Petrarch's Letters to Classical Authors

Petrarch's Letters to Classical Authors

It is hardly necessary to dwell upon Petrarchs extensive correspondence. He was the leader of the learned men of his age; and it is common knowledge that all his prominent contemporarieswhether in the political world, or in the religious world, or in the scholarly worldwere numbered among his friends. Corresponding so incessantly with all men and on all topics, Petrarchs letters soon grew into an unmanageable mass. One day in 1359 (Frac., Note to Fam., XXIV, 13) Petrarch, with a sigh, consigned to the flames a thousand or more papers, consisting of short poems and of letters, merely to avoid the irksome task of sifting and of correcting them. He then noticed a few papers lying in a corner, which (after some hesitation) he spared because they had already been recopied and arranged by his secretary (Praefatio ad Socratem, I, p. 15). Petrarch divided these few letters into two groups, dedicating the twenty-four books of prose epistles to Socrates (Praefatio, loc. cit., and Fam., XXIV, 13), and the three books of[Pg x] poetic epistles to Marco Barbato (Praefatio, loc. cit., pp. 15, 16, and Fam., XXII, 3). Farther on in his prefatory letter to Socrates, Petrarch points out the vigor and the courage to be seen in his earlier letters, and advances extenuating circumstances for the laments which begin to crop out in the later ones. He excuses these by arguing that they were occasioned by the misfortunes which befell his friends, and not by those which he had suffered in his own person. At this point Petrarch does not lose the opportunity for comparing himself with Cicero. The passage gives so completely the information needed by the reader that it is hereby translated in full (Praefatio, I, p. 25): ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 47859
Author: Petrarca, Francesco
Release Date: Jan 3, 2015
Format: eBook
Language: English

Contributors

Translator: Cosenza, Mario Emilio, 1880-1966