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Conti and Rolli

The first two Italians who were to influence in a different measure the history of Shakespeare's reception in Italy, arrived in London in the same year, but their departure from Italy had taken place at different dates. While Rolli left for London directly in 1715, Conti had left Italy much earlier, in 1713, to go to Paris.

Conti, a passionate supporter of cartesian rationalism and English empiricism, had left his cultivated Venetian environment determined to get in touch with the original sources of the two movements^, anticipating what was to become typical 18th century scientific cosmopolitanism. The first stop on Conti's European itinerary was Paris, where his social and economic position ensured him access to noble and academic circles, allowing him to meet the most notable philosophers and mathematicians of the day. Scientific interests drove him on to London , where, while leading an intense social life, he participated as mediator for peace in the famous Newton-Leibniz quarrel, the only practical result of which being that he lost Newton's friendship. In the same year, 1715, he switched to literary interests (which had been only a minor occupation until then) owing to his bad health which obliged him to take up a lighter activity than science, as he explains in the preface to the first volume of his works . *

* According to Conti's official biographer Giuseppe Toaldo, he "Volea bere al fonte, e udire i sistemi e le teorie dalla bocca dei loro autori: era poi cosi avido di sapere che mal tolerava il ritardo delle stampe per istruirsi delle novelle scoperte”. Quoted by G. Gronda in "Antonio Conti e l'Inghilterra”, op.cit., p. 136.

According to Toaldo: ”11 soggetto del nostro viaggio altro non fu che la curiosità di vedere il Newtono e la grande ecclissi", quoted by G. Gronda, ibidem, p. 137.

Cfr. Prose e Poesie, op.cit., p.i.

In tutto il corso della mia vita non mi applicai che alla Filosofia, alla Matematica, ed alla Teologia naturale e rivelata; sferzato da gravi infermità, che mi molestarono in Inghilterra e in Francia, mi applicai alla Poesia per un accidente, che io chiamerò fortunato, perché mi servì molto di sollievo per distrarre lo spirito senza fatica nelle disgrazie dimestiche che mi accaderono, (...)•

He had contacts with the Italian group around Rolli, which included both temporary visitors like Scipione Maffei and the Florentine doctor Antonio Cocchi, and residents like the diplomat Giuseppe Riva, but Conti never had any close relationship with Rolli himself^ although they had many literary and musical interests, as well as publishing activities, in common.-’ While Conti kept rather distant from critical debates on English literature during his three-year stay in London, Rolli, although not such an interesting and open critical mind as Conti, became involved in internationally important discussions with Voltaire. Conti's appreciation of English literature was deeply influenced by his classicist background^ and consequently he was attracted into the cultural circle of the Duke of Buckingham, where Dryden's teaching was still very much alive. It was for this reason that he failed to come into contact with the new English trends in literary aesthetics determined by Locke's and Hutcheson's theories and their emphasis on the inter-subjectivity of mind and things (later to lead to the birth of the Romantic movement) through which he could have had a better understanding of Shakespeare.7 If he could not understand Shakespeare fully, though, he certainly admired him and this meant he occupied a rather progressive position in England at a time when Pope had only just started to re-evaluate Shakespeare, still mixing praise and criticism.** Temple, Pope, and Addison were among Conti's favourite reading during

^ In this connection cfr. G. Gronda, op.cit., p. 143:

(...) il Conti si ricordò di lui (Rolli) solo raramente e di sfuggita, quasi che la diversa classe sociale che teneva distinti a Saint James il nobile scienziato veneto e il precettore d'italiano dei tìgli di Giorgio II si fosse riflessa anche sui loro rapporti letterari e personali.

^ Both Conti and Rolli were interested in Racine and Milton, and both translated Athalie. Conti also wrote a preface to the translation of Lucrece edited by Rolli in 1717. Cfr. ibidem.

® According to J.G. Robertson, op. cit., p. 108, Conti was too "rigidly bounded by the canons of French taste" to be able to really appreciate typical English authors.

n

Cfr. V. Macllamm, "Antonio Conti and English Aesthetics", Comparative Literature, Voi.8, 1956, pp. 12-27.

® Cfr. G. Schiavello, La fama di Shakespeare nel secolo 18°: Camerino, 1903.

his stay in London, and traces of their influence, especially regarding the high value attributed to the imagination, were to be found in Conti's subsequent work in Paris, where he returned in 1718. He took a decidedly anti-modernist position in the French literary "querelle", another reflection of his deep respect for the humanist tradition of Anglo-Saxon classicism^, in which he saw stylistic clarity and correctness assuming the substance of a moral ideal.

