40247277

Substituting for Laura: Objects of Desire for Renaissance Women Poets
Author(s): Janet Levarie Smarr

Source: Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 38, No. 1 (2001), pp. 1-30
Published by: Penn State University Press
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Substituting for Laura: Objects of Desire
for Renaissance Women Poets
JANET LEVARIE SMARR
For the many women who wrote poetry in the sixteenth century, as for
their contemporary male poets, Petrarch provided the openly acclaimed
model. His Rime show up both through their topics and through the di-
rect citation of their phrases. But for women, the central theme of devo-
tion to Laura presented particular problems.
Petrarch's Laura has at least three major aspects. First, she is a woman
and the object of sexual desire. As such she is evoked as a physical being
even in her absence and after her death. Petrarch scatters throughout his
poems references to her hair, eyes, cheeks, neck, shoulders, arms, breast,
hands, feet, and general "membra." Whether he imagines her as a human
with petals falling on her lap, or a laurel tree whose arms have become
branches, or an "idolo scolpito" [sculpted idol], her hair and eyes replaced
by gold and topaz, she is a physical object of contemplation. The chief
emphasis is not only on her starry eyes, but also on her hair; for she is not
only a heavenly guide, but equally an earthly snare and entanglement.
Second, after her death, Laura is a heavenly spirit who might, if the poet
would only heed, guide him from a worldly love towards the love of God.
Third, Laura becomes a symbol, through her name, for glory - the an-
cient glory of Rome, or the modern glory of the poet - and for poetry, to
which the poet records his unflagging devotion. In this manner, she be-
comes a projection of his goals for himself. The second and third aspects
were naturally much easier for women to adopt than the first.
Women were already under moral scrutiny for writing at all, and cer-
tainly for writing about love; for a woman to versify her passionate love
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES, Vol. 38, No. 1, 2001.

Copyright © 2001 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.
2 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES
for a man to whom she is not married would requir

concern for honor. A courtesan might do this, but
would find it very difficult. The problem, however,
expressing female desire; it was also one of finding a
tute for the figure of Laura. What for a female poet co
missible object of devotion? Secondly, how should
Laura, with her curly golden hair, starry eyes, and love
for a male object? That is, how was a lovable male to be
if Laura by her chastity makes herself unavailable to Pe
worthy virtue could one attribute to a male that wo
larly unattainable? A man who for reasons of chastit
offers might well appear more ridiculous than nob
chaste hero of Marguerite's Heptameron tale 18» is su
audience of being either impotent or a fool. During
sixteenth century, women found a variety of solutio
of writing about men in the Petrarchan mode.
A few women avoid these problems by writing, at
as if they were men. Thus, for example, Laura Ter
gloria avrai, Madonna, o che vaghezza,/ quando
partita?/. . . poi che morto sarô per tua bellezza" [W
have, my lady, or what joy/when you will see this soul
. . . For I will be dead because of your beauty]; or Erme
Cerretani compares herself to the traditional moth
"allor che di mia Dea poco lontano/scorto il volto"
not far away of my Goddess' face]. Laodamia Forte
traditional language of adoration to Marguerite
Alessandro de' Medici. As Piéjus comments, "...ex
tion, son affection pour une femme, met à l'abri des cr
et, surtout, permet à la poétesse de s'approprier le d
particulier lorsqu'elle reprend à satiété les termes de
[expressing her admiration, her affection for a wom
moralizing criticisms and, above all, permits the po
the masculine discourse, especially when she repeats
of praise for the lady]. But this simply obliterates the
a woman. For those who want to sing in a female vo
solution involves finding a male who is not a threat
other involves accepting the expression of an erotic
ing to find an appropriate way to write about a be
solution is to refocus the language of love to address
gether. We will see that women poets made use of al
tions.
OBJECTS OF DESIRE AND RENAISSANCE WOMEN POETS 3
I
Three of the earlier female poets seem to have found for themselves
a similar solution of the first kind: Vittoria Colonna, Isabella Morra, and
Marguerite de Navarre. Let us first examine their parallel cases.
Vittoria Colonna, the first woman whose volumes of poetry were
published and who became an enabling model for other women writers,
shifted over time from one version of the first solution to another.2 The
earlier poems properly select as a male object her own husband. This is
not enough, however, for a woman too full of desire even for her own
husband was considered dangerously wanton. Thus Colonna adds two
more qualifications: her love is a rational rather than sensual love, and
her husband is dead. With his death, sexuality has become impossible.
This early collection of poems begins not with falling in love but
with death, not with the first sight but with the loss of visibility of the
beloved. Whereas Petrarch had not only begun with his falling in love
but had also marked various anniversaries of that initial moment,
Colonna*s poems record the anniversaries not of her first sight of Ferrante,
nor of their marriage, but only of his death. He is immediately intro^
duced as "chiaro spirto" (Al:l), "fuor d'umana veste" (Al:3) [famous
spirit, unclothed of human body]. The most frequently recurring words
for him are "sole," "lume" "luce," expressing his abstracted spiritual state.3
Although she mentions a number of times that she retains his image
(Al:2,20, 27,41,50,56,70), it is never described, nor does she - with one
exception which I will come to - describe remembered scenes of him on
earth. He exists from the start as a spirit or light in heaven who guides
her own ascending spirit away from the darkness of this world.
The only trace of his earthly existence is his honor, which for a male
and for Ferrante in particular means military glory. Thus poem 1 intro*
duces as a pair his "chiaro spirto" and "onorata spoglia" [famous spirit,
honored mortal remains]. His "splendor" is both that of a heavenly light
and the splendor of his earthly fame for "valor" and "opre chiare" (Al:4)
[famous deeds]. The only mention of any limb of his body is "tua vittrice
mano" (5) [your conquering hand], hardly a sensual image. He is the guid'
ing example towards both worldly honor and heavenly glory (Al:39,76),
and his own desire is only for honor, not (apparently) for his wife: "spirto
degno,/ del tuo sempre d'onor desir acceso" (17) [worthy spirit, burning
with your desire always for honor]. Not only can she admit no sexual
desire for him, she also cannot present herself as the object of his sexual
interest. His focus on military glory is the masculine virtue which has
deprived her of his presence, first through his absence at the wars and
then through his death. Now that he has infinite g

stringe qui de Ponorata spoglia" [no concern for yo
remains draws you here], his physical existence has
Just as the Petrarchan lover adores his lady in part f
which denies her to him, so Colonna's love is the ra
this "valor," for which the entire world honors him.
in Al:2 that her love is rational rather than sensual:
fu al désir primo e fia Pultimo segno

la bella luce al sommo Ciel gradita
che sovra i sensi mia ragion sospinse.
[the first target of desire was, and may it be the last,

the lovely light pleasing in highest Heaven
which pushed up my reason above my senses.]
Poem 14 declares that they are bonded by "Amor, Fede, e Ragion." An-
other poem affirms that the sight of his face and the sound of his words
inspired her love, but that:
Gli altri semplici sensi che non fanno

concordia, onde beltà nasce. . .
non mi fur mai cagion di gioia o affanno. ( A2: 20)
[The other simple senses which do not produce

harmony, whence beauty arises. . .
were never cause to me of joy or trouble.]
Poem A 1:62 gets explicitly at the core of the matter:
Se ben a tante gloriose e chiare

doti di quelPinvitto animo altero
volgo la mente ognor, fermo il pensero,
non fur Paître di fuor men belle e rare.
Pur perché quelle son, queste n'appare
che sian piu grate; il nostro casto e vero
parrebbe forse amor falso e leggiero
se non fosser Pinterne al cor più care.
[Even if to such glorious and famous

gifts of that unconquered proud spirit
I turn my mind always and fix my thought,

those other external gifts were not less lovely and rare.
Yet although they are so, these appear to us
more pleasing; our chaste and true love
would perhaps appear false and light
if the internal qualities were not dearer to the heart.]
This is the female poet's problem in a nutshell. There is no way to praise

the physical man without appearing "leggiero" and thus dishonored as a
woman. Perhaps intentionally, this poem immediately follows the only
one where Ferrante does appear as a physical body in a remembered worldly
scene. The scene is a monument to his victories, as he returns rich with
royal booty and displays to his wife at her request "le belle cicactrici, e'l
tempo e'l modo/ de le vittorie sue tante e si chiare" [the beautiful scars,
and the time and the manner of his such great and famous victories].
Thus the most personal bodily image we get of Ferrante is still the trium-
phant conqueror crowned with "mille glorie" and displaying the scars of
war.
Another poem (Al:8) that sounds at the beginning, because

