?124 Mirtilla Aiee! If every beloved had to reciprocate for natural compulsion, I would not be as you see me, afflicted and unhappy! Indeed I sorrow for your pain, for I know from experience how unhappy and wretched is a lover who is not loved back. But know that no other object pleases my eyes except handsome Uranio. Uranio it is who alone holds my soul, which no other refuge nor a sweeter prison desires. And because a source of annoyance to me is every other sight, from you I depart, and go in search of him. Tirsi Oh, who deprives me of gazing, alas! at that serene beauty? Who separates me from my fair sun, and who takes her away and steals her from me? So, no longer must I gaze at her, who alone can make me delighted and happy? Aiee, how bitter and stinging to me, my soul, was your departure! O fleeing nymph, wait at least long enough for me as a goddess to adore you, since you disdain as a nymph to be loved.

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208 ISABELLA ANDREINI Or sì che con mio duol conosco e provo quanto sia grande l’amorosa forza; e non è cosa in terra, che non ceda ad Amore. 2500 Ma vo’ seguir colei ch’al suo partire s’ha portato con sé l’anima mia.

SCENA QUARTA Ardelia ninfa Ardelia Il caldo estivo e la fugace fiera
 m’ha fatta più del solito vermiglia; e le chiome, che prima erano asciutte, 2505 umide del sudor si son già fatte e aride le labra; onde fìa meglio ch’a questa fonte io mi rinfreschi alquanto. Ma che veggio? Che miro nel liquido cristallo? 2510 Leggiadra ninfa, anzi leggiadra dea, salvi la tua beltà mai sempre il cielo donde cred’io che scendi; i’ mi t’inchino co ‘l ginocchio e co ‘l core, e per mia dea t’accetto. 2515 Veggio pur che cortese al mio saluto o rispond’ella o di risponder mostra, e pur com’io move le labbra, e ‘l capo china al chinar del mio, ma l’armonia non sento 2520 de la sua voce; or vo’ tacere e mentre taccio concedi a me, cortese diva, ch’io senta le tue care, alme parole. Ohimè, s’io taccio ed ella tace, e s’io mostro d’aver desio ch’ella ragioni, 2525 anch’ella di bramar mostra il medesmo; ahimè, ch’io sento già ne l’alma acceso un focoso desio di possedere la celeste beltà ch’indarno io miro! O pura e chiara fonte, 2530 chi è costei che nel tuo sen soggiorna

Mirtilla 209 Now yes, to my sorrow I recognize and feel how great is love’s strength, and there is nothing on earth that does not give way to Love. But I shall follow her who at her departure carried away with her my soul.

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SCENE 4 The nymph Ardelia Ardelia125 The summer heat and the swiftly-fleeing beast have made me more flushed than usual, and my hair, which earlier was dry, 2505 humid from sweat has become, and arid my lips. So it would be better for me at this spring to refresh myself somewhat. But what do I see? What do I behold in the liquid crystal? 2510 Lovely nymph, or rather, lovely goddess, may your beauty be preserved forever by heaven, whence I believe you have descended. I bow to you with my knee and with my heart, and for my goddess I accept you. 2515 I see that courteously to my greeting she either responds or acts like she responds, and just like me she moves her lips, and her head she bows at the bowing of mine. But the harmony I do not hear 2520 of her voice. Now I shall be silent; and while I am silent, grant me, courteous goddess, to hear your dear, life-giving words. Ah me, if I am silent, she too is silent, and if I show my wish for her to speak, 2525 she too shows a desire for the same thing. Ah me, I feel already within my soul ignited a fiery desire to possess the celestial beauty that in vain I gaze at. O pure and clear spring, 2530 who is she who in your bosom sojourns,

210 ISABELLA ANDREINI da me non più veduta, che me stessa a me medesma ha tolta e m’ha rubata la cara libertà con cui solea girne sì altera e lieta? Onda tu sei 2535 nata per cagionar la morte mia, onde ben credo che l’origin hai da Flegetonte, poi che per tua colpa tutt’avvampar mi sento; ahi lassa, venni al fresco tuo per mitigar l’ardore 2540 de l’assetate labbra, ma tu sete più ardente m’hai posto in mezzo al core. Ma tu che in mezzo a l’acqua accendi il foco, non dispregiar la mia sincera fede 2545 e l’amor mio, poiché per farne acquisto mille amanti piangendo mi seguiro. Deh, vita mia, poiché non vuol natura che viver teco in cotest’onde io possa, vieni tu meco a dimorarti almeno; 2550 deh, giungi la tua mano a la mia mano con ch’io ti aiuterò perché tu ancora aiuti me, cor mio. Ella stende la mano, o me felice, or sì ch’io son contenta, 2555 vieni, vieni mia speme, o mio vano pensiero, amo un’ombra e un’ombra invan desio. O piagge, o colli, o boschi, o selve, o valli vedeste mai, udiste mai che ninfa 2560 provasse più di me dolente sorte? O dura acerba sorte, avvampo e ardo di me stessa e solo posseder bramo quel che più posseggo. O meraviglia, io sentirei men doglia 2565 se la bramata imago mi fusse più lontana, or come mai potrò, se ben ho meco il mio contento, accostar questa mia con la sua bocca? Quello che più desio vien sempre meco, 2570 né fuggir il potrei, se ben volessi. Ahimè che la mia pace

Mirtilla 211 by me never before seen? Who myself from myself has taken, and has stolen my dear liberty with which I was accustomed to go about so proud and happy? O water, you were born to cause my death. O water, indeed I believe your origin is in Phlegethon, since it’s your fault I feel myself blazing all over.126 Alas, I came to your coolness to mitigate the burning of my thirsty lips, but you a thirst even more ardent have placed in the middle of my heart. O you who in the middle of water ignite fire, do not despise my sincere faithfulness and my love, since to acquire them a thousand weeping lovers have pursued me. Come, my life, since nature does not allow me the ability to live with you amid these waves, come to dwell with me at least. Come, join your hand to my hand, with which I will help you so that you also might help me, my heart. She extends her hand, oh happy me! Now yes indeed, I am content. Come, come, my hope! Oh, I am mistaken! I love a shadow, and a shadow in vain I desire. O countryside, O hills, O woods, O forests, O valleys, did you ever see, did you ever hear of a nymph who experienced, more than mine, a sorrowful fate? Oh hard, bitter fate; I blaze and I burn for myself, and I wish only to possess what is most mine. What a marvel! I would feel less pain if the desired image were farther away from me. Now how ever can I, even though I have with me my beloved, bring mine near to her mouth? What I most desire comes always with me, nor could I flee it, even if I wanted to. Ah me, my peace

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212 ISABELLA ANDREINI mi fa continua guerra, e la soverchia copia mi fa d’ogni piacer provar inopia. 2575 Troppo a quest’occhi piaccion gli occhi miei, e ‘l proprio viso e ‘l proprio seno, e troppo ah finalmente a me medesma piaccio; o s’io vo’ far vendetta di chi m’offende, incrudelir conviemmi 2580 contra me sola. Oh sventurato amore! Occhi d’ogni mio mal vera cagione. calde e amare lagrime versate per giusta ammenda de l’ingiusto foco, che sol con la vostr’esca al cor s’accese, 2585 ahimè, ahimè che per maggior mia doglia, mentre piango il mio male, il pianto istesso è del mio mal ministro, poiché turbando l’acqua mi toglie di goder di me medesma. 2590 Voglio dunque partirmi per dar tempo a quest’onde che ritornino tranquille come prima, ond’io di nuovo possa goder di rimirar me stessa. Almen potessi in te lasciare, o fonte, 2595 ben fonte del mio mal tanto mio foco, sì come (ahi lassa) in te lo ritrovai: ohimè, che nel partire io porto meco incendio tal che l’onda ove egli nacque estinguer no ‘l potria; 2600 ma spero che sì come ho rinnovato di Narciso infelice il crudo scempio, così a guisa di lui debba fortuna dar fine al mio dolor con la mia morte. Fine del Quarto Atto

Mirtilla 213 wages on me continual war, and my overflowing abundance makes me feel of every pleasure starved. 2575 Too much do these eyes like my eyes, and my own face and my own breast, and too much (ah!) in the end, myself do I like. And if I want to take revenge on the one who offends me, I must commit cruelties 2580 against myself alone. Oh, unfortunate love! Eyes, of my every pain the true cause, pour out hot and bitter tears as just amends for the unjust fire which only with your tinder in my heart was kindled. 2585 Ah me, ah me! For my greater suffering, while I weep over my pain, the weeping itself increases my pain, since by disturbing the water it prevents me from enjoying myself 2590 I shall therefore depart, to give time to these waves to turn back tranquil like before, so that I again may enjoy gazing at myself. I wish I might in you leave behind—O spring, 2595 the very wellspring of my pain—my so great fire, just as (alas!) in you I found it. Ah me! In departing I carry with me such a conflagration that the water where it was born could not extinguish it. 2600 But I hope that just as I have renewed unhappy Narcissus’s cruel ruination, precisely in his fashion Fortune might put an end to my sorrow with my death.127 End of Act Four

Atto Quinto SCENA PRIMA Mirtilla ninfa e Tirsi pastore Mirtilla Dovresti ormai cessar di darmi noia poi ch’io non ho pensier che di te pensi, or datti pace, che più tosto voglio lasciar questa mia vita, s’è pur mia, che lasciar di seguire Uranio mio.

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Tirsi Tu forse d’esser mia ninfa mi neghi 2610 credendo che di boschi o di caverne abitator io sia? Ma tu t’inganni se questo credi; abitator son io di sì fecondo e fortunato loco e così amico al ciel che neve o ghiaccio 2615 mai non l’offende, e mai rabbiosi venti non gli fan guerra; aura benigna e dolce sol vi spira di zefiro, che vita porge a le piante, agli animali, a l’erbe sempre verdi e fiorite, e manda il colle 2620 odor soave, e più soave il piano di serpillo e di menta e di gigli e di croco e di viole, quivi sempre vedrai l’ape ingegnosa libar da i vaghi fiori 2625 le mattutine sue care dolcezze; quivi d’ogni stagion pendono i rami carchi di frutti e di bei fiori adorni; quivi sono d’argento e di puri cristalli i fiumi e i fonti; 2630 né tra i fior, né tra l’erbe si cela angue maligno, e non infettan le campagne e i prati di mortifero succo l’aconito o la cicuta; né pungenti ortiche 2635 lappole o pruni od altre erbe infelici 214

Act Five SCENE 1 The nymph Mirtilla and the shepherd Tirsi Mirtilla You should right away cease from annoying me, since I have no thought to give thought to you. Now resign yourself, for sooner do I wish to leave this life of mine, if it is yet mine, than to leave off following my Uranio.

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Tirsi Perhaps to be my nymph you refuse me, 2610 because you believe that in woods or in caves I dwell? But you are mistaken if this you believe. I dwell in so fertile and fortunate a place, and one so befriended by heaven, that snow and ice 2615 never offend it, and never do raging winds wage war against it. The benign and sweet breeze of Zephyr alone wafts there, who life offers to plants, to animals, to the herbs always green and flowering;128 and the hill sends 2620 a pleasant fragrance, and the plains an even pleasanter one of flowering thyme and mint and lilies and crocus and violets. There constantly you will see the ingenious bee taste the lovely flowers’ 2625 precious morning sweetness. There in every season the branches droop, loaded with fruit, and with beautiful flowers adorned. There are silvery and pure crystalline rivers and springs. 2630 Neither among the flowers nor amid the grass lurks any malign serpent. The countryside and meadows are not infested with the deadly juice of monkshood or hemlock.129 Not prickly nettles, 2635 not burrs, nor thorns nor other unwholesome herbs 215

216 ISABELLA ANDREINI sorgono tra i fecondi e lieti campi; quivi, bella Mirtilla, allor che ‘l sole è più cocente, ragionando meco o cantando o posando in grembo a l’erbe 2640 potrai startene a l’ombra e di bei fiori tesser ghirlanda a le tue chiome d’oro. Poscia nel vicin fonte mirar quanto sei bella; e io frattanto ne le tenere scorze 2645 de’ crescenti arbuscelli scriverò ‘l tuo bel nome e ‘l mio co ‘l tuo leggiadramente avvinto; e dirò lor: “Crescete, e creschino con voi gli amori nostri.” 2650 E poscia al suon d’una palustre canna canterò ‘l tuo bel viso e farò risuonar fin a le stelle la tua beltade e la mia lieta sorte. Eh piegati, Mirtilla, 2655 forse non sai quel che ti serbo in dono: una coppa di faggio, ove nel fondo vedrai sculto un gran monte che le stelle par che sostegna, e sopra l’alto dorso di lui starsi la luna 2660 in atto di lasciva e boscareccia ninfa che, lasciato in disparte il suo bel carro, co ‘l suo vezzoso Endimion si posa e con la bianca mano 2665 tonde a le pecorelle il folto manto, poi bacia il caro amico; evvi in disparte Pan ch’esce d’una selva ivi vicina e di sdegno avvampando a lei rivolto par che sciolga la lingua in questi accenti: 2670 “Ben del nome di diva indegna sei poi ch’un vil pastorel t’induce, ah rea, a dispregiar un dio così famoso! E ben veggio or che sei mutabile di cor come d’aspetto, 2675 perfida, e sol nel variar costante. E tu vedrai che l’arte

Mirtilla 217 sprout amid the fertile and delightful fields. There, beautiful Mirtilla, when the sun is most scorching, whether conversing with me or singing or lying in the lap of the grasses, 2640 you will be able to stay in the shade, and with beautiful flowers weave a garland for your golden hair. Then in the nearby spring you can gaze at how beautiful you are. And I meanwhile into the tender bark 2645 of the growing saplings will write your fair name, and mine with yours charmingly intertwined, and I will tell them, “Grow, and with you may our love grow.”130 2650 Then to the sound of a marshy cane I will sing of your fair face, and I will make resound all the way to the stars your beauty and my happy fate. Please relent, Mirtilla. 2655 Perhaps you don’t know what I hold in store for you as a gift: a bowl made of beech wood, where in the bottom you will see sculpted a great mountain that seems to uphold the stars, and upon its lofty crest is the moon 2660 portrayed as a lascivious and woodsy nymph who, having left aside her fair chariot, with her charming Endymion dallies; with her white hand 2665 she clips off the sheep’s dense mantle, then kisses her dear friend. There is, off to the side, Pan who comes forth from a forest nearby; blazing up with wrath and facing her, he seems to loose his tongue with these words: 2670 “Truly, of the name of goddess unworthy you are, since a lowly shepherd induces you (ah, cruel one!) to despise a god so famous. Indeed I see now that you are as changeable in your heart as in your aspect, 2675 131 perfidious woman, and only in always changing are you constant.” You will see that art

218 ISABELLA ANDREINI ha formate sì ben queste figure, che la vista non sol resta ingannata, ma vi s’inganna ancor l’udito, al quale sembra quasi d’udir quel che non ode: e ti giuro, mia vita, che per questa mi volse dare Alcon già due vitelli, che non aveano ancor giogo sentito.

