Narrative poetry

Abstract

From Boiardo to Ariosto Narrative poetry in the Cinquecento essentially builds on the impressive initiatives of Pulci and Boiardo in the late fifteenth century. The truncation of the Innamorato in 1494 (see above, pp. 172–5) left dozens of Boiardo's fascinating narrative inventions unresolved and a host of fabulous creatures in a state of suspended animation. To take only the prime players, how, if at all, was the impossible love of Orlando for Angelica to be concluded? What was to be the course of the courtship of Ruggiero and Bradamante, separated as soon as they met, and separated as well by their adherence to different and warring religions? What was to be the result of Agramante's expedition into France? By what means was Charlemagne's empire to be delivered from peril? Lesser characters too had vanished into the unknown: what fate had befallen the always improvident Astolfo, tricked by Alcina? Boiardo's death in the year of invasion deprived his readers of answers, but the intense magnetism of the mystery provoked others to attempt a conclusion. Ariosto was not the only poet to resume the matieère provided by the Innamorato . In 1505, 1514 and 1521 the Venetian Niccolò degli Agostini provided a fourth, fifth and sixth book of continuations to Boiardo's remnant. Raffaele da Verona, known as Valcieco, in 1514 added a fifth book of his own, and in 1518 Pierfrancesco de' Conti da Camerino wrote yet another, sixth book, tracing the life of Ruggiero's and Bradamante's son, Rugino.

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