Petrarchan echo, as if it were going to produce at last an imag
beloved, instead swerves to reject that expectation: "Quanto di be
al mondo diede" [as much of beauty as Nature gave the world] t
to be not Ferrante but all that Vittoria's heart "dispreggia" [disd
comparison with that "luce mortale ed infinita" [mortal and infinite
It is not simply that he surpasses the rest of nature, but that n
altogether set aside as an impossible realm for the object of love
poetry.
Now that Ferrante is united with God (Al:39), the two divin
jects become indistinguishable. As if her were God, it is his mer
her own, that may bring Vittoria to the triumphal palm of heaven
Like the alpha and omega,
"Ei mi mostrô il principio, e'l fin m'offerse

de la vera salute; ei farà degna
Talma... " (Al:63)
[He showed me the beginning and offered me the end

of true salvation; he will make worthy
the soul . . . ]
It seems almost idolatrous blasphemy,4 or at best an

"Signor," for her to write:
Quai ricca oblazion, quai voler pio,

qual priego umil con pura fede offerto
potrà mostrarsi equal al vostro merto,
Signor, ... ?
m'accorgo ben che'l sacrificio è 'ndegno

a voi, spirto divino, ma pur mi godo
che con quanto qui puô Talma v'onora. (Al:55)
[What rich sacrifice, what pious wish,

what humble prayer offered with pure faith
will be able to show itself equal to your deserving,
Lord, ... ?
I realize well that the sacrifice is unworthy

to you, divine spirit, but still I rejoice
that the soul honors you with as much as is within its power here.]
The final canzone, rather than praying, like Petrarch's, for aid in turning
from a human to a divine object of love, instead affirms that nothing has
ever turned her "dal primo mio divino obietto" [from my first divine ob'
ject]. The turn is unnecessary because the object of love was one with
God all along.
A remarkably different, almost opposite approach, appears in
Colonna's later poems. The editorial convention of calling the earlier
and later collections "Rime Amorose" and "Rime Spirituals is almost
backwards; for if Ferrante has, from the start, ascended into divine glory,
Christ has come down into the human body.5 The first of these poems,
regretting her previous "casto amor" aimed at "fama" (both Ferrante's
and her own), makes reference to Christ's blood and blood'drained body
as the physical ink and paper for her new poetry. Poems S 1:7 and 8 speak
of her relation with Christ in terms of "le nozze eterne" and "il caro Sposo"
[eternal marriage, dear Spouse]. Poem 12 prays "ch'io frutto felice/faccia
in Te" [that I may bear in you a happy fruit]. Christ's immense love for us,
and so for her, is often mentioned. She imagines an intimate meeting of
the soul with Christ, "a parlarLi a solo a solo" as he reveals to the soul "i
secreti Suoi nel lato aperto ... e la piagata man le porge soavamente"
(Sl:66) [to speak with him one on one alone . . . the secrets in His opened
side and offers sweetly his wounded hand]. This is far more intimate and
sweet than anything imagined with Ferrante, even in the poem where he
similarly shows her his wounds.
If Ferrante is envisioned chiefly as an indescribable light in heaven,
Christ is again and again envisioned as a physical human in scenes on
earth: his nativity (Sl:21, 153), his baptism by John (26), the last supper
(17), and of course, repeatedly, the crucifixion. Christ's triumph, explains
poem 30, came about by means of this very loving descent into the world.
Thus Colonna's contemplations of Christ on the cross take on sensual
content:
il pensier nostro. . .
sale a cotanto ardir che non pur crede
esser Suo caro membro, anzi alor sente
le spine, i chiodi, il fêle e quella ardente
Sua fiamma" (S 1:41)
[our thought. . .
rises to such boldness that it does not only believe
this to be His dear limb, but rather feels
the thorns, the nails, the bitterness and that burning
flame of His.]
Veggio in croce il Signor nudo e disteso,

coi piedi e man chiodate, e'l dextro lato
aperto, e'l capo sol di spine ornato,
avendo su le spalle il grave peso

de le colpe del mondo (Sl:77)
[I see on the cross the Lord naked and stretched,

with feet and hands nailed, and the right side
open, and the head adorned only with thorns,
having on his shoulders the heavy weight

of the world's sins.]
This is as close as we ever get in Colonna's poetry to a blazon of the

body's various parts: it is Christ's body that is celebrated feature by fea^
ture. The word "nudo" recurs frequently in these poems, not as a sexually
enticing term, of course, but as an emphasis on the vulnerable human
body (e.g., Sl:59,77,89,92). In sonnet 60, Colonna tells her
Fido pensier, se intrar non pôi sovente

entro'l cor di Gesù, basciaLi fore
il sacro lembo, o pur senti il Su'odore.
[Faithful thought, if you can not often enter

into the heart of Jesus, kiss him outside
on his sacred hem, or just smell His fragranc
This is a long way from her claim that her love for
volved the senses other than sight and hearing, or that
cannot produce beauty but only disorder. Indeed, S
sents the senses as a carefully tended and intense m
God:
Se per serbar la notte il vivo ardore

dei carboni da noi la sera accensi
nel legno incenerito arso conviensi
coprirli, si che non si mostrin fore,
quanto più si conviene a tutte Tore
chiuder in modo d'ogn'intorno i sensi,
che sian ministri a serbar vivi e intensi
i bei spirti divini entro nel core?
Se s'apre in questa fredda notte oscura
per noi la porta a Pinimico vento
le scintille del cor dureran poco;
ordinar ne convien con sottil cura
il senso, onde non sia da l'aima spento,
per le insidie di fuor, Pinterno foco.
[If to save through the night the live burning

of the coals we lit that evening
we must cover them with the wood burned to ashes
so that they don't show out,
how much more must we at all hours
enclose the senses from all surroundings
that they may be ministers to preserve alive and intense
the lovely divine spirits in our heart?
If in this cold dark night the door
is opened for us to the hostile wind,
the sparks of the heart will not last long;
it is necessary with subtle care to order