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Mirtilla Non sarà vero mai 2685 che in me possono i doni quel che ragion non vuole che possino d’amante i caldi preghi; che con amore il vero amor si compra e non con doni; ti ringrazio adunque 2690 e ti prego per Dio che ormai tu lasci cotesta tua sì vana e pazza impresa. E se meglio aggradire mi vuoi, partiti ormai. Tirsi Voglio del tuo voler far a me stesso severissima legge e partir voglio, e vo’ lasciar l’impresa; ma vo’ con quella anco lasciar la vita: resta, crudel, più che le fiere fiera. Mirtilla Può esser ch’ei se ‘n vada disposto a far di sé quel che minaccia? Purtroppo sarà vero; e tu comporterai d’esser altrui di volontaria morte cagion Mirtilla? Sei sì cruda? Ahi mira quel che tu fai! Ma forse egli s’infinge; può esser, ma no ‘l credo, né so perché non ‘l creda, ma no ‘l credo, e me ne vien pietade, misero, e vo’ seguirlo e, s’esser puote, lui trar da cruda morte e me d’infamia.

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Mirtilla 219 has formed so well these figures that not only one’s sight is deceived, but it deceives also one’s hearing, so that one seems almost to hear what one does not hear. And I swear to you, my life, that in exchange for this, Alcon once wished to give me two calves132 which had not yet felt the yoke.

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Mirtilla It will never be true 2685 that over me gifts might have the power to achieve what my reason will not allow to be achieved by a lover’s passionate entreaties. With love true love is bought, and not with gifts. I thank you therefore, 2690 and I beseech you in God’s name to finally leave off this so futile and mad enterprise of yours. And if you wish to please me better, go away now. Tirsi I shall of your will make for myself an inflexible law; I’ll depart, and I’ll leave off this enterprise. But I shall at the same time leave my life. Goodbye, cruel one, fiercer than wild beasts. Mirtilla Can it be that he’s going off, disposed to do to himself what he threatens? Unfortunately it must be true. And shall you accept being of another’s voluntary death the cause, Mirtilla? Are you so cruel? Aiee, look at what you’re doing! But perhaps he is pretending. Maybe, but I don’t believe it. I don’t know why I don’t believe it, but I don’t believe it. I feel pity for him, in his misery. I will follow him and, if possible, draw him back from bitter death and myself from infamy.

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220 ISABELLA ANDREINI SCENA SECONDA Igilio pastore Igilio Né d’acqua il vasto mar, né di rugiada la stridula cicala, né di timo la sussurrante pecchia, né di citiso l’avida capretta, 2715 né ‘l crudo Amor di lagrime si sazia. Crud’Amor, ben vegg’io che ‘l fin dolente brami de la mia vita, poiché Filli bella, ond’io mi vivo, fai sì dura al mio pianto, e sì sdegnosa 2720 rendi, e sì sorda a le dolenti note. Darò dunque morendo fin al mio mal, che non ha fin vivendo? Tu ferro che scrivesti sì spesso il nome di colei che adoro 2725 e la mia pura fé seco notasti in queste verdi piante in cui crescendo, cresciuta è con l’amor la pena mia, oggi nel seno mio sarai nascosto. Dunque senza timore, ardita mano, 2730 ferisci ove ferì crudel Amore: sciogli quest’alma ormai dal più dolente corpo che la natura unqua formasse; ma pria che gli occhi al sonno eterno i’ chiuda vo’ col medesmo ferro 2735 scritto lasciar in questa verde pianta de la mia vita il miserabil fine, acciò che d’una in altra lingua errando e d’una in altra orecchia, venga a notizia de la mia crudele 2740 ed empia Filli. Ah, perché mia la chiamo poi che non vuol Amor ch’ella sia mia? E se per queste selve tanto vivrà de la mia morte il grido, ch’ella l’intenda, i’ non ho dubbio alcuno 2745 che morte non impetri da’ begli occhi qualche cortese lagrimetta o qualche

Mirtilla 221 SCENE 2 The shepherd Igilio Igilio Neither with water the vast sea, nor with dew the screeching cicada, nor with thyme the buzzing bee, nor with cytisus133 the avid nanny goat, 2715 nor cruel Love with tears can be sated. Cruel Love, well do I see that of my life you desire the sorrowful end, since beautiful Filli, for whom I live, you make so rigid in the face of my weeping, and so disdainful 2720 you make her, and so deaf to my sorrowful words. I shall make therefore by dying an end to my pain, which has no end while living. You, O knife, who wrote so many times the name of her whom I adore, 2725 and my pure faithfulness with it you noted in these green trees in which, as they have grown, along with my love has grown also my pain, today in my breast you will be hidden. Therefore fearlessly, bold hand, 2730 strike where cruel Love struck. Release this soul at last from the most sorrowful body that nature ever formed. But before my eyes with eternal sleep I close, I intend with the selfsame knife 2735 to leave written in this green tree my life’s wretched end, so that from one to another tongue passing, and from one to another ear, the news might come to my cruel 2740 and wicked Filli. Ah, why “mine” do I call her? Since Love does not intend for her to be mine. And if through these forests long enough shall word of my death last that she hears of it, I have no doubt at all 2745 that my death will entreat from her beautiful eyes some courteous teardrop or some

222 ISABELLA ANDREINI caldo sospir che fu negato in vita. Avventurosa morte, poiché tu sola avrai 2750 quel che mia viva fé non ebbe mai.

SCENA TERZA Filli ninfa e Igilio pastore Filli Or non è quello Igilio? Egli è pur desso. Che vorrà far di quel coltello ignudo? Udir il voglio attentamente e insieme osservar quel che d’esseguir dispone.

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Igilio Aria, ciel, terra e acqua e voi lampade eterne del giorno e de la notte, siate benigni a questa verde pianta, acciò che nel suo tronco eternamente 2760 gli ultimi accenti miei restino impressi. E voi, versi dolenti, s’alcun cortese peregrin bramasse saper il duro fin de la mia vita, così fatel palese: 2765 QUI GIACE IL FIDO IGILIO che Filli amando ebbe sì dura sorte che per lei corse a volontaria morte. Filli O parole che i sassi potrebbono ammollire. 2770 Igilio Intorno al primo ufficio, ardita destra, hai fatto ciò che far doveasi; adempi ora il secondo estremo crudelissimo ufficio in un pietoso e dispietato ufficio.

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Mirtilla 223 warm sigh that was denied in life. A lucky death, since you alone will have 2750 what my living fidelity never had.

SCENE 3 The nymph Filli and the shepherd Igilio Filli Now isn’t that Igilio? It is indeed. What can he mean to do with that unsheathed knife? I shall listen attentively to him, and at the same time observe what he is disposed to accomplish. Igilio Air, sky, earth, and water, and you eternal lamps of the day and the night, be benign to this green plant, so that in its trunk eternally my final words might stay engraved. And you, sorrowful verses, if any courteous traveler should wish to know of the hard end of my life, in this way make it plain: HERE LIES THE FAITHFUL IGILIO who in loving Filli had so hard a fate that on account of her he rushed to a voluntary death.134

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Filli Oh words that could soften stones! 2770 Igilio As to the first task, bold right hand, you have done what had to be done. Carry out now the second, extreme, most cruel task, at the same time a pitiful and a pitiless task.

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224 ISABELLA ANDREINI Filli Ferma Igilio, non fare. Igilio

Ahi, chi mi tiene?

Filli Son io, non mi conosci? Igilio Ah dispietata, tu vuoi ch’io viva per farmi morire di doppia morte in vita? Filli Per darti non la morte ma la vita, lieta, come tu brami, m’ha qui condotta Amore, sarei ben di macigno se veduta di te sì salda prova i’ non volessi cangiar pensiero e voglia; io mi ti dono, togliendomi a colui che indegnamente mi tenne un tempo in duri lacci avvolta. Igilio Occhi miei, che vedete? Orecchie mie, che udite? Son io desto, o pur è questo un sogno? Filli S’agli occhi tuoi non credi e a le orecchie, almen credi a le mani che sì stretta mi tengono, che mai sì strettamente alcuna pianta l’edera non cinse; a te che sei tutto il mio bene, Igilio, io, che son Filli tua, venuta sono per farti a pien de l’amor mio contento. Igilio O giorno più d’ogn’altro per me felice, o fortunato giorno,

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Mirtilla 225 Filli Stop, Igilio, don’t do it! Igilio

Aiee, who holds me back?

Filli It is I, don’t you recognize me? Igilio Ah, pitiless woman, you want me to live, to make me die a double death in life? Filli To give you not death, but a life that’s happy, as you desire, I have been led here by Love. I would have to be hard as a boulder if, having seen your so-solid proof, I didn’t wish to change my mind and my feelings. Myself to you I give, wresting myself from the man who unworthily held me, for a time, painfully ensnared. Igilio O my eyes, what do you see? My ears, what do you hear? Am I awake, or rather is this a dream? Filli If your own eyes you don’t believe, and your ears, at least believe your hands that so tightly are holding me; never so tightly any tree did ivy clasp. To you who are all my joy, Igilio, I, your Filli, have come to make you with my love fully content. Igilio Oh my happiest day ever, oh lucky day,

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226 ISABELLA ANDREINI poiché in un punto oggi due vite acquisto; ma vita mia (se mia pur dir mi lice) dopo tante fatiche e tanti affanni per te sofferti, dammi segno più saldo e certo de la novella tua fiamma amorosa.

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Filli Or poi che l’alma mia che ne la sommità di questa lingua venuta teco parla, non ti può far de la mia fede fede, eccoti la mia mano 2810 per più sicuro pegno. Igilio O bella e bianca mano, ben mi trai da l’abisso e poni in cielo: or pur ti tengo e dolcemente stringo; ma vientene, cor mio, ch’a i miei compagni vo’ palesar le mie liete venture, quanto sperate men, tanto più care.

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Filli Andiam dove ti piace.

SCENA QUARTA Uranio pastore Uranio Da chi mi segue, Amor, fuggir mi fai e seguir chi mi fugge. 2820 Dura legge d’Amore, s’è pur legge d’Amor l’esser crudele; ma ecco quella che co’ suoi begl’occhi di questi ha fatto un fonte e del mio petto una fascina ardente. 2825 Vo’ qui pormi in agguato per udire Ciò ch’ella dice, e s’è pentita ancora D’usarmi crudeltade.

Mirtilla 227 since in one moment today two lives I acquire! But, my life (if to say “my” is indeed permitted me), after so many efforts and so much grief I’ve suffered for you, give me a sign more solid and certain of your new flame of love.

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Filli Now since my soul, which to the tip of this tongue came to speak with you, cannot satisfactorily to my fidelity bear witness, here is my hand 2810 for a surer pledge. Igilio O beautiful white hand, truly you draw me from the abyss and place me in the heavens. Now indeed I hold you and gently squeeze. But come away, my heart, for to my friends I wish to make plain my good fortune— the less hoped-for, the more dear.

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Filli Let us go where you like.

SCENE 4 The shepherd Uranio Uranio From the ones who follow me, Love, you make me flee, and follow the one who flees me. Harsh law of Love, if indeed it is Love’s law to be cruel. But here is the woman who with her beautiful eyes of my eyes has made a fountain, and of my breast a blazing forge. Here I shall lie in wait to hear what she says, and whether she repents yet for treating me cruelly.

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228 ISABELLA ANDREINI SCENA QUINTA Ardelia ninfa, Uranio pastore Ardelia Pur son astretta di tornar qui dove perdei me stessa, o cruda fonte, o sola cagion de’ dolor miei, non ti dispiaccia ch’affissando gl’occhi nel tuo tranquillo seno io goda alquanto di mirar me medesma, e se turbassi la tua tranquillità co ‘l pianto mio, scusimi appresso a te l’altro desire che di goder me stessa il cor mi punge.

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Uranio So pur ch’io non m’inganno, questa è pure la dispietata Ardelia che si strugge di se medesma. O strana meraviglia, 2840 o degna pena di beltà superba, o d’Amor incredibile possanza! Voglio accostarmi a lei sol per udire s’ella ha imparato ancora a mostrarsi men cruda. 2845 Ecco, Ardelia superba e dispietata, tu provi pur ne le tue pene ormai quali sien le mie pene e quali sien del grand’Amor le forze. Ardelia Conoscol troppo, e ‘l mio fallir confesso, e ben posso far fede ad ogni gente del sommo suo potere; ma se far mi voleva a un tempo amante divenir ed amata, ei pur dovea amante farmi de l’amante mio e non di me medesma; poi ch’altrui sì poco e nulla a me giovar poss’io me stessa amando.

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Mirtilla 229 SCENE 5 The nymph Ardelia, the shepherd Uranio Ardelia [enters, unaware of Uranio’s presence] I am constrained to return here where I lost myself, O cruel spring, the only cause of my sorrows. May it not displease you that, in fixing my eyes upon your tranquil surface, I enjoy somewhat gazing at myself. If I should disturb your tranquility with my weeping, let my excuse to you be the keen desire that to enjoy myself pricks my heart.

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Uranio [aside] I know I am not deceived. This is indeed the pitiless Ardelia who is pining away for herself. Oh strange marvel, 2840 oh worthy penalty for haughty beauty, oh Love’s incredible power! I shall approach her only to hear if she has learned yet to show herself less cruel. 2845 [to Ardelia] Lo, Ardelia proud and pitiless, you feel indeed in your pains now how strong are my pains, and how strong is great Love’s power. Ardelia I know it all too well, and my fault I confess. Truly I can bear witness before all people as to his supreme power. But if he intended to make me at the same time a lover and a beloved, he should have made me a lover of my lover and not of myself, since to others so little and to myself not at all can I do good by loving myself.