the sense, lest from the soul the internal fire
be extinguished by external snares.]
The senses here, focused on their divine object of meditation and shut to
the outer world, become the means of maintaining the soul's fire. The
holy object makes an intensely emotional and sensual love possible at last.6
Like Vittoria Colonna, Isabella Morra sought for herself an irre-
proachable male object of desire, in this case replacing erotic desire with
filial love. As for Colonna, so too for Isabella, this male is not only a
non-erotic object but is doubly safe by being far away. Her father's honor-
able loyalty to the French is the virtue which has caused his exile in
1528, leaving her bereft and longing. Thus in sonnet 3, Isabella gazes in
vain at the sea for any sign of her father's return. If Petrarch was the
stormy bark on the ocean and despairing of the port, Morra is on land
with equal desperation waiting for her father's ship to come in. As Petrarch
in Rime 126 fantasizes that Laura will come at last only to find him dead,
so too Morra, in her eighth sonnet, imagines that she is dying and that
her father will come too late. The turbulent waters through which his
ship, like Petrarch's, will have to struggle to port will declare to him,
"M'accreber si mentre fu viva,/ non gli occhi no, ma i fiumi d'Isabella"
[What swelled me was, while she was alive, not the eyes, no, but the
rivers of Isabella].7 Petrarch's absence from Laura is an aspect of his po-
etry very useful to women in a manner different from its usefulness to
men: it ensures not only the possibility of desire tout court, but the possi-
bility of desire with honor.
Just as Laura was not only a woman but a symbol of other things that
Petrarch desired, so Isabella's father also becomes a symbol of access to
all that Isabella cannot have in her present circumstances: marriage, and
recognition for her poetry. The Petrarchan "e spero ritrovar qualche
pietate" [and I hope to find some pity] of her own first sonnet laments
the wasting of her unwed youth and unnoticed talent. Her "ardo e
agghiaccio" [I burn and freeze] of poem 10 is the conflict of hope and
despair for her situation. In her second sonnet, the "bello aurato laccio"
[lovely golden noose] that was once Laura's hair is not the hair of any
person but the bond of marriage which Morra prays to Juno to make pos-
sible for her. So too it is not a beloved human but Juno as the goddess of
marriage who is praised for her "soavi odori" [sweet fragrances]. The iden-
tity of the spouse is intentionally left open and unknown; it is marriage
itself which she desires. The "dolce aura" and "auro suave" of poems 4
and 5 emanate from the King of France, in whose presence Luigi Alamanni
1 0 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES
finds both the material and the reward for his writin
hopes that this king will furnish her with a marble
crown if only she can find a way to present her verse
and 4); meanwhile, however, he is another safe inspir
tant song, of which he remains entirely unaware. It is no
is the object of desire, but the literary recognition wh
possible for her. Unlike the male poet who can make h
writing about his unrequited love, Morra, unheede
Alamanni, or the French king, languished not only fr
but also from being unknown and unread. If these ad
men - father, poet, and king - are unresponsive, Isabel
but Fortune, who becomes the cruel lady of her poem
her pain.
Like Colonna, Morra similarly shifts her focus in later poems to a
divine object of devotion. In poem 12 she prays to be able to describe
herself as the Petrarchan lover pointed out by those around her, but with
her faithful desire aimed at God: "fammi di tanto ben per grazia erede/
. . . che ognun m'additi per tua fide amante/ in questo mondo errante. . ."
[make me, through grace, the heir of so much good. . . that every one may
point me out as your true lover in this erring world]. Moreover, as in
Colonna's poetry, it is Christ who receives the only full blazon of physi'
cal beauties:
Signor, nel piano spazio di tua fronte

la bellezza del Ciel tutta scolpita
ciglia, del cor fenestre, onde si mostra

Talma salute nostra;
occhi che date al Sol la vera luce
perché non dite ancor de* suoi capelli

tanto del Sol più belli
Signor, da questa tua divina bocca

di perle e di rubini, escon di fore
dolci parole c'ogni afflitto core
sgombran di duolo . . .
Guancie di fior celesti adorne e piane
Signor, le mani tue non dirô belle
OBJECTS OF DESIRE AND RENAISSANCE WOMEN POETS 1 1
per non scemar, col nome, lor beltade;
A la vaghezza del tuo bianco piede

il Ciel s'inchina e cede.
[Lord, in the smooth space of your forehead

the entire beauty of heaven is sculpted.
Eyebrows, windows of the heart, from which appears

our dear salvation;
eyes which give true light to the sun
why not speak also about his hairs

so much more beautiful than the sun
Lord, from this divine mouth of yours

of pearls and rubies, issue forth
sweet words that unburden
every afflicted heart from grief
Cheeks smooth and adorned with heavenly flowers
Lord, your hands I will not call beautiful

in order not to spoil their beauty with the name
To the charm of your white foot

Heaven bows down and yields.]
The canzone begins and ends by acknowledging the impossibility and

the folly of describing God's beauty. It is certainly not a particularly male
beauty: the golden sun-like hair, the pearl and ruby mouth, move straight
from the image of Laura to the image of Christ, although the attributes
here give way in turn to a description of divine powers: hands that ere*
ated the cosmos, a mouth whose words comfort the afflicted, etc. Laura's
beauty serves as a set of signs for Beauty itself. But no normal human
male could be described in those terms.8
Both Vittoria Colonna and Isabella Morra, then, combine the same
two tactics: first, the selection of a safe male family member who is ab-
sent or dead and who is praised only in the most abstract manner, becom-
ing rather a symbol of potential glory and honor than a physical person;
and second, an intensely physical representation of Christ, who is ad-
dressed with all the ardent and sensual desire of a lover.
A very similar phenomenon appears in the writing

Navarre. In a recent article, Brenda Dunn-Lardeau ha
whereas in the Heptameron, Marguerite rarely describ
in detail, preferring instead to say simply that a chara
"beau," in her poem "Miroir de Jhesus Christ crucifié
blazon of Christ's body.9 On the one hand, her recurr
conflict between body and spirit leads her to disvalue
eral; thus she has no desire to linger over aesthetic des
own sake. Beauty is inevitably linked with moral issue
a major cause of sin both in the possessor and in the b
beauty of Christ is obviously intimately associated wit
tion. On the other hand, as Dunn-Lardeau shows, "it i
matter of abstract divine beauty, but also of the uglin
the body of Christ. . . . The result is a series of precis
scriptions of the beauty and apparent ugliness of Christ's
into a series of pious blazons" [my trans.] (Dunn-Larde
Marguerite begins with the crown of thorns and conti
through the face, eyes, mouth, nose, ears, hair, chin,
whole body, and heart. There is actually a double bla
beauties of Christ have become uglified in the tortures
so that his body may serve as a mirror for Marguerite
sinner. Thus she continually juxtaposes her own body
has made ugly by sinful use, with the fair but bloodi
who bears physically the marks of her sin.
The sensual physicality of these descriptions, and t
of beauty and ugliness, can be seen, for example, in th
section on Christ's face:
Face qui feust tant au Paire agréable

face de l'ange et des sainctz desirable,
comme tu es paliee et descrachee
plaine de sang et bofie et machee. (153-56)
[Face which was so pleasing to the Father,

face desired by angel and saints,
how you are become pale and spit upon
full of blood and swollen and bruised.]
The section on the mouth considers Christ's speech an

his kiss, contrasted with the usual human kiss.
O forte amour, qui la terre au ciel poulse

aproche moy de ceste boulche doulce,
et purifye et netoye ma bouche,
afin qu'un peu a la tienne elle touche . . ♦ (377-80)
[O strong love, which pushes earth to heaven,

approach me with this sweet mouth,
and purify and clean my mouth
so that it may briefly touch yours ♦ ♦ .]
The section on the nose asks
Faictz moy santir de tes doulx oignemens

Poudeur qui faict rejouir tes aymantz
et après toy courir par violance. (409-11)
[Make me smell of your sweet ointments

the fragrance that makes your lovers rejoice
and run after you violently.]
The section on the arms, naturally, speaks of an embrace; and the section
on the feet evokes specific women in their loving relation to Christ:
O piedz, desquelz la doulceur esprouva

la pécheresse, ou son salut trouva;
piedz apportans la joye aux troies Maries
en les touchant, qui tant feurent marries
de ne t'avoir au sepulchre peu veoir. (725-29)
[O feet, whose sweetness the sinner-woman felt

where she found her salvation;
feet bringing joy in touching them
to the three Maries who were so regretful
not to have seen you at the sepulchre]
O mon Seigneur, mon ame pécheresse

treshumblement a tez doulx piedz s'adresse:
ne me dictz poinct: "noli me tangere"
car s'il te plaist ma bouche lougeré
au plus proufond de ta cruelle playe, . . . (783-87).
[O my Lord, my sinful soul

most humbly addresses your sweet feet:
don't tell me 'do not touch me*
for if it pleases you, my mouth will lick
into the depths of your cruel wound.]
As Vittoria Colonna, so too Marguerite includes and

touch, smell, and taste which are normally considered
part of physical desriptions. Sensuality here is altogeth
closer one can feel to Christ the better, both for the s
realistic and vivid suffering, but also for the sake of i
sire for union with Christ and of steeping one's senses
that will make all other earthly objects lose their powe
Just as the Italian poets refer to Christ as a spouse a
ardent lovers, so too Marguerite concludes her poem w
tion leading into rapturous union:
icy se peult contempler la beaulté

icy l'on a durable loyaulté;
l'espouse icy voit son expoux a plain
et de ce doulx regard son cueur est plain;
icy l'espoux embrasse son expouse,
icy mon cueur dedans ce cueur reppose,
et en sentand ceste union si forte
icy amour mon cueur en Dieu transporte: . . .
here one can contemplate beauty,

her one has lasting loyalty;
the bride here sees her spouse fully
and with this sweet look her heart is full;
here the spouse embraces his bride,
here my heart reposes in this heart,
and in feeling this union so strong
here love transports my heart into God: . . . ]
As DumvLardeau comments, Marguerite can finally

within this celestial marriage (76).
Paradoxically, religion offered these women the best ou
most sensual expressions. All three of these women w
century. Their adoption of this similar solution prov
opened up to women the possibility of writing Petrarc
II
Two poets of the mid-century, Gaspara Stampa and Louise Labé, wrote
with astonishing human passion, though with the consequence of being
called courtesan or whore at least by some, Fiora Bassanese has pointed
out some of the shifts by which Stampa adapted Petrarchan concepts for
her own female perspective.10 For example, Petrarch's Easter
innamoramento and Laura's potential rivalry with God as the object of
the poet's devotions is changed by Stampa to a Christmas moment of
falling in love in which Collalto plays the part of God raising the humble
Mary by his attention. In this way Stampa becomes the productive fe-
male poet inspired by her male beloved, whose name, like Laura's, is
associable with poetry itself, as the Parnassian mountain instead of
Apollo's laurel (e.g., her sonnet 10).
The problem of how to describe and praise a male, however, remained
a source for deviation from the Petrarchan model. Sonnets 4-7 offer a
series of attempts at this task.11 The first two take their focus from the
heavens: sonnet 4 outlines the gift each planet has bestowed upon
Collalto, while sonnet 5 compares his features and moods to the sun,
stars, and seasons. The result in both cases is an emphasis not on his
physical features but on qualities of character. The planets have made
him intelligent, desirous of worthiness, valiant in war, eloquent and, un-
fortunately, cool towards her. The very general "bellezza" granted by Ve-
nus is the only reference to his looks. The descent of the typical blazon
from hair to brow, eyes, mouth, and so on is replaced by a descent from
planet to planet, for the honorable male body cannot be similarly anato-
mized. So too sonnet 5 sums up the usual blazon in 3 lines, again in only
the most general terms, and then goes on to focus on his actions instead:
... Il suo bel viso è il sole;

gli occhi, le stelle, e'l suon de le parole
è l'armonia, che fa'l signor di Delo.
[His beautiful face is the sun;

his eyes the stars, and the sound of his words
is the harmony made by the god of Delos.]
After this come his angers and the moments when he gives her hope.
There the changing weather indicates that even the opening blazon is
not so much a matter of physical description as of activity: his face is the
sun because its altering expressions produce her sprin

because it is radiant or golden-haired. Likewise, poem
use of this image.
Poem 6 recycles most of the attributes and vocab
without mentioning the planets. What it adds instead
his social status, wealth, and youth. A generalized beau
item in this list of "catene, che già mi legaro" [chains
me] and is clearly not the most important. The "dolce
[sweet and honored war] which his qualities cause th
because of his intellectual and social heights (cf. her pr
tree in sonnet 9). Poem 7, which asks other ladies to p
for themselves, begins at last to create a more physic
two lines really give any specific details:
di pelo biondo, e di vivo colore,

di persona alta e spazioso petto.
[with blond hair, and lively color,

tall of stature and broad-chested.]
The other lines mention his generally sweet appeara

his valor and glory. The adjectives that modify his ph
tics - vivo, alto, spazioso - give a definitely male air t
emphasizing largeness and liveliness. The sestet turn
herself, whose suffering best represents his combination
of attractive qualities and frustrating coolness.12
Fittingly enough these four poems are followed - whe
design or her first editor's - with a sonnet (8) that asks w
cult to portray her beloved. Poem after poem repeats
were able to describe him, or the declaration that she
wish or a declaration that replaces any actual descript
account of her own poetic aspirations and social perfo
15,16, etc.). Sonnet 58 repeats a similar complaint:
Deh perché non ho Pingegno e Tarte

di Lisippo e d'Apelle, onde potessi
il viso, che per sole al mondo elessi,
dipinger e scolpir in qualche parte,
poi che non posso ben ritrarr'in carte ... ?
[Ah, why do I not have the skill and art

of Lisippo and of Apelles, by which I could
paint the face which I chose as sun to the world,
and sculpt it in some part,
since I cannot well portray it on the page . . . ?]
Sonnet 19 avoids the problem of representing him by stating that his fine
qualities are, like the stars, too numerous to list. Sonnet 94 proposes to
turn from the impossible task of describing him to the representation of
her own love and pain.This is in fact her general strategy: the focus of
her representation is not the male object nearly so much as it is herself in
love. This focus on the poet-lover is, of course, very close to much of
Petrarch's poetry too. It is a feature which she can exploit to cover for a
feature which she cannot readily adopt.
The cause of his inaccessibility to her - though he is not always hv
accessible (poem 104 celebrates their night together) - is treated in two
quite different ways. On one hand, he is indeed too high for her and busy
with the duties of his rank; thus the honor that repulses her desires is a
male honor. He is, like Vittoria's husband, "a Pake cose intento" (69),
"al monte faticoso ed erto/ d'onor poggiate" (63) [intent on high matters;
you lean towards the steep and laborious mountain of honor]. This mas*
culine honor just as effectively prevents her union with him as Laura's
feminine honor did for Petrarch.13
On the other hand, he neglects her because he is unfaithful and dis-
honorable: "È questa quella viva e salda fede,/ che promettevi ... ?" (201);
"fonte di valor, conte, e d'inganno" ( 142) [Is this the lively and firm faith
you promised?; wellspring of valor, Count, and of deceit]. The image of
him sculpted in her breast is "un poche tto incostante e disdegnoso" (57)
[somewhat inconstant and disdainful]:
La fé, conte, il più caro e ricco pegno

che possa aver illustre cavaliero,
corne cangiaste voi presto e leggiero ... ? (79)
[Loyalty, Count, the dearest and richest pledge

which an illustrious cavalier can have,
how did you change it so quickly and lightly . . . ?]
These accusations, however, offer no real threat to his reputation, as they

would were similar accusations of deceitful inconstancy and lightness
published against a woman. Such reproaches can be made to a man with'
out his detriment, especially as her inferior status and hi

lie honor have already given him a good excuse.14
By blaming him for an excusable moral failure, St
completely the sense of moral guilt or anxiety that em
poetry, when he realizes that he cannot get what he
desire is improper and sinful. Petrarch must combat h
Stampa's sufferings are all caused from outside, not from
ments are those of a victim of love, without any anguish
is Collalto who should be feeling guilty as "egli in Fr
d'oblio" (81) [he stays in France loaded with forge tfu
self ^critical phrase from Rime 189 ("Passa la nave m
has been shifted from the subject to the object of St
unwavering fidelity gives her the moral upper hand
his social superiority.
Quant'ei tutt'altri cavalieri eccede

in esser bello, nobile ed ardito,
tanto è vinto da me, da la mia fede. (91)
[As much as he exceeds all other cavaliers

in being handsome, noble, and bold,
so much he is overcome by me, by my fidelity.]
Even her obvious social ambitions leave her unabashed.

ial nobility is a recurring and prominent feature of his im
him for his "nobiltate" (29) or " sangue " (77). Sonnet
with acclamation of his "grazioso aspetto" and "lucen
aspect, shining eyes], follows them immediately with
illustre" [noble blood].
Chi vuol veder Pimagin del valore,