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230 ISABELLA ANDREINI Uranio Questo è del tuo fallo degno castigo; ma se vuoi godere di te medesma, ama il tuo fido Uranio; 2860 però che essendo ei per virtù d’Amore in te cangiato, vita mia, ne segue che me godendo, goderai te stessa; così le tue fatiche e l’amor tuo non fia gettato al vento. 2865 E poiché tu conosci l’error tuo, fanne debita ammenda, se non vuoi che ‘l ciel teco si sdegni. Si può, quando si vuole, sgravarsi d’ogni colpa, e chi no ‘l face 2870 chiede di se medesmo a i sommi dei vendetta: piglia adunque il mio consiglio, non aspettar che le dorate chiome si faccino d’argento, e che la fronte, ch’ora si mostra spaziosa e vaga, 2875 rugosa venghi; e la pulita guancia ove ‘l latte contende e ‘l sangue misto s’increspi e si scolori; e che l’avorio che chiudi in bocca il suo candor disperga; e le purpuree rose de’ tuoi labri 2880 pallidette viole (ohimè) diventino: non aspettar, Ardelia, che l’orribile e inferma vecchiezza a te ne venga; non voler, vita mia, di tua beltade spendere inutilmente i giorni e l’ore 2885 ché se tu aspetti che ‘l rapace tempo adopri contro a te le forze sue, ben ti potrai pentir del tuo fallire, ma già rimediarvi non potrai e pentita dirai: 2890 “Perché a l’animo saggio non ritorna la forza e al corpo la bellezza e gli anni floridi e freschi? Perché a me non torna quell’età ch’assai può, ma vede poco?” Ma le parole e i tuoi desir sariano 2895 sparsi per l’aria; e non è cosa nuova, ch’il pentirsi da sezzo nulla giova,

Mirtilla 231 Uranio This is for your fault a worthy punishment. But if you wish to enjoy yourself, love your faithful Uranio. Since he through the power of Love has been changed into you, O my life, it follows that in enjoying me, you will enjoy yourself. In this way your efforts and your love will not be thrown to the winds. Since you recognize your error, make for it proper amends, if you don’t want to rouse against you heaven’s wrath. One can, when one wishes, be relieved of every guilt, and whoever doesn’t do it, upon his own head asks the highest gods to take vengeance. Take therefore my advice. Don’t wait for your golden locks to turn silver, for your forehead (which now is broad and charming) to wrinkle, and your polished cheek (where milkiness contends with the blood immixed) to roughen and discolor, for the ivory enclosed in your mouth to lose its whiteness, for the deep red roses of your lips to become (ah me!) pallid violets. Don’t wait, Ardelia, till horrible and infirm old age comes to you. Don’t, my life, spend uselessly your beauty’s days and hours, for if you wait for rapacious time to employ against you its forces, you will surely repent of your failure. But then to remedy it you won’t be able, and repentantly you will say, “Why to my spirit, now grown wise, won’t strength return, and to my body its beauty and those years florid and youthful? Why to me won’t that age return, that is capable of much but sees little?” But your words and your wishes would be scattered in the air. And it’s not a new thing, for repenting at the last moment does no good,135

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232 ISABELLA ANDREINI e de gli accorgimenti vani e tardi si ride Giove; e tanto si disdice l’esser serva d’Amor ne la vecchiezza, quanto nemica ne la giovinezza. Ardelia I tuoi saggi consigli possano tanto in me ch’io mi dispongo di mutar voglia pria ch’io muti volto. Ora mi toglio al falso e al ver mi dono: amare il corpo voglio e non più l’ombra: Uranio a te mi dono e mi consacro e voglio viver tua e tua morire. Uranio Ben mostri a questo punto d’esser donna, poi ch’improvviso ti sei consigliata di farmi tuo interamente; e certo che il bel femineo sesso tra molti e molti doni, che ‘l cielo e la natura gli concesse possiede anco il consiglio tanto più saggio quanto men pensato. O cara Ardelia mia, pur m’è concesso averti per mia sposa! Grazie vi rendo, o sacre amiche stelle, o fonte che sorgendo scaturisti con l’onde tue la mia dolce salute, prego il ciel che ti doni in ricompensa di tanto mio contento che giamai torbida non divenghi, e se non fusse, che ministra d’Amor sei stata e duce, pregherei Giove che la dea triforme in te per l’avvenir lavasse sempre le delicate sue pregiate membra; ma sdegnerebbe forse la sorella del sol lavarsi in te, che la più bella ninfa che la seguisse le hai levata. Ardelia No, no, non sdegna Cinzia alcuna cosa che gli levi le ninfe, ancor che care

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Mirtilla 233 and Jove mocks those vain and belated realizations. To the same extent it is unbecoming to be Love’s maidservant in old age, as to be his enemy in one’s youth. Ardelia Your wise advice has so much power over me that I am disposed to change my mind before I change my face. Now I take myself from the false, and to the true I give myself. Love the body I will, and no longer the shadow. Uranio, to you I give and consecrate myself; I want to live as yours, and as yours to die. Uranio You show clearly in this moment that you are a woman, since all of a sudden you have resolved to make me yours entirely. And certainly the fair feminine sex, among many, many gifts that heaven and nature have granted it, possesses also judgment so much the wiser when less thought-out. O my dear Ardelia, to think it is granted me to have you for my wife! Thanks I give you, O sacred, friendly stars. O fount, which in springing forth poured out along with your waves my sweet salvation, I pray heaven to grant you, in recompense for my great happiness, never to become turbid. And except that for Love a minister you have been, and a guide, I would pray to Jove that the triform goddess136 in you in future would wash always her delicate and precious limbs. But perhaps in you the sun’s sister would disdain to wash herself, since the most beautiful nymph who followed her, you have taken from her. Ardelia No, no, Cynthia does not disdain anything that takes away her nymphs, even though dear

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234 ISABELLA ANDREINI le tenga, pur che a fine onesto e giusto condotte sien; non abborrisce Amore quando per accoppiarle in matrimonio l’infiamma di pastor leggiadro e bello; anzi ch’ella ne gode, conoscendo che se d’onesto e maritale amore fosser prive le ninfe, ella sarebbe priva di servitude: e nulla è regno senz’aver serve, come a lei siam noi.

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Uranio Rallegromi d’udir novella tale, poiché questo bel fonte, se non avrà quel ben ch’io gli desio, 2945 almen non fia da lei per odio guasto. E noi lieti e sicuri goderemo vita lieta e felice; ma vieni ormai a la capanna mia, anzi a la tua, dove vedrai dintorno 2950 il tuo bel nome scritto e la mia doglia e anco vederai diverse cose ch’io fabricai per te quando sprezzandomi nulla accettar volesti, e ora voglio che con la bella man le pigli e anco 2955 che con lo schietto dito tu cancelli quelle meste parole che già furo del mio grave dolor segno verace: e che invece di quelle tu vi scriva queste brevi parole: 2960 Uranio fu degl’altri il più infelice, e or, la mia mercede, è il più felice. Ardelia Farò quello che vuoi; andiamo ormai. Uranio Andiamo, idolo mio.

Mirtilla 235 she holds them, provided that to an end honest and just they are conducted. She abhors not Love, when to pair them in matrimony he enflames them for a shepherd graceful and handsome. Rather, she is pleased about it, knowing that if of honest marital love the nymphs were deprived, she would be deprived of servants, and no good is a kingdom without having servants, such as we are for her.

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Uranio I rejoice at hearing such news, since this fair spring, if it doesn’t receive the good that I wish, 2945 at least by her hate it won’t be ruined. And we, delighted and secure, will enjoy a life joyful and happy. But come now to my hut— rather, to yours—where you will see all round 2950 your fair name written, and my sorrow. Furthermore, you will see diverse things that I fashioned for you when, disdaining me, you would accept nothing. Now I want you to take them with your beautiful hand, and also 2955 with your honest fingers to erase those sorrowful words that formerly were of my grave sadness a truthful sign. In their stead I want you to write there these brief words: 2960 Uranio was of all men the unhappiest; and now, thanks to me, he is the happiest. Ardelia I shall do what you want. Let’s go now. Uranio Let’s go, my idol.

236 ISABELLA ANDREINI SCENA SESTA Tirsi pastore, Mirtilla ninfa Tirsi Se ben di sdegno armata ho pur di nuovo 2965 la mia dolce nemica ritrovata, non però scema il mio desire ardente; anzi, che quanto più vietar mi veggio l’amata vista sua, tanto più sento crescere in me la pertinace voglia. 2970 Né per repulso si rallenta il nodo onde mi stringe Amore e mi tormenta; ma come mai potrò senza il bel lume de l’una e l’altra viver, s’io altra vita non provo? 2975 Ahi, che privo di lei, son di me privo, e tal mi tiene Amore, acciò che senza fine sien le gravi mie pene. Vorrò dunque patir di sostenere 2980 vita peggior che morte? Ah, non fia vero! Fuggi, fuggi, cor mio, quelle luci crudeli onde t’uccide Amore, Amor che cerca di novelle spoglie 2985 far sempre adorno il tuo infiammato carro; fuggite occhi dolenti l’aria omicida di quel viso ch’io per mia sventura vidi. Passi, che sparsi foste nel seguire 2990 la fugace Mirtilla, conducete me misero e dolente sopra ‘l più alto monte che qui in Arcadia sia, acciò precipitando 2995 ponga fine al mio duolo con un tormento solo, benché non è d’alcun tormento morte ad uomo travagliato, ma più tosto fine d’ogni travaglio; me ‘n vo adunque 3000

Mirtilla 237 SCENE 6 The shepherd Tirsi and the nymph Mirtilla Tirsi [unaware of Mirtilla’s presence] Although I have yet again found 2965 my sweet enemy armed with disdain, not for this does my ardent desire decrease. Rather, the more forbidden to me I see the beloved sight of her, the more I feel growing in me the pertinacious yearning. 2970 Nor for repulses does the knot relent, with which Love binds me and torments me. But how ever can I live without the fair light of both her eyes, if no other life do I experience? 2975 Aiee! Deprived of her, I am of myself deprived, and in this condition I am kept by Love so that endless will be my severe pains. Shall I really tolerate leading 2980 a life worse than death? Ah, let it not be true! Flee, flee, my heart, those cruel eyes by means of which Love kills you, Love who seeks with new trophies 2985 always to adorn his flaming chariot.137 Flee, sorrowful eyes, the murderous air of that face that I to my misfortune have seen. You footsteps which went far and wide behind 2990 the fleeing Mirtilla, lead me, wretched and sorrowful, atop the highest mountain that’s here in Arcadia, so that by plunging down 2995 I might set an end to my grief with one torment alone— although no torment is death to a suffering man, but rather the end of every travail. I shall set out therefore 3000

238 ISABELLA ANDREINI a finir la mia vita acerba e dura poi ch’Amore e Mirtilla braman la morte mia. Mirtilla Chi cerca di morire per fuggire le miserie 3005 che seco il mondo apporta d’ogni viltade è pieno. Non sai che tempo, amor, fede e fermezza non fanno vana mai l’altrui speranza? Ho sentito, mio Tirsi, tutto quello 3010 che per troppo dolor dicevi e come diffidando d’Amor e di Mirtilla volevi darti con il precipizio indegna morte, ma se pur tu vuoi precipitarti, io voglio 3015 che questo seno mio sia il precipizio. Tirsi Quando avessi scoperto che ‘l mio amore se non ti fusse stato caro, almeno non ti fusse spiaciuto, allor sarei degno d’esser codardo e vil chiamato, 3020 se per non sofferir qualche tormento avessi di morir determinato; ma ‘l saper fermamente che tu seguivi Uranio e l’intenderlo ancor da la tua lingua, 3025 e l’aver conosciuto anco per prova che Amor de l’ardir mio s’era sdegnato fur cagion ch’io sprezzando questa vita mi volea dar la morte; ma s’io volea morire 3030 per la tua crudeltade, è giusto ancora che per la tua pietade io viva e spiri: e ben son lieto e fortunato in terra poscia che la mia guerra è qui finita. Cortese Amore e pio 3035 grazie ti rendo poi che non vuoi far di me più lungo strazio.

Mirtilla 239 to end my hard, bitter life, since Love and Mirtilla wish for my death. Mirtilla Whoever seeks to die in order to flee the miseries that with it the world brings, with base cowardice he is filled. Don’t you know that time, love, faith, and constancy never thwart people’s hope? I have heard, my Tirsi, everything that for excessive sorrow you were saying, and how, distrusting Love and Mirtilla, you intended to give yourself with a plunge an unworthy death. But if truly you intend to make the plunge, I want this bosom of mine to be the precipice. Tirsi If I discovered that my love was not precious to you, if at least it didn’t displease you, then I would be worthy of being called a vile coward, if, in order not to suffer any torment, I decided to die. But knowing with certainty that you followed Uranio, and hearing it from your very lips, and realizing furthermore through experience that Love at my boldness had grown wrathful— these caused me, disdaining this life, to wish to give myself death. But if I wished to die because of your cruelty, it is just, then, that through your pity I live and breathe. And indeed I am delighted and fortunate on the earth, since my war is herewith ended. Courteous Love, and compassionate, thanks I give you since you will no longer torment me.

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240 ISABELLA ANDREINI O mia bella Mirtilla pur sei contenta al fine d’aggradir la mia fede e d’esser mia.

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Mirtilla Tirsi, vivi sicuro, ch’io non sarò mai d’altro, ma sono e sarò tua mentre ch’io viva. Tirsi O felice d’amor stretto legame, che così presto indissolubilmente 3045 hai legate di noi le miglior parti: ma chi son questi che ver noi ne vengono pieni di gioia e festa? Uranio, Ardelia, Igilio e Filli sono, o belle coppie, v’è Coridone ancor, or dove vanno? 3050

SCENA SETTIMA Uranio, Tirsi, Igilio e Coridone pastori Ardelia, Filli e Mirtilla ninfe Uranio Il Ciel ti salvi, Tirsi. Tirsi Il benvenuto, Uranio, u’ vai con sì leggiadra schiera? Uranio Di comune consenso venuti siamo al tempio di Ciprigna, poi che la sua mercede e del suo figlio 3055 contenti e lieti siamo, e perché Amor non brama altra vittima od altro sacrifizio che quel de’ nostri cori, lasciando gl’altri onori 3060 a la sua bella madre,

Mirtilla 241 O my beautiful Mirtilla, truly you are content in the end to appreciate my fidelity and be mine?