Palbergo de la vera cortesia,
il nido di bellezza e leggiadria,
la stanza de la gloria alta e d'onore,
venga e veder Pillustre mio signore" (121).
[He who wants to see the image of valor,

the dwelling of true courtesy,
the nest of beauty and charm,
the room of high glory and honor,
come and see my illustrious lord.]
It is after all not so remarkable how the same words - valore, cortesia,
gloria, onore, illustre - recur in the poems of Colonna and of Stampa de-
spite the tremendous differences between these two women and the kinds
of love they express. This was simply the set of words necessary for praise
of a nobleman.
Yet although Stampa is herself "abietto e vile"(8) [abject and low],
she presents herself not as transgressing into improper areas but as ren-
dering service and in exchange reaping glory. Thus she praises the honor
not only of her count, but also, repeatedly, of the "schiera gentil" [well-
born social group] to whom she performs her laments, praying that these
evenings of entertainment that have raised her status may continue into
a long future:
A me si dia per grazia di gioire

con lei [schiera] molt'anni e con la fiamma mia,
che sovra il ciel mi fa superba gire. (269)15
[To me may it be granted to enjoy

with you (group) many years and with my my flame
which makes me walk proudly above the heavens.]
As the pastoral Anassilla, she prays to the gods on behalf of "questi

chiarissimi pastori,/ che me di gioia et Adria han d'onor pieno; /si che
non turbi il lor felice stato/fortuna av versa. . . " [these most famous shep-
herds, who have filled me with joy and Adria with honor; may adverse
fortune not disturb their happy state]. In return she reaps the benefits of
her association with them. Indeed, the Collalto she adores represents
through his very name this larger high society whom she celebrates, and
whose attention she wins, but to whose lofty station she cannot ever
fully ascend:
Cosi col pianto . . .

fo pietose quest'onde e questo mare;
ed ei si vive lieto ne' suoi colli. (47)
[Thus with weeping

I fill with pity these waves and this ocean,
while he lives happy in his hills.]
She names herself for the river that bathes the feet of his hill and reflects
its image (139). The male beloved is, from the very first poem and in
many others, the vehicle of a social desire for her own honor:
SI chiara fiamma merta i pregi suoi;

in questa parte io deggio esser cantata
fin ch'io sia viva, eternamente, e poi. (115)
[If a bright flame deserves its rewards,

in this area I will be sung about
as long as I live and eternally after.]
Petrarch's use of Laura to signify more than just a w

tremely useful to poets such as Morra and Stampa, wh
on their own aspirations as the object of their devotio
the necessary means for their own access to the public, t
their love poems is the one who can actually make p
success.
Louise Labé, like Gaspara Stampa, accepts the erotic n

relationship, though in this case the beloved remains uni
poetry. Like Stampa, she faces the problem of how to de
male, and one of her sonnets (21) tackles this issue head
Quelle grandeur rend Phomme venerable?

Quelle grosseur? quel poil? quelle couleur?
Qui est des yeus le plus emmieleur?
Qui fait plus tot une playe incurable?
Quel chant est plus à Phomme convenable?
[What figure, height and shade of hair are fittest

To make a man admired? and what complexion?
What color of eye most sweetens the affection?
Which deals the heart a deadly wound the quickest?]
The list of questions continues. The poet concludes that

know the general answers to these questions, but that sh
love with one particular man, who remains completely un
views such a description as not only difficult but also ir
for her, is not the rational response to obvious virtues; rath
tional, and there is no set of qualities which reliably pro
final poem, Labé warns other women who might be inc
her: you may fall in love even harder and with someon
much worse.
Like Stampa, Labé focuses on her own feelings rathe
creation of an object. Peter Sharratt notes, moreover, th
fusion of persons" in poems which begin to describe the beloved only to

shift without warning into a description of the lover herself, or leave the
object ambiguous (Labé 45). Sonnet 2, for example, gives one line to his
"O beaus yeus bruns, ô regars destournez" [O lovely brown eyes, o looks
turned away] and then immediately slips into her own sighs, tears, etc.
After a long series of apostrophes to her own condition, the male object
returns for one more line at the start of the sestet, in a list of body parts
without any descriptors: "O ris, ô front, cheveus, bras, mains et doits" [O
laugh, o brow, hair, arms, hands, and fingers] from which we have learned
nothing about him, but only something about her own loving glances.
Also like Stampa and Colonna, Labé describes her man in terms of
his actions rather than his looks. In her case, it is not the military hero
but the poet, whose hair appears only as the "blond chef couronné/D'un
laurier verd" [blond hair crowned with laurel] as, a second Orpheus, he
makes the very rocks and trees follow him. His poetry praises her in the
conventional visual blazon, as she indicates when complaining of his fick-
leness in sonnet 23:
Las! que me sert, que si parfaitement

Louas jadis et ma tresse dorée,
Et de mes yeus la beauté comparée
A deus Soleils . . .
[What good is it to me that once you praised

The silk perfection of my golden hair,
Or that to two bright Suns you would compare
The beauty of my eyes . . . ]
Perhaps because her love is for an active subject and not a picturesque
object, she remains more faithful than the man of conventional and su-
perficial praises. Certainly she has no wish to write that same kind of
poetry about him as he has apparently written about her.
Catherine des Roches took a very different approach from the poets
we have been observing. Defiantly unmarried, and protecting her chaste
reputation, she wrote an exchange of love sonnets between a male and
female whose combined names form an anagram for her own. Ovid's
Heroides, of course, had established a model for men writing texts in an
imagined woman's voice, and even exchanges between a pair of lovers.17
Catherine simply takes over this model from the other end. But this in-
troduces problems: she must compose male poems in praise of herself,
and reply without apparent loss of honor.
Catherine declares explicitly in a prefatory letter t

the ideal projected by her fantasy; as such he is simul
and safe:
Ils diront peut-estre que je ne devois pas escrire

si je suis amoureuse il ne faut pas le dire, que si je ne
faut pas le feindre; je leur respondray à cela, que j
ne feins de Pestre; car j'escris ce que j'ay pensé, et
jay veu en Syncero, lequel je ne connoy que par im
comme il est advenu à quelques grands personnages
un Roy parfaict, un parfaict orateur, un parfaict cou
je voulu former un parfaict amoureux.18
[They will say perhaps that I should not write abo

if I am in love, I should not say so; that if I am n
pretend it; I will reply to them that I neither am
tend to be; for I write what I have thought, and n
seen in Sincero, whom I know only through the i
just as it occurred to several great people to repr
king, a perfect orator, a perfect courtier, so I have w
perfect man in love.]
His name "Sincero" indicates that he is not the deceitful flatterer that
women must beware of; her name "Charité" - the name of one of the
Graces but also clearly a form of caritas - indicates the purity of her love.
The two produce an equal number of poems (both sonnets and songs),
fourteen each (adding up perhaps to the lunar 28 of the chaste Diana);
then Sincero adds two more, a sonnet directly to Charité, and a song
addressed to a rose which he is sending her.
Most of Sincero's poems are quite conventional in their themes, and
his final sonnet is a blazon of a very traditional sort,19 although unlike
the poet'lover of whom Labé complains, this one is by definition "sin-
cere." Earlier sonnets praise the lady's mouth (4), eyes (6, 8), hair (2),
and hands (7). After a dozen sonnets, his song (13) describes a fearful
premonition and dream that he and she both have become marble
statues, "Sans parler et sans mouvoir" and without "sentiment /
aucunement" [without speaking and without moving . . . (without) any
feeling], and that her image is no more responsive to him than was Daphne
to Apollo after she became a laurel tree.This perhaps expresses the fear
that poetry, especially the conventional kind of poetry, can produce at
best a dead, still image, an object , while the lovable qualities of speech,
motion, and feeling are those of an unfixable subject.
Charité, whose sonnets follow his dream poem, joins other women
poets in avoiding the physical description of her beloved. Her opening
sonnet (15) emphasizes that she is describing not what is but what she
wishes for, and the wishes have more to do with behavior than with looks:
Je veux que Sincero soit gentil et accord,

Né d'honnestes parens; je veux que la noblesse
Qui vient de la vertu orne sa gentilesse,
Et qu'il soit tempérant, juste, prudent, et fort.
Je veux que Sincero m'ayme jusqu'à la mort,
Me retenant du tout pour unique maistresse;
Je veux que la beauté avecques la richesse
Pour le favoriser se trouvent d'un accord.
Je veux en Sincero une douce eloquence,
Un regard doux et fin, une grave prudence,
Un esprit admirable, et un divin sçavoir,
Un pas qui soit gaillard, mais toutesfois modeste,
Un parler gracieux, un agréable geste:
Voilà, qu'en le voyant, je desire de voir.
[I wish that Sincero be kind and agreeable,

born of honest parents; I wish that his good birth
be adorned with the nobility that comes from virtue,
and that he be temperate, just, prudent, and strong.
I wish that Sincero love me until death,
keeping me as his unique mistress;
I wish that beauty and wealth form
a mutual agreement to favor him.
I wish in Sincero a sweet eloquence,
a sweet and lovely look, a serious prudence,
an admirable spirit and a divine wisdom,
a step that is hearty yet at the same time modest,
a gracious speech, a pleasant gesture:
here is what I want to see when I see him.]
Despite the final line, there is almost nothing visual about this portrait.
Sincero's poems tell us that Charité has green eyes and blond hair, but
these kinds of details are irrelevant to Charité 's image of Sincero. We get
instead the active subject with the motions, speech, and feelings which
that marble image excludes: the classic moral virtues, eloquence, learn-
ing, and an ever-faithfiil love, adorned (this is an ideal, after all) by class,
wealth, and only the most generic "beauté."
Absolute fidelity is the most important of these attri

eral poems return to that theme, declaring - in contrast
stinate fidelity - that her love will last no longer than h
23). In sum, what is most lovable about him is that he
continually loves her: "Car je ne veux jamais que Ton m
(23) [for I never want to be half- loved]. Catherine des
doubtedly aware of the narcissism in this ideal. In her witty
following up his earlier declarations that her portrait is
his heart, she eagerly opens her lover's breast and sees w
that her image really is there. Sincero's final reply, imm
invites her to look at it but ends by warning lest she f
herself. As her preface disarmingly asserts, she does not, lik
need "serviteurs" to sing her praises, for women are qui
chanter elles-mesmes" (183) [to sing about themselves]. T
mate chaste love, for which the fantasized male object is
essary intermediary or mirror.21 Given the nature
continually fantasized object that enables the poet's self-
ativity, Catherine's poetry is truly Laura's revenge.
Ill
Women occasionally addressed love poetry not to a dead or fantasized

male but to an inhuman object. In the examples considered below, the
object bears some connection to the poet's own identity, in part objecti-
fying her sense of her own self. This might be done with a touch of hu-
mor, as in Catherine's famous sonnet to her distaff {Oeuvres 292-93). As
Sankovitch has observed, Catherine addresses the distaff as if it were her
husband, ready to defend her honor, and promises never to leave its
"honneur domestic" for "un bien estranger" [a foreign good]; yet she asks
its leave to allow her occasionally to hold a pen as well, offering to use
her pen to praise the distaff, by writing about "vos valeurs" (cf. Sankovitch
52-53). The poem performs what it promises, moving away from the usual
female activities in order to praise them. Yet a confusion of gendering
qualifies both spinning and writing. "La quenouille" is also called
"m'amie;" one might think of it as the female duty contrasted to the male
work of writing. However, the writing tool is also female, "la plume," and
is paired in the final line with "le fuzeau" (the spindle), a masculinized
replacement for "quenouille." Moreover, even with its feminine noun
"quenuoille," its role in the poem is clearly that of husband, and its
"valeurs" is the "valore" which was the standard male equivalent of fe-
male "bellezza." Meanwhile the pen, as a "bien estranger," becomes a lover.
The implication is clearly the illicit or at best suspect nature of a woman's

writing at all, even when the writing is in praise of housework. The ac^
tivity of writing itself has become a dangerous masculine object of desire.
And yet female housework has also become a beloved male. For the fe^
male subject, all desirable activities take on the opposite gender, even
while she tries at the same time to identify with them both as her own.
Perhaps one of the most delightful examples of the replacement of a
human male object with a very different object of desire occurs in the
poetry of Veronica Gambara.22 Dramatically faithful to her dead husband,23
Gambara wrote a wide variety of poems. Some address her spouse; others
seem to be songs of a more generic nature, to no one in particular. Sev^
eral sonnets, however, redirect the Petrarchan language of love to places,
especially her own property. In one sonnet Petrarch's blessing of the ex*
act moment when he saw Laura's eyes (e.g., Rime 13 and 61) is turned by
Gambara into a blessing of the time when she can see again her country
estate (37). The "bel paese" and the famous "chiare fresche et dolci acque"
that in Petrarch's sonnets (61 and 126) are simply the setting for those
"duo begli occhi" and the other "belle membra" of his lady, have become
here the object of affection itself.
Poi che per mia ventura a veder torno

voi, dolci colli, e voi, chaire e fresche acque,
e te, che tanto alia Natura piacque
fare, sito gentil, vago ed adorno,
ben posso dire avventuroso il giorno,
Cost sempre vi sia largo e cortese,

lochi beati, il ciel, come in me spento
è, se non di voi soli, ogni desio.
[Since to my good fortune I return to see

you, sweet hills, and you, clear and fresh waters,
and you, to whom it so pleased Nature
to make you, gentle site, lovely and adorned,
well can I say "O happy day!"
so always may the Heavens be to you generous and kind,

blessed places, just as in me is extinguished
every desire except for you alone.]
Like Laura, the place itself is the recipient of Nature's

"Vago e adorno," another descriptive phrase for Laura, ha
to this "sito gentil," sole object, claims the poetess, of he
frequent celebrations of "gli occhi" has turned into
Even the "e te," where we might expect a person introdu
be still referring to the location. On one hand, the pla
retreat from duties into pleasure. On the other hand,
Morra celebrated the men who could raise their statu
ready at the top of society, celebrates the property w
power.
Another of Gambara's poems, this time a set of four octaves, simi-
larly addresses her home region as the substitute for a beloved partner
(43):
Con quel caldo desio che nascer suole

nel petto di chi torna, amando assente,
gli occhi vaghi a vedere, . . .
con quel proprio voi, piagge al mondo sole,

fresche acque, ameni colli, e te, possente
più d'altra che il Sol miri andando intorno,
bella e lieta cittade, a veder torno.
[With that hot desire that tends to arise

in the breast of one who returns, loving and absent,
to see the lovely eyes, . . .
with that same desire I return to see you