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Mirtilla Tirsi, be sure that I shall never be another’s, but I am and shall be yours as long as I live. Tirsi Oh love’s happy, tight bond, that so quickly, indissolubly 3045 has bound our better parts! But who are these people who toward us come, joyful and festive? They are Uranio, Ardelia, Igilio, and Filli. What fine couples! There’s Coridone as well. Now where are they going? 3050

SCENE 7 The shepherds Uranio, Tirsi, Igilio, and Coridone; the nymphs Ardelia, Filli, and Mirtilla Uranio May heaven preserve you, Tirsi. Tirsi Welcome, Uranio. Where do you go with so fair a group? Uranio By common consensus we have come to the temple of the Cyprian138 since, thanks to her and her son, 3055 happy and joyful we are. Because Love does not desire another victim or another sacrifice than that of our hearts, and leaves other honors 3060 to his beautiful mother,

242 ISABELLA ANDREINI a lei farem dovuto sacrifizio, e ringraziando lei, ringraziaremo il suo vezzoso figlio, e tu che sei di lui nuovo seguace, se ‘l ver di te risuona, comincia ad adorarlo.

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Tirsi Per certo voglio farlo, e saggiamente ragioni, che onorando il figlio anco s’onora 3070 il padre, e così ancora onorando la madre il figlio onorasi; ond’io seguendo il tuo consiglio voglio render grazie a la dea del terzo cielo, poi che la sua mercede, 3075 rimasto son contento e fortunato. Comincia Uranio e noi poi seguiremo; ma ecco appunto Gorgo che a noi viene carco di vettovaglia, vorrà forse anch’ei lodare Amore. 3080

SCENA OTTAVA Gorgo, Uranio, Tirsi, Igilio, Coridone pastori Ardelia, Mirtilla, Filli ninfe Gorgo Or vedi, or vedi Che Damon potrà stare ad aspettarmi, son ito a la capanna e ho trovato appunto Alfesibeo che un buon capretto e sì grosso arrostiva, che stato son di prelibarne astretto cento soli bocconi e ho bevuto sì ragionevolmente ch’io mi sono addormentato alquanto, e credo che Damone dee morirsi di fame il poverello; io vo’ gire a trovarlo.

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Mirtilla 243 to her we will make a well-deserved sacrifice. In thanking her, we will thank her charming son. And you who are his new follower (if there’s truth in recent reports), begin to worship him.

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Tirsi Most certainly I intend to do so, and wisely you reason, for in honoring the son jointly one honors 3070 the father, and likewise in honoring the mother the son is honored. Hence I’ll follow your advice; I intend to give thanks to the goddess of the third heaven since, thanks to her, 3075 I have turned out happy and fortunate. Begin, Uranio, and we afterwards will follow. But here is Gorgo, who toward us comes, loaded down with provisions. Can he too, perhaps, wish to praise Love? 3080

SCENE 8 The shepherds Gorgo, Uranio, Tirsi, Igilio, and Coridone; the nymphs Ardelia, Mirtilla, and Filli Gorgo Now look, now look; Damon must be waiting for me. I went to the hut and I found Alfesibeo himself, who a goodly kid was roasting, and so fat that I was constrained to savor only a hundred mouthfuls of it; and I drank so reasonably that I fell asleep a while; and I believe that Damon must be dying of hunger, poor fellow. I shall go find him.

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244 ISABELLA ANDREINI O che bella brigata, addio pastori, addio ninfette! Filli Fermati balordo. Gorgo Perché mi ingiuri tu salvaticaccia? Tocco pur le mie capre, e pur anch’esse 3095 vagliono qualche cosa; volger mi voglio a queste che hanno viso d’esser sì mansuete come son le mie pecore. O bellone, lasciate ch’io vi tocchi, o che manine 3100 pastose come lana, io vi prometto che s’io stessi tra voi andareste a ventura di farmi innamorare, e, se per vostra sorte mi piaceste, 3105 vi vorrei presentare caprettini sì belli e sì lascivi come voi siete, agnelli così bianchi come le vostre mani, uva sì dolce come le vostre labbra, 3110 vitelle così morbide e sì grasse come appunto voi sete ghiotterelle. Mirtilla Infin bisogna sempre che ‘l tuo detto si risolva in mangiare. Gorgo E ben, che te ne pare, non mi governo saviamente? Mirtilla Certo, che secondo il tuo gusto ti governi da savio.

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Mirtilla 245 Oh, what a fair company! God be with you, shepherds, God be with you, young nymphs. Filli Stop, fool! Gorgo Why do you insult me, you wild woman? I touch only my goats, and yet these too 3095 are worth something. [aside] I wish to address these women who from their countenance seem as gentle as my sheep. [to Ardelia, Mirtilla and Filli] O you fetching girls, let me touch you. Oh what little hands, 3100 as soft as wool! I promise you that if I stayed among you it would be your fortune to make me fall in love. And if it were your fate to please me, 3105 to you I would present little kids as fair and as tender as you are, lambs as white as your hands, grapes as sweet as your lips, 3110 heifers as soft and as plump precisely as you are, you dainties. Mirtilla In short, always your speech ends up about eating. Gorgo And so? What do you think, don’t I govern myself wisely? Mirtilla Certainly, according to your taste you govern yourself as a wise man.

3115

246 ISABELLA ANDREINI Ardelia a costui più. Gorgo

Orsù Mirtilla non guardare

Perché non son io bello?

Uranio Gorgo volgiti, ascolta quel ch’io dico.

3120

Gorgo Di’ pure ch’io t’ascolto. Uranio Noi di comune accordo render grazie vogliamo a l’alma dea d’amore, sì che sta cheto, e se non ti piace d’onorar questa dea, noi te ne avremo obligo grande, oltre che farai il tuo dovere.

3125

Gorgo Or via me ne contento; ma cominciate voi, perché seguire e imitar vi possa. Uranio Or dunque ascolta, 3130 ch’io do principio a quanto si conviene, poscia che siamo al tempio de la dea queste purpuree rose chiaro e verace segno de le cocenti tue voglie amorose, 3135 o bella dea di Gnido, da l’amato lor nido tolsi stamane, e riverente e umile a te consacro; or non aver a vile il lieve don, ma con benigno core 3140 prendilo per mio amore.

Mirtilla 247 Ardelia Come on, Mirtilla, don’t look at this fellow any longer. Gorgo

Why, am I not handsome?

Uranio Gorgo, look here; listen to what I say.

3120

Gorgo Say on, for I’m listening. Uranio In common accord, to give thanks we intend to the bountiful goddess of love, so be quiet. And if with us you’d like to honor this goddess, we to you will be greatly obliged, and furthermore you will do your duty.

3125

Gorgo Now go ahead, I’d be happy to. But all of you begin, so that I may follow and imitate you. Uranio Now then, listen, 3130 for I shall be first to do what is fitting, since we are at the temple of the goddess. These deep red roses, a clear and truthful sign of your burning amorous desires, 3135 O beautiful goddess of Cnidus,139 from their beloved nest I took this morning and, reverently and humbly, to you I consecrate them. Now, do not disdain my small gift, but with a benign heart 3140 take it for love of me.

248 ISABELLA ANDREINI Ardelia Questa di vaghi fior vaga corona Ardelia umil ti dona, madre d’Amore e dea del terzo cielo, poiché con divo zelo 3145 hai posto fine a le sue fiere voglie facendola d’Uranio amata moglie. Igilio Questa verde mortella a te, Venere bella, lieto consacro, poiché per me tutti morti sono i martiri, le lagrime e i sospiri che furon già de la mia vita i frutti; prendila dunque ormai in testimon de’ miei passati guai.

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Filli Questa pura colomba sì cara a te (se ’l ver tra noi rimbomba) con puro affetto e pio qui ti consacro anch’io. Tirsi Questo sanguigno fiore, 3160 che languendo si muore e del tuo bello Adon l’imago asconde, prendi tra queste fronde, o vaga Citerea, più bella assai d’ogni celeste dea. 3165 Mirtilla Questo candido e schietto velo, benigna diva, da cui sempre deriva ogni gioia e diletto, a te dono per segno di mia fede candida sì ch’ogni candore eccede.

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Mirtilla 249 Ardelia Of varied flowers this lovely crown humble Ardelia gives you, O mother of Love and goddess of the third heaven, since with divine zeal 3145 you have put an end to her cruel desires, in making her Uranio’s beloved wife. Igilio This green myrtle to you, beautiful Venus, joyfully I consecrate, since for me all dead are the torments, the tears, and the sighs that were previously my life’s fruits. Therefore take it now, in witness of my past troubles.

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Filli This pure dove, so dear to you (if the truth among us resounds), with affection pure and pious here to you I also consecrate. Tirsi This bloody flower 3160 which languishes and dies, and your handsome Adonis’s image hides,140 take among these fronds, O fair Cytherean,141 lovelier by far than every other celestial goddess. 3165 Mirtilla This snowy, immaculate veil, O benign goddess from whom always are derived every joy and delight, to you I give as a sign of my fidelity, so pure white that it exceeds every other whiteness.

3170

250 ISABELLA ANDREINI Coridone Questi vaghi fioretti ch’in un pratello adorno la bella Nisa mia di sua man colse a lo spuntar del giorno 3175 e a me dar li volse, riverente consacro al tuo bel simulacro. Gorgo Ancora ch’io non abbia per costume d’offerire al tuo nume, 3180 nondimeno pur voglio lieto, sì come soglio, donarti alcuna cosa non già mortella o rosa od altri vaghi fiori, 3185 né colomba, né velo sì come han fatto qui ninfe e pastori per testimon del lor devoto zelo; ma ecco ch’io vo’ darti cose migliori assai per ricrearti: 3190 di Cerere e di Bacco i frutti amati ti dono, perché i tuoi cari tesori senza questi sarian freddi e gelati. Ed ecco ch’io vo’ farne il saggio prima, acciò tu forse non facesti stima 3195 che ci fosse mortifero veleno; ma vo’ prima sedere a l’erbe in seno. Igilio Sì, sì siediti pure, acciò che il vino vada comodamente al loco suo. Tirsi O come lo tracanna, pare appunto che ‘l vaso con il vino insieme ingoi. Gorgo Or mi par di star meglio ancora che innaffiato

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Mirtilla 251 Coridone These lovely little flowers, which in a richly-decorated meadow my beautiful Nisa with her own hands gathered at the break of day, 3175 and to me she chose to give them, reverently I consecrate to your fair image. Gorgo Although it is not my custom to make offering to your godhead, 3180 nonetheless I too wish happily (just as I am customarily) to give you something— by no means a myrtle or rose, or other lovely flowers, 3185 nor a dove nor a veil, such as have been given here by nymphs and shepherds as witness to their devoted zeal. But behold, I wish to give you things far better to refresh you: 3190 of Ceres and of Bacchus the beloved fruits I give you, because your dear treasures without these would be cold and icy.142 And behold, I shall take a taste first, in case you might surmise 3195 there were deadly poison; but I wish first to take a seat in the grass. Igilio Yes, yes, by all means sit, so that the wine may go comfortably to its place. Tirsi Oh, how he gulps it down! It looks just like he’s swallowing the jar together with the wine. Gorgo Now I seem to feel better, although I’ve barely

3200

252 ISABELLA ANDREINI m’abbia a pena il palato, ma ecco che di nuovo 3205 torno a colmar il nappo e come io ti promisi, pur te ‘l dono. Ma io mi vo’ partire, Venere bella, addio pastori, addio ninfe, vi lascio, rimanete in pace 3210 ch’io vado a ritrovare il mio compagno, dove su l’erba fresca spiegheremo le comuni vivande e quivi lietamente in gioia e festa tra noi le mangeremo. Addio brigata. 3215 Uranio Va pure a la buonora. Igilio, Tirsi, Coridone, Mirtilla, Ardelia e Filli, poscia che soddisfatto abbiamo in parte a ciò che si dovea, e poi che Febo s’inchina a l’occidente, 3220 meglio sarà che a le paterne case festeggiando tra noi ci riduciamo, e ogn’anno in tal giorno mentre spirto averemo voglio che insieme tutti 3225 veniamo a far dovuti sacrifici in questo loco, testimonio fido de’ nostri lieti e fortunati amori. Preghiamo intanto il cielo che arrida sempre a questi ameni campi, 3230 e che Zefiro spiri eternamente fra queste verdi frondi, e la tua bella Flora ognora infiori le valli, e i colli, e le campagne, e i prati. Ardelia Non ritenga mai neve o ghiaccio algente il corso a i fiumi fuggitivi e a i fonti, né giamai greggia con immondo piede turbi le lucid’onde sì che le chiare sue tranquille linfe specchio sien sempre a le più belle ninfe.

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Mirtilla 253 sprinkled my palate. But see, again 3205 I refill the goblet and, as I promised you, indeed to you I give it. But I wish to leave, beautiful Venus. Goodbye, shepherds, goodbye, nymphs, I’m leaving you; stay in peace. 3210 I’m going to find my friend. Upon the fresh grass we’ll lay out our shared foods, and there happily, in joy and festivities, between us we’ll eat them. Goodbye, you fair company. 3215 Uranio By all means, go, and godspeed. Igilio, Tirsi, Coridone, Mirtilla, Ardelia, and Filli, since we have fulfilled in part what is due, and since Phoebus is declining toward the west,143 3220 it is better that to our fathers’ houses, celebrating among ourselves, we return. And every year on this day, as long as we live, I wish that together we all 3225 shall come to make due sacrifices in this place, as a faithful witness of our delightful and fortunate loves. Let us pray meanwhile that heaven will smile forever on these pleasant fields, 3230 and that Zephyr will waft eternally among these green fronds, and his beautiful Flora will constantly make bloom the valleys, the hills, the countryside, and the meadows.144 Ardelia May snow or freezing ice never hold back the courses of the fleet rivers and the springs, nor ever a flock with soiled foot disturb the lucid waters, so that their clear, tranquil liquids may forever be a mirror for the most beautiful nymphs.

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254 ISABELLA ANDREINI Igilio Non si vegghino mai selvagge fiere per queste piagge amiche, ma scorga sempre il duro agricoltore di Cerere ondeggiar le bionde chiome. Filli Non turbi mai Giunon l’aria tranquilla, né con irata man folgore avventi Giove tra noi, né il suo fratel Nettuno il monte o ‘l piano scuota, ma conceda mai sempre la natura eterna primavera a questo loco.