slopes unique in the world, fresh waters, shaded hills, and you
more powerful than anything else which the Sun regards in
its round journey,
beautiful and happy city.]
Once again we might be momentarily fooled into thinking that with "e
te" we are finally getting to the person who makes this scene so lovely;
but the Sun's own beloved object of gaze is a town, not a lady, or rather a
town which maintains the gender of a lady, allowing Gambara to take on
the traditionally male poet's voice and phrases. As Petrarch's sun or Apollo
gaze on their shared object Laura, so Gambara's sun gazes down on her
own beautiful and beloved city. The poem ends with two ideas common
to love lyric: that the object is far too high for the "roco e basso" Ian-
guage of the poet, and that its inexpressible but remembered image re-
mains "in mezzo il core,"
A third poem (38), addressing "Onorate acque, e voi, liti beati" [Hon-
ored waters, and you, blessed shores], uses again the motif of the impossi-
bility of the poet's "basso ingegno" finding a style lofty and adorned enough
to celebrate properly and immortalize the "grande altezza" of "l'almo ed
ameno/ vostro sito, di grazia e valor pieno" [the great height of your dear
and lovely site, full of graces and of value]. The descriptor "di . . . valor
pieno" suggests a male beloved, but refers to the place, while the "grande
altezza" which in a man might signify honor or status has become the
physical height of the hills. Like the beloved lady on whom Heaven or
Nature has bestowed all gifts at once (cf. Petrarch's 154 or 248, imitated
by Stampa as we noted above) , this place is the one on which "il ciel . ♦ .
appieno/ sparge i suoi doni, a tutti altri negati." According to Pia Mestica
Chiappetti, this poem refers, like the first, to Correggio and the poet's
own estate.24 It implies a claim, therefore, that the property she governs
is better than any other and is the special object of divine favor. Satisfac-
tion with the place is a kind of self-satisfaction, less direct than but not
far removed from that of Charité at seeing her own image in Sincero's
heart. These are expresssions of contentment rather than of longing. If
Petrarch sees Laura's image in rocks and trees while wandering through
the mountains, Catherine des Roches and Veronica Gambara address with
pleasure and gaiety the components of their own home scene.
In sum, women found a variety of ways to adapt the lyric and to
construct its object of desire. One was to turn it to religious purposes,
finding in Christ an object for the sensual outpourings that might not be
expressed for any other man. Another was to write about the very prob-
lem of describing a male beloved; or to turn from the "bellezza" of the
lady to the "valor" of the man, a sort of Venus to Mars shift, which en-
tails abandoning physical descriptions for descriptions of action and so-
cial status. Finally, women could turn the familiar phrases of traditional
love lyric to objects neither human nor divine: a spindle, a country es-
tate, a town. Women of quite different social status and situation shared,
as women, some of the same solutions. Meanwhile, the experimental va-
riety of approaches was surely one of the enlivening features of a highly
conventional sixteenth-century poetry.
University of California at San Diego
NOTES
1. Jolana De' Blasi, Antologia delle Scrittrici Italiane dalle origini al 1800 (Firenze: Casa
Editrice "Nemi," 1930) 198-99, 203-04. Marie-Françoise Piejus, "Les poétesses siennoises
entre le jeu et l'écriture," Les femmes écrivaines en Italie au Moyen Age et à la Rennaissance.
Actes de colloque international Aix-en-Provence, 12, 13, 14 novembre 1992, (Aix-en-
Provence: Publications de l'Université de Provence, 1994) 320-22.
2. Alan Bullock, in the notes to his edition of Vittoria Colonna's Rime, Scrittori,
d' Italia 270 (Bari: Gius. Laterza & Figli, 1982) identifies three phases of her writing: 1)
an early phase of "amorous" poetry, culminating in the collection of poems given by
Vittoria to Francesco della Torre and in the unauthorized 1538 edition of her poems; 2)
a middle phase in which she is writing both "amorous" and "spiritual" poetry; and 3 ) a
mature, religious phase of "spiritual" poetry, culminating in the collections which she
sent to Marguerite de Navarre and Michelangelo and in the Venetian edition of 1546
(see esp. pp. 224-28, 325-26, 359-60, 381-86). All quotations of the poetry are from
this edition, which numbers the poems in four sections: amorose (Al), amorose dis-
perse (A2), spirituali (SI), spiritual! disperse (S2).
3. Petrarch, in contrast, even after Laura's death recalls "Gli occhi di chi'io parlai si
caldamente,/et le braccia et le mani e i piedi e'l viso .... le crespe chiome d'or puro
lucente" (292). Luciana Borsetto, "Narciso ed Eco: Figura e scrittura nella lirica
femminile del Cinquecento: esemplificazioni ed appunti," in Nel cerchio della luna, ed.
Maria Zancan (Venice: Marsilio, 1983) 199-203, comments that the descriptions of
male beauty by Vittoria Colonna, Chiara Matraini, and Veronica Gambara follow the
neoplatonic focus on the eyes and their light, on the virtues, and on the spirit.
4. Suzanne Therault, Un Cénacle humaniste de la Renaissance autour de Vittoria Colonna
châtelaine dflschia (Paris: Librairie Marcel Didier, 1968) comments similarly, "On reste
confondu devant les proportions géantes que la marquise n'a pas craint de donner à sa
louange" (145). However, Dennis McAuliffe, "Neoplatonism in Vittoria Colonna's Po-
etry: From the Secular to the Divine," in Ficino and Renaissance Neoplatonism, ed. Konrad
Eisenbichler and Olga Pugliese, University of Toronto Studies 1 (Toronto: Dovehouse
Editions, 1986), notes: "For Vittoria and her contemporaries poetry is also imitation
and its mimetic effort is, in Platonic terms, to bypass the imperfect, created world and
imitate the divine archetype" (104).
5. McAuliffe comments, ". . . Vittoria's acceptance of the evangelical message meant
accepting the immanence of the Son along with the transcendence of the Father" (109).
He too prefers "earlier" to "secular" as the descriptor for her poems to her husband,
arguing that "It is an intensely spiritual poetry from the earliest sonnets" (101). I would
go even further in my claim that the traditional adjectives for her earlier and later
poems should almost be reversed, although "amorous" would have to be understood as
an intense religious love.
6. Patricia Cholakian, "Signs of the 'Feminine': The Unshaping of Narrative in
Marguerite de Navarre's Heptameron, Novellas 2, 4, and 10," in Reconsidering the Re-
naissance, ed. Mario Di Cesare (Binghamton: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Stud-
ies, 1992) 243, observes similarly in re Floride oilieptameron 10: "Only God can satisfy
Floride's desire for both love and honor."
7. The texts of her poetry can be found in Giovanni Caserta, Isabella Morra e la
società méridionale del cinquecento (Matera: Edizioni Meta, 1976) and also in Benedetto
Croce, Isabella di Morra e Diego Sandoval de Castro (Palermo: Sellerio editore, 1983);
the quotations here are identical in both volumes.
8. M. A. Grignani, "Per Isabella di Morra," Rivista di Letteratura italiana 11:3 (1984)
526 and 546, has noted Isabella's "quasi erotico" description of Christ and application
to him of the "canone della bellezza." So too Sara Adler, "The Petrarchan Lament of
Isabella Di Morra" in Ada Testaferri, éd., Donna: Women in Italian Culture, U. of Toronto
Italian Studies 7 (Toronto: Dovehouse Editions, 1989) 212 and 215, notes the use of
language from Petrarchan descriptions of Laura in Isabella's representation of Christ,
and "her sensuous rapture."
9. Brenda Dunn-Lardeau, "La Beauté dans le Miroir de Jhesus Christ Crucifié de Mar-
guerite de Navarre," Carrefour 17:2 (1967) 67-85. For a text of the poem, see the edi-
tion by Lucia Fontanella, Pluteus Testi II (Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 1984).
10. The best account is Fiora Bassanese, Gaspara Stampa (Boston: Twayne, 1982) 53-81;
but see also Bassanese 's "Gaspara Stampa" in Italian Women Writers: A Bio^bibliographical
Sourcebook (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood P, 1994) esp. p. 408; Patricia Phillippy,
"Gaspara Stampa's Rime: Replication and Retraction," Philological Quarterly 68:1 (Win-
ter 1989) 1-24; and Luigi Malagoli "II Petrarchismo della Stampa," in La Liricia del
Cinquecento e Gaspara Stampa (Pisa: Libreria Golliardica, 1966) 26-30.
11. Quotations are taken from Gaspara Stampa Rime, introd. Di Maria Bellonci, note
di Rodolfo Ceriello (Milano: Rizzoli Editore, 1954).
12. Sonnet 121 similarly invites the reader to behold her lord, but only in the most
general terms, and once again emphasizing his social status; women are particularly
warned not to look too long lest, like her, they be wounded with love. Fiore Bassanese,
in a talk to the Renaissance Society of America (1997) on "Gaspare Stampa's Male
Subject" indicates poem 7 as an example of the masculinized Laura. While his broad
chest and height indicate his maleness, in much of the poem "sexually neutral attributes
are employed: Vago e dolce aspetto,' youth, blondness, fair complexion. Collaltino is
represented as Laura's twin." Even his "un poco empio in amore" reflects the traditional
"donna crudele."
13. In Gaspara Stampa, Bassanese suggests that Stampa views herself and Collalto as a
Venus and Mars pair: she is all love, he all military boldness and honor.
14. Luciana Borsetto, suggests that the model for this combination of military honor
and amatory infidelity is Aeneas (216-17).
15. Cf. sonnet 268, addressed similarly to the "schiera gentil": "ho, la vostra mercé,
trovato pace./ Cosi piaccia ad Amor di stabilire/ questa mia breve gioia; ..."
16. Louise Labé, Sonnets, Edinburgh Bilingual Library 7, introd. and commentary by
Peter Sharratt, trans, by Graham Dunstan Martin (Austin: University of Texas, 1972).
Ann Rosalind Jones, "Assimilation with a Difference: Renaissance Women Poets and
Literary Influence," Yale French Studies 62: Feminist Readings, spec, issue of Yale French
Studies 62 (1981): 135-53, points out that Labé sonnets 2, 10, and 21 struggle openly
with the problem of applying the traditional blazon to a male as there are no estab-
lished standards of male beauty that would provoke a female's love.
17. Carlo Vecce, "Vittoria Colonna: il codice epistolare della poesia femminile," in
Ulysse éd., Les femmes écrivaines en Italie, discusses this model as an entrée for a woman,
such as Vittoria Colonna, to write her own verse epistle (229-31). One can also think
of Petrarch's Rime 359 with Laura's imagined reply from heaven, or perhaps more dan-
gerously because in vita, Benucci's capitolo to Tullia d'Aragona followed by his "Risposta
a se stesso in nome della medesima Signora Tullia." Francesco Bausi, "Le rime di e per
Tullia d'Aragona," in Ulysse éd. Les femmes écrivaines en Italie observes: "il capitolo in
nome e in persona di una donna è génère assai diffuso tra Quattro e Cinquecento,
soprattutto in àmbito cortigiano (284).
18. Madeleine des Roches, Catherine des Roches, Les Oeuvres, éd. Anne Larsen
(Geneva: Droz, 1993), 182. Compare Isabella Andreini's reference to her own verses
for the stage: "questi finti adori/ ... ne le scene imaginati amori. . . " in De Blasi
Antologia, 251-52.
George Dillier, Les Dames des Roches. Etude sur la vie littéraire à Poituers dans la
deuxième moitié du XVIe siècle (Paris: Droz, 1936) argues that Sincero represents Claude
Pelle jay, who is said by a contemporary to have written two bo