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Tirsi Non neghi Apollo i suoi lucenti rai a questo almo paese, ma sia sempre fastoso e sempre ameno, sempre di fior, sempre di frutti pieno. Mirtilla Né queste rive sien turbate mai dal furor d’Aquilone, ma sia perpetuamente in questo loco fior, fronde, erbe, ombre, antri, onde, aure soavi.

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Coridone Andiam lodando Amore e la sua bella madre, 3260 poi che, la lor mercé, tante sventure hanno avuto felice e lieto fine e sia propizio sempre a questo sito il fato; e i rosignuoli fra questi verdi rami 3265 temprino a prova lascivette note e con nuove vaghezze cantin sempre d’amor l’alte dolcezze.

Il Fine

Mirtilla 255 Igilio May one never see wild beasts in this friendly country, but may the hardy farmer always discern the waving of Ceres’s blond tresses.145 Filli May Juno never disturb the tranquil air, nor Jove with an irate hand cast the thunderbolt among us, nor his brother Neptune cause the mountains or the plains to shake,146 but may eternal spring by nature be granted forevermore to this place.

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Tirsi May Apollo not deny his shining rays to this bountiful land, but may it be always splendid and always pleasant, always with flowers, always with fruits filled. Mirtilla Nor may these riverbanks be disturbed ever by the furor of Aquilone,147 but may there be perpetually in this place flowers, fronds, grasses, shade, caves, waters, and gentle breezes.

3255

Coridone Let us go, praising Love and his beautiful mother 3260 since, thanks to them, so many misfortunes have had a cheerful and happy ending. May fate be always to this site propitious, and may nightingales among these green branches 3265 improve through competition their sensual tunes, and with new charms may they sing always of love’s noble delights. The End

Notes 1. Venus, the Roman counterpart of the Greek Aphrodite, was the goddess of love and beauty. Her son Amor (Love, the Greek Eros) was the god of love, a winged child or young man, whose arrows sparked love in their victims. For the historical and mythological information given in the notes throughout the text, we have followed a variety of sources, such as The Oxford Dictionary of Classical Myth and Religion, ed. Simon Price and Emily Kearns (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), ad vocem; Brill’s New Pauly: Encyclopedia of the Ancient World: Antiquity, ed. Hubert Cancik and Helmuth Schneider, 15 vols. (Leiden: Brill, 2002–10); Michael Grant, A Guide to the Ancient World: A Dictionary of Classical Place Names (New York: H.W. Wilson, 1986), ad vocem; Robert Graves, The Greek Myths (1955; reprint New York and London: Penguin, 1992), ad vocem; and Richard Buxton, The Complete World of Greek Mythology (New York: Thames and Hudson, 2004), ad vocem. We have also retraced these myths whenever possible in the work of Ovid, Virgil, Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, and other early modern writers. 2. The third heaven is that of Venus, situated between Mercury and the sun in the Ptolemaic system. It is where the spirits of the lovers are seen. In Paradiso 9, Dante identifies the third heaven as the place for love poets (there he met the troubadour Folquet de Marseille). See The Divine Comedy, trans. with a commentary by Charles S. Singleton (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1970– 77). This association was soon reprised by Petrarch in Sonnet 287: “Ma ben ti prego che ‘n la terza spera / Guitton saluti et messer Cino, et Dante / Franceschin nostro et tutta quella schiera” (But I beg to salute all on the third sphere: Guittone and messer Cino and Dante, our Franceschino, and all that band). See Petrarch’s Lyric Poems: The Rime sparse and Other Lyrics, ed. and trans. Robert M. Durling (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976). 3. In Metamorphoses 4, introd. Bernard Knox and trans. Charles Martin (New York: Norton, 2005), Ovid recounts the story of Pyramus and Thisbe, who were forbidden by their rivalrous parents to communicate with each other. The pair decided to meet near a mulberry tree. When Thisbe arrived, she saw a lioness with a bloodied mouth and ran away. Pyramus came soon after and noticed the veil that she had left behind. Assuming she was dead, he killed himself. When upon coming back Thisbe saw her dead beloved, she too committed suicide. This tale of forbidden love is lovingly recounted by Giovanni Boccaccio (“Ohimé, Tisbe, chi ti uccise? / Chi mi ti tolse, dolce mio riposo?”) in Amorosa visione, ed. Vittore Branca (Milan: Mondadori, 2000), Canto 20; and then reprised by, among others, Chaucer and Shakespeare. Many stories in Ovid’s Metamorphoses had become newly popular at the time of Andreini’s writing thanks to the adaptation by Lodovico Dolce in Trasformationi (Venice: Gabriel Giolito de’ Ferrari, 1555), which was deeply influenced by Lodovico Ariosto’s Orlando furioso; like Ariosto’s epic, it was rendered in ottava rima. On the importance of Dolce for Ovid’s continuous popularity in the Renaissance, see Chiara Trebaiocchi, “‘Il letterato buono a tutto’: Lodovico Dolce traduttore delle Metamorfosi,” in Per Lodovico Dolce: Miscellanea di Studi, ed. Paolo Marini and Paolo Procaccioli (Rome: Vecchiarelli, 2016), 1:271–316. 4. In this story from Ovid’s Heroides, ed. and trans. Harold Isbell (London: Penguin, 1990), Book 18, the virgin priestess of Aphrodite, Hero, fell in love with Leander of Abydos, who swam to her house every night to be with her, guided by a light from her tower in Sestos. When one night the light failed to guide him, he drowned. In desperation at her loss, Hero threw herself from the top of her tower. The story was reprised by, among others, Christopher Marlowe in Hero and Leander (1598; reprint, London: Stourton Press, 1934).

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Mirtilla 257 5. Halcyon and Ceyx, another doomed mythological couple, were married and inseparable. Ceyx left one day to consult the Delphic oracle, and drowned when a storm capsized his boat. Seeing his body floating near the shore, Halcyon rushed to the sea, but before drowning she was changed into a kingfisher and was able to fly off with Ceyx, who underwent the same transformation. See Ovid, Metamorphoses 11. 6. The reference is to the well-known myth of Helen, who left her husband Menelaus after being abducted by Paris, thus causing the war between the Greeks and the Trojans at the center of Homer’s The Iliad, trans. Robert Fagles (New York: Viking Penguin, 1990; reprint, New York and London: Penguin, 1998). 7. Going away from Troy, Demophon was shipwrecked in Thrace, where Queen Phyllis repaired his sails, and he married her. He left the next day and promised to return within a year, but he settled in Cyprus and forgot about her. When the year elapsed, Phyllis took poison and died. Ovid tells the story in Heroides 2. 8. Myrrha fell in love with her own father, Cinyras, king of Cyprus, and became pregnant. Full of guilt, she fled across Arabia. After giving birth to a son, Adonis, she was transformed by the gods into a myrrh tree. The story is in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Book 10. Dante mentions her in Inferno 30. 9. As Ovid recounts it, Byblis fell incestuously in love with her twin brother, Caunus. When he received the letter in which she declared her feelings, he ran away in disgust. She ran after him, crying all the way until she died and was transformed into a spring (Metamorphoses, IX). 10. In Ovid’s retelling in Heroides 11, Canace fell in love with her brother Macareus, became pregnant, and had a child. When her father learned of the event, he sent her a sword with which to kill herself, and also had the infant killed. This mythological account became the first tragedy ever written in Italian, Canace (1542), by Sperone Speroni, which was scheduled to be staged in Padua by the company of the famous playwright and actor, Ruzante. He died just before the performance, and Canace never made it to the stage. The tragedy became a controversial point of discussion in the literary circles of the University of Padua (called “Studio” at the time) in the second half of the sixteenth century due to the appropriateness of an incestuous topic for a tragedy not in the Greek canon. Andreini was certainly aware of the play and of its academic resonance. An English translation of Canace is now available, edited by Elio Brancaforte (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaisssance Studies, 2013). 11. Medea, a most infamous mythological mother, abundantly revenged herself for having been abandoned by Jason for a younger wife and murdered her rival, her rival’s father, and her own two children by Jason. Ovid’s recounting of her story is in Metamorphoses 7. 12. In Metamorphoses 8, Ovid explores the story of Scylla, daughter of Nisus, who fell in love with Minos, and helped him win Megara, where her father reigned, by presenting Minos with a purple lock from her father’s head, an item that had granted him invincibility through the years. Minos accepted her love and sacked the city, but then, repelled by her filial betrayal, went away, pursued all the way by Scylla, who was killed by a sea eagle when she was the closest to his boat. 13. In Ars amatoria, 1:289–326, Pasiphaë—wife of Minos, king of Crete, and mother of Ariadne and Phaedra—fell in love with a white bull and had Daedalus design a portable wooden cow covered with a real hide that allowed her to mate with him while hidden from view. She gave birth to the Minotaur,

258 ISABELLA ANDREINI a monster with a bull’s head and a human body. See Ovid, The Art of Love and Other Poems, trans. J. H. Mozley, rev. G. P. Goold (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979; reprint, 1999). 14. In Fasti 2, Hercules (Heracles in Greek mythology) was for a time a servant of Omphale, queen of Lydia after her husband’s death, who had him dress as a woman, do women’s work, and spin wool. Omphale eventually fell in love with Hercules and had a son by him, Lamus. See Ovid, Fasti, trans. Anne and Peter Wiseman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). A rewriting of this story is in the tragedy Celinda by Valeria Miani (Vicenza: Francesco Bolzetta, 1611). 15. In Ovid’s rendering in Metamorphoses 6, Tereus, a Thracian king, fell in love with his wife’s sister, Philomela, and cut her tongue so she would not reveal his rape of her to anyone. Philomela was able to communicate with her sister, Procne, by weaving a tapestry with the story of what had happened to her. Procne in revenge killed her son and served his flesh to his father, Tereus. Having been made aware of this cannibalistic act, Tereus was determined to kill the two sisters, but the gods intervened, transforming Philomela into a nightingale and Procne into a swallow. 16. Semiramis, a legendary warlike empress of Assyria, had a reputation for being sexually insatiable, perhaps because she was not only very beautiful but also, and most threateningly, very potent. She was accused of killing the men with whom she had made love so that they would not expose her lust, and is often portrayed as libidinous for having had incestuous desires for her son. Dante puts her among famous lovers in Inferno 5, 48–62. 17. The reference is to the dual image of Cupid: a benign one, carrying a gold-headed arrow bestowing love, and a capricious and perverted one, carrying a leaden-headed arrow stirring aversion. One version of the myth says that Love’s father was Mars (the Greek Ares), the god of war. 18. Amor is another Latin name for Cupid. As noted above, the Greeks called him Eros. 19. The verse paraphrases Dante’s famous address in Paradiso 12, “O insensata cura de’ mortali.” 20. Hymenaios or Hymen, the god of marriage, was usually represented as a tall, young man, a sort of older Cupid. He was the Greek god of weddings, shown carrying a bridal torch in his hands as he was leading the bride to the groom’s house. He is often a character in Renaissance poetry. Shakespeare, for example, mentioned him in five plays. 21. Uranio was the principal character in Jacopo Sannazaro’s Arcadia (written in 1483–86 and published in 1504); the female equivalent, Urania, was a common name in pastorals and in romance novels (as in Giulia Bigolina’s Urania, ca. 1552). 22. The debate on free will, best articulated by Giovanni Pico della Mirandola in 1486, was very much at the center of Renaissance philosophy. See Pico della Mirandola: Oration on the Dignity of Man: A New Translation and Commentary, ed. Francesco Borghesi, Michael Papio, and Massimo Riva (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). 23. Jove was the god of the sky and its phenomena. He was usually portrayed holding a thunderbolt. 24. Hyrcania was a region southeast of the Caspian Sea (mostly in present-day Iran). Virgil has the abandoned Dido speculate that Aeneas’s cruelty stems from drinking the milk of Hyrcanian tigers. See The Aeneid, ed. and trans. Barry B. Powell (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), Book 4, 365–67.

Mirtilla 259 25. The references are to the Nemean lion, a vicious monster with a golden fur that rendered its body invulnerable, and to the serpent-like, multi-headed water monster, the Lernaean Hydra. Both were killed by Hercules in the first two of his twelve labors. In Hamlet, 1.4, Shakespeare refers to the Nemean lion to evoke hardness: “My fate cries out, / And makes each petty artery in this body / As hardy as the Nemean lion’s nerve.” 26. Lake Avernus at Cumae in Italy was considered an access point to the underworld, as in Virgil’s Aeneid. Its king, Pluto (the Greek Hades), fell in love with Proserpina (the Greek Persephone) after being hit by Cupid’s arrows. He abducted her while she was playing with other nymphs and made her his queen. 27. Venus’s lovers included the war god Mars and the mortal Adonis. Eros fell in love with and eventually married Psyche. 28. Uranio’s sense that love is a universal force echoes similar verses in Tasso’s Aminta, favola boscareccia (Venice: Aldo Manuzio, 1581), 1.1.213–255. 29. The ligustrum is a type of shrub (commonly known as privet) whose flower is white and scented. 30. Frankincense and myrrh were produced in Arabia. 31. Ardelia is here constructed poetically along Petrarch’s long canon, which itemized specific features of the beloved from the hair to the foot, and compared them to lilies, corals, apples, and so on. The description was so common in later Petrarchan and chivalric poetry that it naturally found its place in pastoral plays. 32. In Roman mythology, Pales was the goddess of shepherds and of their flocks. The festival held in her honor, the Parilia, was a purification ceremony connected to fertility and good health (and thus it has been suggested that the name may, etymologically, come from “phallus”). It usually took place on April 21 (here indeed “lovely flowering April” is mentioned), and was closely connected to the founding of Rome: Romulus was said to have founded the city on this feast day, which is still celebrated in Rome every year. In this herdsmen’s rite, the shepherd decorates his sheep pen with greens, cleans the pen, and purifies both the enclosure and his sheep by lighting a bonfire of mixed straw, greens, and sulfur. A young animal is then sacrificed at a public ceremony, after which prayers are offered for the protection of flocks and domestic animals, which are sprinkled with lustral water. 33. The ancient kingdom of Saba, the biblical Sheba, was located in present-day Yemen. Myrrh and frankincense were produced there. 34. Andreini echoes Petrarch’s “Canzone 127”: “I’ vidi a l’aura sparsi / i capei d’oro ond’io sì subito arsi.” Or see this other well-known Petrarchan line from Sonnet 90: “Erano i capei d’oro a l’aura sparsi / … / qual meraviglia se di subito arsi?” In Rime Sparse. 35. Echoes of Petrarch’s Sonnet 225: “L’alta beltà ch’al mondo non ha pare,” in Rime Sparse. 36. Uranio means that four years have elapsed since he fell in love with Ardelia. Although he speaks of twelve houses (“dodici alberghi”), he probably means twelve zodiac signs, which make up one year, as opposed to twelve houses of roughly two hours each, which make up one day. In a daily astrological chart, each house represents an aspect of life and is ruled by a specific sign, starting with the first

260 ISABELLA ANDREINI house (Aries) and ending with the twelfth house (Pisces). The astrological year also begins with Aries and ends with Pisces, so the sun’s passing four times through the cycle could be seen as meaning four years. 37. Echoes of Petrarch’s Sonnet 359: “Son questi i capei biondi e l’aureo nodo / … ch’ancor mi stringe,” in Rime Sparse. 38. Flower, as a metonymic substitute for the female pudendum, has a long history in poetry, most famously perhaps in the characterization of Angelica’s virginity in Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando furioso (1532), trans. Guido Waldman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 1.55ff. 39. The text says “Fillide,” which is used interchangeably with “Filli.” “Filli” will be used throughout. 40. Cynthia, born in Mount Cynthus in the island of Delos, was called Artemis by the Greeks and Diana by the Romans. She is the goddess of the moon and the hunt, but also of childbirth and virginity, and is often portrayed holding a bow and arrows. In the Renaissance, this chaste goddess started to be associated with Endymion, a most handsome son of Zeus (the Roman Jove), and bore him fifty daughters. Zeus bestowed on Endymion everlasting youth but also continuous sleep. Diana fell in love with the youth and visited him every night when he was asleep. 41. The hollow stones are caves. In Ovid’s Metamorphoses 3.356–507, we have the story of Echo, a nymph with a most wonderful voice, who helped Zeus commit adultery by distracting his wife Juno with chattering and singing. Hera punished her by depriving her of speech other than the ability to repeat the last syllable she heard. 42. This is Venus, the star of love and also the evening star. 43. The three Fates were sisters: Clotho spun the thread of each mortal’s life, Lachesis measured it, and Atropos cut it when it was time for the mortal to die. Here Filli identifies with Atropos, the goddess who cuts the thread. 44. Seen from Greece or Italy, the sun appears to rise from the sea. The goddess of the dawn was Aurora (the Greek Eos). The topos is common in Renaissance poetry and love songs, as for example in Tasso’s “Madrigal 143”: “Ecco mormorar l’onde / … / O bella e vaga Aurora, / L’aura è tua messaggera.” See Le rime di Torquato Tasso, ed. Angelo Solerti, 4 vols. (Bologna: Romagnoli-Dell’Acqua, 1898–1902). 45. The three Graces were the goddesses of everything graceful and beautiful. They often accompanied Venus. 46. Jove took the form of a white bull to carry off the mortal Europa, then ravished her under a shady plane tree. 47. The goddess Diana was frolicking with her nymphs and bathing naked in a stream when the hunter Actaeon, who was following a deer in the woods, stumbled upon the scene. This led to his undoing, since Diana punished him for his ogling of her (or for his attempted rape, in another version of the myth) by transforming the hunter into a stag and setting his own dogs after him. 48. Igilio’s fantasy of being transformed into a flower, and then into grass, stone, plant, fountain or wild beast echoes Petrarch’s famous “Canzone 23” in Rime Sparse, “Nel dolce tempo della prima etade,” itself a rewriting of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. All draw from a variety of mythological figures.

Mirtilla 261 49. The episode recalls the pretty garland that Erminia makes for herself in the woods in Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata, ed. Fredi Chiappelli (Turin: Loescher, 1968), 7.3–4. 50. Ardelia identifies with the goddess Diana, twin sister of Apollo, who liked her virginity so much that she asked her father Zeus to make it eternal. Her favorite places are secluded woods, mountains, and founts, and she is associated with the moon. She is usually seen in the company of virgin nymphs. 51. Ardelia follows a deer with arrows in her hands, just like Diana, who as goddess of the hunt was portrayed with a bow and quiver, and was followed by hunting dogs or a deer. 52. Ardelia addresses the god of sleep as ‘Sleep’ rather than by his mythological name (the Greek Hypnos or Roman Somnus). Sleep lived in the shades together with his brother Thanatos (Death), in a cave near the black, sunless Cimmerian mountains, which later were localized in the Crimea. Each night he followed his mother Nyx (Night) into the sky. He is a character in Homer’s Iliad, Book 14, and in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 11. 53. Silence, the god of secrecy and confidentiality, was called Harpokrates in Greek mythology. He is usually figured as a naked boy holding a finger to his lips to quiet his surroundings. See Ovid, Metamorphoses 9.688ff. 54. The lovely wife is Juno/Hera, who bribed Sleep first with a golden throne and then promised him the hand of one of the Graces so that he would cast a spell of sleep on Zeus. Sleep does so disguised as a bird of prey—thus Andreini’s reference to black wings at l. 835. This mythical story is recounted, among others, by Homer in The Iliad 14. 55. The god Sleep was sometimes imagined as holding a poppy or a horn from which sleep trickled down onto the mortal; sometimes he fanned mortals to sleep with his dark wings. 56. It is typical in pastoral settings to fall asleep next to founts, as in the famous episode of Erminia in Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata, 7.3–4, that Andreini echoes here. See also Marzia Pieri, La scena boschereccia nel Rinascimento italiano (Padua: Liviana, 1983), 98. 57. Apollo was the Greek god of the sun. From Italy the sun seems to rise out of the Adriatic Sea. Tethys and her husband as well as brother Oceanus were the Titans who ruled the sea before Poseidon. Each dawn Apollo rose from his Palace of the Sun, located on the river Okeanos, to ascend into the sky in a golden chariot drawn by four winged horses (“destriers” are chargers, or warhorses). Having awakened nature to the arrival of the day, he travelled through the sky from east to west, descending at sunset. 58. This line is missing in the edition by Sebastiano Dalle Donne, but present in the “corrected” edition of 1599 by Francesco Dalle Donne and Scipione Vargnano. 59. The word gentle (“soave”) is missing in the edition by Sebastiano Dalle Donne, but is present in the Discepolo edition of 1588. 60. Mirtilla’s love lament is firmly embedded within the Petrarchan code of love at first sight, which was inevitably followed by suffering, tears, and quasi-desperation. 61. That is, the souls of the dead in the underworld, as in Dante’s “le genti dolorose / c’hanno perduto il ben dell’intelletto,” in Inferno 3.17–18.

262 ISABELLA ANDREINI 62. In the literary tradition, lovers often carve messages on trees, as in Act 5 of La Mirtilla and most famously in the episode of Angelica and Medoro in Ariosto’s Orlando furioso, canto 19. 63. Some Greek creation myths have the first deity emerging from primordial Chaos, before the creation of the universe. The goddess Chaos embodied the air and mist that surrounded the earth prior to the creation of night and day—that is, she was at the origin of all things. In Metamorphoses 1.9, Ovid describes Chaos as a “shapeless heap.” 64. For Cynthia/Diana’s association with the moon goddess Selene, see the note to l. 559. Diana was also associated with Hecate, who was both a moon goddess and a goddess of the underworld. In later versions of her myth, she was the goddess with three forms: Selene in the sky, Artemis (Diana) on earth, and Hecate in the lower world. 65. Endymion was a young, ever youthful shepherd with whom Cynthia/Diana fell in love one clear night while he was asleep; again, see the note to l. 559. 66. Selene was also seduced by the god Pan, who protected shepherds and their flocks. He had the horns and legs of a goat, and was feared by the nymphs because of his sexual advances. In Virgil’s Georgics, Pan lured Diana as moon goddess into the depths of the Arcadian woods with what appeared to be a gift of immaculate wool—by covering his own goat’s hair with a dazzling white fleece. See Virgil’s Eclogues. Georgics. Aeneid: Books 1–6, trans. H. Rushton Fairclough, rev. G. P. Goold (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999), 391–93. 67. These last four lines, plus the second rejoinder by Ardelia below (“E poi?”), are contracted into three in the 1588 version, thus the seemingly irregular numbering. 68. As Guarini’s Mirtillo says, “Primaché mai cangiar voglia o pensiero, / cangerò vita in morte.” See Il pastor fido (Venice: Giovanni Battista Bonfadino, 1590), 3. But also see, as usual, Petrarch’s “Poem 360”: “Né cangiar posso l’ostinata voglia,” in Rime Sparse. 69. There are clear echoes here of Petrarch’s famous “Sonnet 90” in Rime Sparse: “Erano i capei d’oro a l’aura sparsi che ’n mille dolci nodi gli avolgea.” The following description of the beloved’s eyes, eyelashes, brow, lips, and breast is thoroughly derivative, as is the earlier one in Act 1, of the Petrarchan vocabulary. 70. The most clear echo of these verses is in Tasso’s “Sonnet 605” of Rime: “Né core innamorato ha tante pene / né tante il verde aprile erbe novelle, / né tanti augelli l’aria e ‘l cielo stelle, / né tanti pesci il mare e ‘l lido arene / quante bellezze voi … / non basta il tempo a l’opra e dal soggetto / perde la lingua mia.” 71. Adonis, the personification of male beauty, was killed by a wild boar sent by the goddess Diana, who was jealous of his hunting prowess. Venus heard his groans and he died in her arms. She sprinkled his blood with nectar and he turned into the flower anemone. The story is in Ovid, Metamorphoses 10.708–39. 72. See note to l. 108. 73. Hymen, the god of weddings, was thought to attend every marriage ceremony with a garland of roses, a burning torch, and a purple veil to represent the approaching loss of virginity.

Mirtilla 263 74. Zeus took the form of a swan to lie with Leda, who also lay with her husband Tyndareus the same night; afterwards she bore Pollux and Helen, children of the god, and Castor and Clytemnestra, children of her husband. Zeus also disguised himself as Artemis to lie with the nymph Callisto, Diana’s companion and daughter of the king of Arcadia, who had taken a vow of chastity. He then transformed Callisto into a bear in an unsuccessful attempt to save her from Artemis’s wrath. Her son Arcas was the ancestor of the Arcadians. Zeus transformed himself into an eagle when the extraordinary good looks of the adolescent Ganymede caught his eye, and carried him off to Olympus, where he became the cup-bearer of the gods. In another transformation Zeus turned into a shower of gold to visit Danae, a princess of Argos, who was kept by her father in a bronze chamber because of a prophecy that he was destined to be killed by his grandchild. She bore a son, Perseus. 75. See the note to l. 262. The metaphor was commonly used in poetry, as in Virgil’s Aeneid, 4.365–67, in which Dido reproaches Aeneas, or in Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata 16.57: “e le mamme allattar di tigre ircana.” Shakespeare too used the expression “Hyrcanian beast” in Hamlet, 2.2. 76. According to a tale from Granada, Melampo was one of the three dogs accompanying the shepherds who visited the infant Jesus in Bethlehem. See, e.g., Stanley Coren, The Intelligence of Dogs: A Guide to the Thoughts, Emotions, and Inner Lives of our Canine Companions, rev. ed. (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006), 51. In Alberto Lollio’s Aretusa (1563), the shepherd Dameta’s dog Licisca saves a lamb from a wolf. See Louise G. Clubb, “The Tragicomic Bear,” in Shakespeare and the Literary Tradition, ed. Stephen Orgel and Sean Kellen, 147–60 (New York and London: Garland Publishing, 1999), 150. Melampo and Licisca appear, alone or together, also in Sappho’s poetry, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in relation to the Actaeon myth, and in Guarini’s Il pastor fido. 77. See the note to l. 367. Uranio’s goddess is Pales, protector of shepherds and their flocks; see l. 424. 78. Satyrs were spirits of the forests and mountains. They had horns, pointed ears, hairy bodies, a goat’s tail, and cloven hooves. They were described as having the upper half of their body like that of a man and the lower half like a goat. Satyrs loved wine, women, the music of bagpipes, and frenetic dancing. 79. For Selene and Pan, see the note to l. 951. Pan was often confused with satyrs because of his physical resemblance to them; like the satyr of this pastoral, he was a half-goat shepherd with goat-like legs, ears, and horns. His cult was long localized in Arcadia. 80. Bacchus or Dionysus, the son of Semele and Zeus, was the god of revelry and wine and was often accompanied by satyrs and by noisy female followers, the Bacchantes. He had horns on his brow that were either those of a ram or of a bull. In Ovid’s famous telling of the story in Heroides X, the weeping Ariadne, after being deserted on the island of Naxos by Theseus, was rescued by Bacchus, who jumped out of his chariot to protect her from terrifying beasts, then married her. The scene is most famously represented in Titian’s painting Bacchus and Ariadne (1520–23). 81. Alcides is another name for Hercules. After slaying the Nemean lion, he wore its skin. When the centaur Nessus attempted to abduct Hercules’ wife, Dejanira, Hercules rescued her by shooting Nessus with an arrow dipped in the poisonous blood of the Lernaean Hydra (see the note to l. 264). As Nessus lay dying, he told Dejanira that a potion made from his blood would keep Hercules faithful to her, so she took a sample and kept it with her. When Hercules’ affections inevitably strayed, Dejanira smeared the potion into his lionskin shirt, causing Hercules’ skin to burn when he put it on—the