Catherine, and was certainly long associated with the Roches
gues that Charité 's reproaches to Sincero for "vice" and infidelity
after all, an ideal lover; and that specific references in the poem
Most of Diller's examples of specific details, however,
sixteenth-century poetry. It is possible that Pellejay was a mode
Catherine's claim of inventing the whole situation is self-protec
sible that Catherine wished to construct for herself the role o
(Ariosto's Melissa is the explicit role model in her sonnet 19), th
but educable male, who gives the female a position of moral sup
also note 20. There is no strong reason for Diller to assume, on
connection between Pellejay and Sincero, that Pellejay wrot
that - since the lovers' dialogue echoes those sonnets - that he c
the dialogue as well. This is simply piling up a house of cards.
19. Tilde Sankovitch, French Women Writers and the Book: Myt
(Syracuse: Syracuse UP, 1988) agrees with George Diller's asses
love poems in general "are no more than slick literary exercises
(57).
20. One sonnet, which refers to Sincero's departure for Poland, is the strongest sup-
port for the notion that Claude Pellejay is the real Sincero (see Larsen's note on 278,
and Diller pp. 42-44). He may in part be so; nonetheless Charite's opening poem is
obviously a wish-list rather than a report. Even if she had a particular male in mind,
what made it possible for her to write about him was to present him as her own fantasy;
and many of the poems seem just that. Writing his poems herself reinforces her claim
that he is her creation, a claim which she repeats in a letter (the passage is cited by
Diller 39-40). In this regard I agree whole-heartedly with Ann Jones, The Currency of
Eros: Women's Love Lyric in Europe, 1540-1620 (Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1990):
Whatever Catherine's relationship to Pellejay was, Sincero is a literary construction,
possibly almost entirely a fanstasy character (64-65). Jones reads this set of sonnets as
a "courtesy book . . . written to encourage masculine self- improvement" (64) and as "a
manual for proper behavior in the Neoplatonic salon" (68).
21. Cf. Jones's comments "she produces a duet sung in her own honor" (68), and
where she argues that Catherine is reversing the usual male practice of constructing a
female who legitimizes the poet's self (75). In Sperone Speroni's widely read "Dialogo
di Amore," Tasso argues that all women love themselves, viewing their own portrait in
their lover; men, however, seeing perfection in woman and not in themselves, love in
the woman what they themselves lack, in Sperone Speroni, Opere I (Rome: Vecchiarelli
Editore, 1989) 29-36. Catherine may well have been aware of this theoretical account,
which would serve her own desire to maintain a chaste autonomy. Diller's assumption
that Catherine could not possibly have written such praise of herself as in Sincero's
verses, "moins d'un orgueil incroyable" (41 and 45), flies in the face of Catherine's
explicit claim that she would rather praise herself than find male "serviteurs" to do it
for her. It also overlooks the humorous tone which Catherine employs, a humor
self-mocking as well as making fun of male rhetoric. The whole sequence is easily seen
as a delightful game, just the sort of precious game-playing that Diller himself observes
(e.g., 143-51) is a major facet of this bookish and unsentimental woman's writing in
general.
22. Veronica Gambara, Rime, ed. Alan Bullock (Firenze: Leo S. Olschki, 1995).
23. See Richard Poss, "Veronica Gambara: A Renaissance Gentildonna," in Women
Writers of the Renaissance and Reformation, ed. Katharina Wilson (Athens: U of Georgia
P, 1987) 49-50.
24. Veronica Gambara, Rime e Lettere, ed. Pia Mestica Chiappetti (Florence: G.
Barbera, 1879) 366. The text of the poem is on 25-26.

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Substituting for Laura: Objects of Desire for Renaissance Women Poets

Author(s): Janet Levarie Smarr

JANET LEVARIE SMARR

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES, Vol. 38, No. 1, 2001.

for a man to whom she is not married would requir

then through his death. Now that he has infinite g

fu al désir primo e fia Pultimo segno

[the first target of desire was, and may it be the last,

Gli altri semplici sensi che non fanno

[The other simple senses which do not produce

Poem A 1:62 gets explicitly at the core of the matter:

Se ben a tante gloriose e chiare

[Even if to such glorious and famous

I turn my mind always and fix my thought,

This is the female poet's problem in a nutshell. There is no way to praise

Another poem (Al:8) that sounds at the beginning, because

"Ei mi mostrô il principio, e'l fin m'offerse

[He showed me the beginning and offered me the end

It seems almost idolatrous blasphemy,4 or at best an

Quai ricca oblazion, quai voler pio,

m'accorgo ben che'l sacrificio è 'ndegno

[What rich sacrifice, what pious wish,

I realize well that the sacrifice is unworthy

Veggio in croce il Signor nudo e disteso,

avendo su le spalle il grave peso

[I see on the cross the Lord naked and stretched,

having on his shoulders the heavy weight

This is as close as we ever get in Colonna's poetry to a blazon of the

Fido pensier, se intrar non pôi sovente

[Faithful thought, if you can not often enter

Se per serbar la notte il vivo ardore

[If to save through the night the live burning

it is necessary with subtle care to order

Signor, nel piano spazio di tua fronte

ciglia, del cor fenestre, onde si mostra

perché non dite ancor de* suoi capelli

Signor, da questa tua divina bocca

Guancie di fior celesti adorne e piane

Signor, le mani tue non dirô belle

per non scemar, col nome, lor beltade;

A la vaghezza del tuo bianco piede

[Lord, in the smooth space of your forehead

Eyebrows, windows of the heart, from which appears

why not speak also about his hairs

Lord, from this divine mouth of yours

Cheeks smooth and adorned with heavenly flowers

Lord, your hands I will not call beautiful

To the charm of your white foot

The canzone begins and ends by acknowledging the impossibility and

A very similar phenomenon appears in the writing

Face qui feust tant au Paire agréable

[Face which was so pleasing to the Father,

The section on the mouth considers Christ's speech an

O forte amour, qui la terre au ciel poulse

[O strong love, which pushes earth to heaven,

The section on the nose asks

Faictz moy santir de tes doulx oignemens

[Make me smell of your sweet ointments

O piedz, desquelz la doulceur esprouva

[O feet, whose sweetness the sinner-woman felt

O mon Seigneur, mon ame pécheresse

[O my Lord, my sinful soul

As Vittoria Colonna, so too Marguerite includes and

icy se peult contempler la beaulté