264 ISABELLA ANDREINI unintended consequence of Dejanira’s own burning (as the Satyr puts it, she “blazed all through with amorous fire” for Hercules). This story harks back to the earlier allusions to Hercules’ first two labors (the killing of the Nemean lion and the Lernaean Hydra), showing that Andreini makes connections to various well-known mythological versions within her play. She also has the Satyr refer ironically to Dejanira—rather than Hercules—as the one who burns. 82. The expression “domandar mercede” is taken from Tasso’s Aminta, 1.1.161, in a clear homage to the more famous poet. 83. The Caucasian boulders are hard and heavy, difficult to move as in this metaphor. 84. As in Tasso’s Aminta, 1.1: “Cangia, cangia consiglio, pazzarella, che sei.” 85. I.e. the beloved lady’s lips. 86. Ibla was an ancient city in Sicily famous for its flowers, herbs (especially thyme), and honey from its bees. 87. This wild thyme, “serpillo,” is an odorous plant in the mint family. It is used in cooking and also as an antibacterial in medicinal preparations because it helps digestion and hides halitosis. See also Ariosto, Orlando furioso, 18.138. More generally, the “serpillo” recalls the bitter aloe pill given to Calandrino in Giovanni’s Boccaccio’s The Decameron, trans. G. H. McWilliam, 2nd rev. ed. (London: Penguin, 2003), and that given to Nicia in Niccolò Machiavelli’s Mandragola [The Mandrake], trans. Mera J. Flaumenhaft (Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, 1981). 88. The figure of Gorgo, the glutton, recalls a similar character in Agostino Argenti, Lo sfortunato, favola pastorale (Venice: Gabriel Giolito de’ Ferrari, 1568); Agostino Beccari, Il Sacrificio, favola pastorale (Ferrara: Francesco di Rossi da Valenza, 1555); Andrea Calmo, Giocose moderne et facetissime egloghe pastorali (Venice: Giovanni Battista Bertacagno, 1553); and Alberto Lollio, Aretusa, commedia pastorale (Ferrara: Valente Panizza, 1564). See Franco Vazzoler, “Le pastorali dei comici dell’arte: la Mirtilla di Isabella Andreini,” in Sviluppi della drammaturgia pastorale nell’Europa del CinqueSeicento, ed. Maria Luisa Chiabò and Federico Doglio (Viterbo: Centro studi sul teatro medioevale e rinascimentale, 1992), 281–99, on pp. 295–96. Another Gorgo-like character is Bassano in the later pastoral by Valeria Miani, Amorosa speranza (Venice: Francesco Bolzetta, 1604). 89. Ceres (the Greek Demeter) is the goddess of agriculture, crops, and the harvest, and Bacchus is the god of harvest and wine, making them both natural friends of Gorgo. 90. The Styx is a river marking the boundary between the earth and the underworld. Dante mentions its smoky marsh in Inferno 8.13–16. Gods were bound to their word when they swore by the Styx. 91. Lieo or Lysius (meaning one who loosens or frees) is another name for Bacchus. 92. Ceres was the Roman goddess of the harvest (see the note to l. 1609 above). Pomona was the Roman goddess of garden fruits, a wood nymph, not present in Greek mythology. She is the goddess of abundance associated with the flowering of fruit trees. 93. A wise, elderly shepherd named Opico appears in Sannazaro’s Arcadia. He is described as “vecchio e carico / di senno” (“old and fraught / with wisdom”). See Nandini Das, Renaisssance Romance:

Mirtilla 265 The Transformation of English Prose Fiction, 1570–1620 (Farnham, UK, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 69. See also Marsha S. Collins, “In the Ending Is the Beginning: Sannazaro’s Arcadia (1504),” Chapter 2 of Imagining Arcadia in Renaissance Romance (New York and London: Routledge, 2016). 94. As both an adjective and a noun, this word means “wild” or “savage.” At ll. 1646–47, the Satyr tells Gorgo of a bearskin given to him by a wild man (“una gran pelle d’orso, che l’altr’ieri / mi diede un uom selvaggio”). 95. Flora is the goddess of flowers, twin sister of the goddess Fauna, and associated with a spring festival named Floralia (held about a week or so after the Parilia, which honors Pales). In Ovid’s Fasti 5.197ff., she is linked to Zephyr, the West Wind, who rapes her first and then marries her. Although a minor goddess, her myth was greatly revived by Renaissance humanists and later by the English Pre-Raphaelites, and she often appears in paintings and poetry. 96. That is, Opico’s musical instrument. 97. The Muses were patron goddesses of music, song, poetry, and the fine arts in general. 98. Calliope, the eldest of the Muses, was the goddess of song and dance as well as the muse of heroic poetry. She was the mother of Orpheus, whose ability to charm all living beings with his music was legendary. Apollo gave Orpheus a lyre and instructed him to play it to perfection, while Calliope taught him to invent verses for singing. 99. In Hesiod’s compilation of the genealogy of gods, Zeus was the father of nine young and beautiful muses who lived in Olympus. Their mother was Mnemosyne. Each muse had a specific artistic sphere: Calliope, epic poetry; Clio, history; Erato, erotic poetry; Euterpe, lyric poetry; Melpomene, tragedy; Polyhymnia, religious hymns; Terpsichore, choral song and dance; Thalia, comedy; and Urania, astronomy. See Theogony, ed. and trans. Richard S. Caldwell (Newburyport, MA: Focus Information Group, 1987). 100. Although the father of the Muses was Zeus, Mirtilla is addressing Apollo here in his capacity as a god of music and the leader of the Muses. In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, 1.452, Daphne is identified as the daughter of the river god Peneus. As a Naiad, she is connected to rivers, streams, and springs, that is, to the pastoral world. Apollo fell in love with her beauty and pursued her, but she asked for her father’s help before being caught by him and was transformed into a laurel tree. 101. Dameta is a shepherd in Virgil. See The Bucolics of Virgil, ed. Frederic J. De Veau (New York: Oxford University Press, 1935), 3. 102. The reference is to the three beautiful goddesses, Hera (Juno), Athena (Minerva), and Aphrodite (Venus) among whom Paris, a Trojan, was asked to declare who was the fairest when he met them on Mount Ida. Each tried to bribe Paris so that he would lean to her own cause: Hera promised to make him king of Europe and Asia; Athena offered him wisdom and skill in battle; and Aphrodite offered him the most beautiful woman in the world, Helen, wife of the Greek king, Menalaus. Paris chose Helen, and thus set in motion the chain of events that tragically led to the Trojan War. 103. Medea helped Jason steal the Golden Fleece from her father, then fled with him to his homeland, which was under the rule of Jason’s usurping uncle, Pelias. In Seneca’s tragedy, Medea, the sorceress Medea, wife of Jason, restored youth to her father-in-law, Aeson, by infusing his blood with the

266 ISABELLA ANDREINI medicinal herbs she had gathered for the purpose, and then by putting the concoction back into his body. But she also tricked Pelias’s daughters into dismembering and cooking Pelias, as a supposed prerequisite to magically rejuvenating him. See Medea, ed. and trans. A. J. Boyle (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014). 104. The first heaven was that of the moon. Tirsi is referring to Diana, goddess of both the moon and the hunt, associated with the first heaven. 105. The ingenious Daedalus and his son Icarus escaped imprisonment with wings Daedalus had fashioned. Icarus ignored his father’s warnings and flew too near the sun, which melted the wax that held the feathers, causing him to fall to his death in the Icarian Sea. To prove he was really the son of Helios, the sun god, Phaethon extracted the promise of a favor from his father. Helios tried to dissuade him from driving his solar chariot, but the presumptuous Phaethon insisted. Unable to control the horses, he nearly burned up the world before Zeus struck him with a thunderbolt; Phaethon fell into the waters of the Po River. Both stories are in Ovid’s Metamorphoses: 8.183–235 for Icarus, and 2.1–343 for Phaethon, the longest mythological account in the text. The moral of these stories is that an overreaching and ambitious desire to control nature leads to utter failure and demise. 106. The myths of Zeus’s set of transformations—into a bull, a swan, an eagle, a shower of gold, and a satyr—have been reconstructed in the notes to ll. 650 and 1097–1104. See Ovid, Metamorphoses 6.103–14. 107. A bitter alcoholic beverage whose main ingredient is the wormwood plant (Artemisia absinthium). In the past it was often considered hallucinogenic. 108. That is, a reed pipe. 109. Echo lived among stones and mountains where her voice resonated back to her. See the note to l. 570. 110. Scabies is a skin infection transmitted to both humans and animals by mites; it causes severe itching and lesions. Podagra is a form of inflammatory arthritis known as gout, a human ailment which is rare in most animals. 111. The ‘unwholesome cockle’ is a plant commonly known as darnel (Lolium temulentum), which grows in the same areas as wheat (the ‘golden panicles’ to which it is ‘so harmful”); in fact, it so closely resembles wheat that it is called ‘false wheat.’ Before the era of modern machinery, darnel would have to be separated from wheat manually, undoubtedly a painstaking process. 112. Tethys and her husband, Oceanus, were the Titans who ruled the Ocean stream that surrounded the earth. The sun’s chariot was believed to sink into Ocean at the end of the day. See the note to l. 852. 113. The sun god Apollo’s sister was Diana, the moon goddess. Coridone is speaking of lunar eclipses. 114. Saturn, the father of Olympian gods, was an irritable deity and the Romans linked lead intoxication to him by calling it saturnine gout. 115. The warrior god Mars was naturally connected to aggression and savagery, often unable to cure his pride or address his anger, two of the seven deadly sins.

Mirtilla 267 116. Among the gods of Olympus, Zeus, the ruler of all gods, was often considered benign. 117. Melibeo is a shepherd in Virgil’s Bucolics 1. 118. The Phrygian shepherd was the Trojan Paris, who was tending sheep when he was called upon to adjudicate a contest of three goddesses (Pallas, Juno, and Venus), and to award a prize to the most beautiful woman among them. Eris (Discord) had provided a golden apple as the prize, thereby motivating the goddesses’ rivalry. See the note to l. 1945. Pallas was another name for Athena/Minerva. 119. Love informing the natural world in its entirety recalls Tasso’s Aminta, 1.1.213–55. 120. In Virgil’s Eclogues, 2.24, Aracynthus was a mountain located between Boeotia and Attica, in Greece. 121. Erymanthus is a mountain in Achaea, Greece, where Hercules completed his fourth labor, trapping the Erymanthian boar and carrying it to Mycenae. Ovid mentions the boar that wasted Arcadia in Metamorphoses 9.191. 122. Mopso is a Virgilian shepherd in Eclogue 5, also present in Tasso’s Aminta. 123. The Napaeae are nymphs of woods, valleys, and grottoes; the Naiads are nymphs of brooks, wells, and springs. As Moderata Fonte writes, “to the singing of the amorous Naiads, the Nepaeae performed charming dances, the latter adorned with lilies and sweet-scented roses, the former with pearls and corals.” See The Worth of Women (1600), ed. and trans. Virginia Cox (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), 251. 124. This appears to be an Italian proverb: “Ama chi t’ama, rispondi a chi ti chiama.” See Riccardo Schwamenthal and Michele L. Straniero, Dizionario dei proverbi italiani e dialettali (Milan: RCS Rizzoli Libri, 1991; rpt., 1999), proverb 359. 125. The scene of the nymph at the fount who falls in love with her own reflected image, Narcissus-like, is modeled on a similar scene in Tasso’s Aminta 2.25.40–56. The major antecedent—Narcissus falling in love with his reflection in the water—is of course Ovid, Metamorphoses 2.339–500. On the myth, see for example, Louise Vinge, The Narcissus Theme in Western European Literature up to the Early 19th Century (Lund, Sweden: Gleerups, 1967). 126. The Phlegethon is one of the five rivers of the underworld; its name means, literally, “river of fire,” as in Virgil, Aeneid 6.550–51. The goddess Styx fell in love with Phlegethon, but was consumed by its flames. Here, Ardelia uses it as a metaphor for her new ardor. 127. The handsome Narcissus spurned the nymph Echo, who died of a broken heart. The gods punished Narcissus by making him fall in love with his own image in a fountain. Unable to leave the image, he died there and was changed into the narcissus flower. 128. Zephyr is the west wind of springtime. See also the note to ll. 1725–26. 129. Both monkshood (Aconitum) and hemlock (Conium maculatum) are extremely poisonous. Because the leaves of the monkshood resemble those of parsley, they can be inadvertently ingested, with fatal results. Hemlock was used to execute condemned prisoners in ancient Greece, most famously the philosopher Socrates.

268 ISABELLA ANDREINI 130. Writing one’s love on trees is a literary topos used by Virgil, Sannazaro, Ariosto, and Tasso, among many others. 131. The story recalled here is that of Diana, enamored of the humble shepherd Endymion, whom she visited when he was asleep at night. But Pan was enamored of Diana, and thus jealous of such a lowly choice on the part of the goddess. See the notes to ll. 948 and 951. 132. Alcon is a shepherd in Virgil, Bucolics 5.11. Baldassar Castiglione wrote a Latin poem, “Alcon,” commemorating the death of his brother, Girolamo, to emphasize the importance of harmony and togetherness. See T. P. Harrison, Jr., “The Latin Pastorals of Milton and Castiglione,” PMLA 50, no. 2 (1935): 480–93. 133. Although “citiso” means laburnum (Cytisus laburnum), Igilio is referring to Cytisus scoparius, or broom, an invasive shrub that is sometimes removed by introducing goats into the affected area as a natural form of weed control. Laburnum, on the other hand, is extremely poisonous to both humans and animals. 134. These two lines (2767–68) are rhymed hendecasyllables. 135. The entire verse in Italian comes from Tasso’s Aminta, 1.1.131. 136. See the notes to ll. 559 and 944. 137. This is a reference to Petrarch’s The Triumph of Love (Triumphus Cupidinis, begun ca. 1350), I. 22–24: “Four steeds I saw, whiter than whitest snow, / And on a fiery car a cruel youth / With bow in hand and arrows at his side.” Cupid drives before him a throng of famous lovers, emperors and gods alike, including the famously unfaithful Hercules and—chained to the front of the chariot—Jove (translation from Peter Sadlon’s website on Petrarch, ). Andreini may have been familiar with an illustration by Francesco Rosselli (14481513), produced between 1480-1500, where Hercules carries a column (the “pillars of Hercules”) and Jove is chained to the front of the chariot. 138. This is the temple of Venus, whose cult was particularly observed in Cyprus. 139. Knidos is a coastal city in southwestern Asia Minor (in present-day Turkey) with an important temple of Aphrodite. 140. When Aphrodite’s lover, Adonis, was killed by a wild boar, anemone flowers sprang from his blood. 141. This is another name for Venus, who was born from the foam of the sea near the island of Cythera. 142. Lacking the food associated with Ceres and the wine associated with Bacchus to invigorate the blood, Venus would be left cold. 143. Phoebus is another name for the sun god, Apollo. 144. For Flora and Zephyr, see the note to l. 1726. 145. That is, the golden grains of wheat, since Ceres was the goddess of grain crops.

Mirtilla 269 146. For Jove and thunder, see the note to l. 252. Jove’s brother Neptune (the Greek Poseidon) had the power to cause earthquakes. 147. A strong, cold wind from the north.

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Index Ariosto, Ludovico, 23, 31, 37, 256, 260, 262, 264, 268 Armani, Vincenza, 23–24, 24n, 25 Asinari, Margherita Valperga, 33 Assarino, Luigi, 13, 13n Aurora, 85, 101, 260 Avanzi, Giovan Maria, 38n

Accademies: Filarmonica, 1, 6n; Intenti, 6, 6n; Olimpica, 1, 6n Actors, 4, 20, 21–24, 24n, 27 Actresses: deceptive, 15–16, 27–28; early actresses, 19–21; female stage, 18–29; ideas about female acting, 4–5; jealousy, 24, 25; in sacred representations, 19; performing madness, 17–18, 28; self-presentation, 23, 24, 28. See also Pastoral Ademollo, Alessandro, 25n Adonis, 117, 249, 257, 259, 262, 268 Agnelli, Scipione, 21n Alberghini, Angelica, 25 Aliverti, Maria Ines, 14n Andreini, Francesco, 3, 4n, 5n, 8, 9, 11, 12, 40n, 41n Andreini, Giovanni Battista, 3, 3n, 8n, 25, 29, 29n, 40n Andreini, Isabella: actress, 13–18; authorial selfpresentation, 5, 14n, 15–17; biography, 3–9; literary reputation, 1, 6–8, 12; marriage, 4 Rime, 10, 10n, 11n; 16n, 36 Fragmenti, 12, 12n Lettere, 5, 5n, 9n, 11 Mirtilla: composition, 2, 9–11, 264; plot, 33–34; publication, 1, 9, 10n, 32n, 42; publishers, 9, 10, 42–44; similarity with other pastorals, 36–39, 40, 42; staging, 35, 41 Anderson, Michael, 32n Andrews, Richard, 17n, 23n Antonazzzoni, Marina, 25 Apollonio, Mario, 23n Aquilone, 255 Argenti, Agostino, 264 Ariadne, 129, 263

Bacchus (Lysius), 129, 153, 157, 251, 155, 263, 264, 268 Baldacci, Luigi, 35n Barasch, Frances, 27n Barbieri, Nicolò, 28n Bargagli, Girolamo, 17n, 20n, 33n Bartoli, Francesco, 12n, 25n, 26n Baschet, Armando, 8n Beau-Lieu, Mademoiselle de, 8n Beccari, Agostino, 35, 35n, 36n, 38n, 264 Beffa Negrini, Antonio, 43n Bernardi, Leonora, 33, 33n Bianconi, Lorenzo, 31n Bibbiena, Bernardo, 19 Bigolina, Giulia, 2, 258 Boccaccio, Giovanni, 31, 256, 264 Bolico (Brolo), Giulia, 24 Bonarelli, Guidobaldo, 34n Bonsone, Giulio, 42n Borgogni, Gherardo, 7 Bosi, Kathryn, 7n Bray, Bernard, 12, 12n Burattelli, Claudia, 3n, 4n, 21n, 23n Burgess-Van Aken, Barbara, 32n Byblis, 55, 257 Calliope, 163, 265 Callisto, 119, 263 Calmo, Andrea, 264 Campbell, Julie, 7n, 10, Campiglia, Maddalena, 1, 32, 32n, 40n Canace, 55, 257 287

288 Index Carpanè, Lorenzo, 36n Castiglione, Baldassar, 268 Cecchini, Orsola, 26, 26n Cecchini, Pier Maria, 22, 23n Ceres, 153, 155, 251, 255, 264, 268 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 256 Chiabrera, Gabriello, 1, 6, 11 Clubb, Louise George, 30, 30n, 31n, 36n Cocco, Ester, 22n Coller, Alexandra, 5n Commedia dell’Arte (Compagnie dell’Arte): birth, 22; Accesi, 25, 26; Confidenti, 4n, 24; Desiosi, 25; Fedeli, 3n, 4n; Gelosi, 1, 3, 3n, 4n, 5n, 7, 8, 9, 10, 17n, 18n, 24, 24n, 25, 28n, 32n, 35, 36, 37n; Uniti, 4n, 25, 26, 26n Connors, Joseph, 22n Contarini, Francesco, 37n Coreglia, Isabetta, 32, 32n, 40n Coryate, Thomas, 26, 26n Costa-Zalessow, Natalia, 33n Costa, Margherita, 33n Cox, Virginia, 3n, 6n, 16n, 33n, 36n Crescimbeni, Giovanni Mario, 6, 6n Crohn Schmitt, Natalie, 17n Cynthia (Diana), 83, 107, 233, 89, 119, 260, 261, 262, 263, 266, 268 D’Ancona, Alessandro, 19n, 21n, 23n D’Orso, Angela, 26n Dalle Donne, Sebastiano, 44, 261 Danae, 119, 263 Dante, 256, 257, 258, 261, 264 Davico Bonino, Guido, 21n De Blasi, Jolanda, 12n De’ Angelis, Francesca Romana, 3n, 12n De’ Sommi, Leone, 23 Decroisette, Françoise, 40n Dejanira, 129, 263, 264 Del Monaco, Francesco Maria, 27, 27n Della Rovere, Lavinia, 9, 9n, 49 Demophon, 55, 257

Diaz, Sara, 33n Discepolo, Girolamo, 42, 43, 261 Doglio, Maria Luisa, 9n, 10n, 40n, Dolce, Lodovico, 256 Echo, 83, 101, 103, 187, 260, 266, 267 Elam, Keir, 20n Endymion, 107, 217, 260, 262, 268 Erculiani, Camilla, 2 Europa, 89, 260 Fabbri, Paolo, 18n Fabrizio-Costa, Silvia, 11n Faccioli, Emilio, 7n, 23n, 25n Falena, Ugo, 12n Farnese, Margherita, 24 Fates, 85, 260 Fenlon, Iain, 24n Ferguson, Ronnie, 21n Ferrone, Siro, 8n, 18n Finucci, Valeria, 2n, 14n, 32n, 33n Flora, 161, 253, 265, 268 Galli Stampino, Maria, 40n Gambacorta, Pietro, 27, 27n Ganymede, 119, 263 Garaffio, Ornella, 40n Garzoni, Tommaso, 6, 6n, 24n Gerbino, Giuseppe, 30n Giachino, Luisella, 11n Giambacorta, Pietro, 27n Giannetti, Laura, 16n Gilder, Rosamond, 12n Giraldi Cinzio, Giovan Battista, 28, 28n Gl’Intronati, 20 Goethals, Jessica, 33n Gonzaga, Francesco, 25 Gonzaga, Vincenzo, 4n, 7, 15n, 18n, 21, 24, 25 Gori, Domenico, 27–28, 28n Graces, 87, 260, 261 Grasso, Nicola, 19 Graziosi, Elisabetta, 6n Guarini, Giovan Battista: 29, 30n; Il pastor fido, 2, 30, 37n, 42, 262, 263

Index 289 Guidiccioni, Laura, 7, 7n, 33, 33n Guardenti, Ezio, 14n Hacke, Daniela, 5n Halcyon and Ceyx, 55, 257 Helen, 257, 263 Henke, Robert, 17n, 31n Henri III (Valois), 7, 24 Henri IV (Navarre), 7, 8 Hercules (Alcides), 55, 129, 258, 259, 263, 264, 267, 268 Hero and Leander, 256 Hesiod, 265 Homer, 257, 261 Hymen, 57, 117, 258, 262 Icarus, 181, 266 Ingegneri, Angelo, 7, 31, 31n, 37n Jove (Jupiter, Zeus), 67, 89, 119, 185, 203, 233, 255, 189, 258, 260, 261, 263, 265, 266, 267, 268, 269 Juno (Hera), 185, 191, 255, 260, 261, 265, 267 Katritzky, M. A., 29n Kenneth, Richards, and Laura, 4n Kerr, Rosalind, 14n, 35n King, Catherine, 9n Koluta, Leo, 20n L’Estoile, Pierre de, 7n, 24, 24n Lavocat, Françoise, 30n Lebégue, Raymond, 8n Leda, 119, 263 Legname, Jacopo da, 19 Leoni, Leone, 7 Lollio, Alberto, 35n, 263, 264 Love: as Cupid, god of love, 51, 53, 55, 57, 59, 61, 63, 67, 69, 71, 81, 89, 91, 95, 103, 105, 107, 111, 115, 117, 127, 131, 153, 155, 159, 163, 167, 173, 181, 183, 185, 191, 193, 203, 205, 209, 221, 229, 231, 233, 235, 237, 239, 241, 243, 249, 255,

256, 258, 259, 268; as chaste, 31; as enduring, 31, 34; as narcissistic, 40–41; as powerful, 33–34, 259; as unreciprocated, 33–34 Machiavelli, Niccolò, 19n, 264 MacNeil, Anne, 4n, 6n, 7n, 8n, 9n,10n, 11n, 12n, 15n, 17n, 33n Majorana, Bernadette, 28n Maloni, Lucilla, 25 Maloni, Virginia, 25 Malquori Fondi, Giovanna, 12n Manfredi, Muzio, 1n, 33n Marino, Giambattista, 1, 7 Marlowe, Christopher, 256 Marotti, Ferruccio, 3n, 4n, 5n Mars, 55, 189, 258, 259, 266 Martinelli, Angela, 24 Martinelli, Caterina, 25 Mathieu, Pierre, 1 Mauri, Daniela, 8n, 9n, 10n, 12n, 41n Mazzi, Curzio, 20, 20n Mazzoni, Stefano, 3n, 14n, 36n Mazzuchelli, Gian Maria, 12n McGill, Kathleen, 29n Medea, 55, 179, 257, 265 Medici, Marie de, 8, 25 Messisbugo, Cristoforo da, 20 Miani, Valeria, 2, 2n, 32, 33n, 35n, 39n, 258, 264 Middleton, Thomas, 18n Mirabella, Bella, 18n Molinari, Carla, 44n Molinari, Cesare, 17, 20n, 22n, 23n Monteverdi, Claudio, 7, 26 Montrose, Louis, 31n Muses, 161, 163, 187, 265 Myrrha, 55, 257 Naiads, 203, 265, 267 Napaeae, 203, 267 Narcissus, 213, 267 Neptune (Poseidon), 255, 261, 269 Nicholson, Eric, 18n, 20, 20n, 23n, 24n Night (personified), 99

290 Index Orgel, Stephen, 26n Ottonelli, Domenico, 5, 5n, 22, 22n, 27, 27n Ovid, 12, 31, 40, 256, 257, 258, 260, 261, 262, 263, 265, 266, 267 Padoan, Giorgio, 21n Pales, 77, 79, 259, 263 Pallas (Athena), 191, 265, 267 Pan, 107, 217, 262, 263, 268 Parfaict, Claude and François, 12n Pasiphaë, 55, 257 Pastoral plays: 21, 29–32, 30n, 35–36; happy ending, 30; natural elements, 30; nymphs and satyrs, 36–37, 36n, 38–39, 40n; performances, 17–18, 31, 35; Petrarchan echoes, 37, 259, 260, 261, 262, 268; plots, 30; praises, 31; profeminist themes, 30, 35, 41; shepherds, 30, 31n, 33, 34 Pavoli, Margherita, 25 Pavoni, Giuseppe, 17n Pellegrina, Lodovica, 9, 9n Peneus, 163, 265 Perrucci, Andrea, 29n Petrarch, 11, 14, 27, 31, 40, 256, 259, 260, 262, 268 Phaethon, 181, 266 Phyllis, 55, 257 Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni, 258 Pieri, Marzia, 30n, 32n, 37n Piissimi, Vittoria, 7n, 17n, 24, 24n, 35, 36 Piperno, Franco, 36n Pirrotta, Nino, 25n Poliziano, Angelo, 31 Pomona, 155, 264 Ponti, Diana, 24, 25 Povoledo, Elena, 25n Proserpina, 69, 259 Puteanus, Erycius, 7, 12 Pyramus and Thisbe, 53, 256 Quondam, Amedeo, 11n

Radulescu, Domnica, 2n, 17n Ramponi, Virginia, 25 Rasi, Luigi, 12n, 25n Ray, Meredith, 2n, 11n, 40n Re, Emilio, 23n Rebaudengo, Maurizio, 3n Rees, Katie, 32n, 39n, 40n Reiss, Sheryl, 9n Residori, Matteo, 30n Revelli, Marco, 42n Riccò, Laura, 30n Rinuccini, Ottavio, 7 Romana, Flaminia, 23 Romei, Giovanna, 3n, 4n, 5n, 30n Roncagli, Silvia, 28n Rotari, Virginia, 26 Ruelens, Charles, 11n Ruzante, 20, 21n, 257 Salomoni, Angela, 24 Sampson, Lisa, 26n, 30n, 32n, Sanesi, Ireneo, 18n, 24n, 25, 25n, Sannazaro, Jacopo, 31, 258, 264, 268 Saslow, James, 17n Saturn, 189, 266 Scala, Flaminio, 16, 17n Schino, Mirella, 4n, 8n, 21n, 22, 26n, 29n Scoglio, Egidio, 19n Scott, Virginia, 4n Scylla, 55, 257 Semiramis, 55, 258 Seneca, 265 Shakespeare, William, 26–27, 28n, 256, 258, 259, 263 Shapiro, Michael, 26n Siena, Lucrezia da, 23 Silence, 99, 101, 261 Sleep, 99, 101, 261 Solerti, Angelo, 36n Speroni, Sperone, 257 Stampa, Gaspara, 2 Sterling, Charles, 7n Tasso, Torquato, 1, 9n, 11, 43n

Index 291 Aminta, 2, 33, 36–37, 36n, 37n, 39, 40, 259, 264, 267, 268 Rime, 6n, 260, 262 Gerusalemme Liberata, 261, 263 Taviani, Ferdinando, 4n, 6n, 8n, 14n, 21n, 22n, 26n, 27n, 29n, 36n Terentius, 19 Tereus, 55, 258 Tessari, Roberto, 8n, 9n, 22n Testaverde, Anna Maria, 24n Tethys, 101, 189, 261, 266 Torelli Benedetti, Barbara, 32, 32n, 33, 35n Troiano, Massimo, 22 Tylus, Jane, 28n, 30n, 40n Ultsch, Lori, 32n Valerini, Adriano, 24, 24n Varotari, Chiara, 2 Vazzoler, Franco, 35n Venus, 35, 41, 51, 53, 55, 57, 59, 61, 63, 87, 105, 107, 117, 191, 241, 249, 253, 256, 259, 260, 262, 265, 267, 268 Veronese, Paolo, 14 Vescovo, Piermario, 2n Virgil, 31, 35, 256, 258, 259, 262, 263, 265, 267, 268 Walker, Thomas, 31n Welch, Evelyn, 14n Wilbourne, Emily, 25n Wilkins, David, 9n Zephyr, 215, 253, 265, 267, 268