Conti returned to Italy in 1726, and the publication, in the same year, of his first Roman tragedy 11 Cesare was warmly welcomed by the Italian literary world and staged with remarkable success. Toaldo's account^ of how Conti took up the writing

19

of his first tragedy follows closely Conti's own account , as well as inevitably quoting Conti's fundamental parallel with Corneille. However what is especially fascinating is the biographer’s reverent attention to Conti's personal feelings which slowly lead to the decision to write II Cesare, in contrast to the very swift rhythm of the actual writing of the tragedy:

(...) il suo Cesare (...) comparve alla luce alla fine di questo stesso anno (1726). ed avea cominciato undici anni prima in Inghilterra. Dimorando nella campagna di Chisington, e leggendo i poeti inglesi, gli venne alle mani il Sasper, che può chiamarsi il Cornelio d'Inghilterra, il quale compose una Tragedia sulla morte di Giulio Cesare, in cui tra i molti difetti regnano delle parti molto belle. Conversando poi col Duca di Buckingham, che avea pur fatte due Tragedie collo stesso soggetto diviso nel Cesare e nel Bruto, s'innamorò a poco a poco del carattere di Cesare, e cominciò a studiarlo negli Storici Romani, e qui concepì la prima idea della sua Tragedia, di cui non fece allora che abbozzare qualche scena. Ritornato in Francia dopo qualche anno ripigliò il suo piccolo abbozzo; vi cambiò e vi aggiunse molte cose, e si mise a verificarlo seriamente, del che venne a capo in due mesi.

Conti's return to Italy, far from being a spiritual retirement to self-limiting Q

Cfr. Gr. Gronda, "Antonio Conti e l 'Inghilterra", op.cit., pp. 146-149.

10 In this connection cfr. Conti’s opinion on The Essay of Man, as an example of serious moral commitment in comparison with the abstract pelrarchism of Italian poets, who did not realize that "...il poeta, secondo l'etimologia del nome, è creatore, e che la facoltà civile l'obbliga a dirigere l'opere della sua creazione all'utile della società." Quoted ibidem, p. 147.

* * Cfr. Prose e Poesie op.cit., Tomo Secondo e Postumo (edited by G. Toaldo), cui precedono le Notizie spettanti alla sua vita, e suoi studi. In Venezia presso Giambattista Pasquali, MDCCLVI, Cap. XIV "Suo ritorno in Italia 1726, Edizione del Cesare", pp.60-61,

Cfr. supra p.S3, "Milestones...". 12

provincialism1-*, started a lifelong (his death occurred in 1749) strenuous re-elaboration o f up-to-date accumulated learning in an extraordinary variety of cultural fields (philosophy, science, aesthetics, poetry, theatre) all unified by the same search for the transgressive potentialities of modern lay culture. Such a multiplicity of converging interests was enough to confirm Conti as perhaps the most rebellious of early 18th century Italian intellectuals. The other side of the coin, however, was, as pointed out by J.G. Robertson,1'* that his intellectual and literary work, so distinctively marked by his long residence abroad, covered an excessively wide range of different fields, and the sum of it was in the end disappointing. Conti's insatiable thirst for knowledge and vast ideas were not accompanied by a sufficient tenacity o f purpose to bring them to concrete completion and the result was that he dissipated an enormous amount of energy. His turning from scientific to literary interests was probably a primary cause o f the rather inconclusive nature of his career, but, as he himself explained,1^ it was also a source of existential gratification. On the whole, though, Conti can well be considered "one of the central figures for the development on the continent of interest in (...) English letters".1**

As already mentioned, many differences mark the life, works, and character of Rolli and Conti the first two protagonists of the history o f Shakespeare's reception in Italy. Although Rolli belonged to a lower social category than Conti, this did not * ***

Cfr. M. Ariani, op.cit., p.87:

Ritorno che serviva al Conti per denunciare e misurare l'enorme arretratezza culturale dell'Italia all'altezza del 1726, come risulta da un passo della Risposta al Martello dove si scaglia duramente contro un certo tipo di provincia intellettuale del tempo: "Non è facile il credere, come i fanciulli inglesi, allevati in tali Accademie parlino con maggiore intelligenza e franchezza del peso dell'aria, della varia refrangibilità de'raggi, delle leggi della percossa, delle forze centrifughe, e de' moti uniformi e accelerati, che certi professori in Italia, non in altro consumati, che in asciutte e litigiose quistioni scolastiche.1'

*** Cfr. J.G. Robertson, Studies on thè Genesist.,.1 op.cit., p. 108.

Cfr. supra pp.64-65 "Rolli and Conti".

Cfr. G.E. Dorris, op.cit., p.229.

prevent him from becoming a key figure in the cultural interchange between England and Italy.

He went on playing this important role for nearly thirty years (1715-1744), translating and teaching Italian to the royal family and members of the nobility, engaging in polemic attacks on Voltaire and Sir Robert W alpole, providing libretti (called by him "dramatici scheletri") for the most famous musicians of the day and editing numerous Italian literary works, "mosso dalle istanze di non pochi Cavalieri inglesi amantissimi della nostra poesia". But, most important o f all, for thirty years Rolli represented the continuum element in cultural relations between "the Italian world of the Arcadia and the English world of the D unciad".^ As a pivotal element of the Italian intellectual community in London, he kept direct links with great Italian scholars like Muratori (the most important reference point for all those who, both inside and outside Italy, tried to develop and promote Italian culture) and poets like Metastasio.

The last period of Rolli's stay in England was not a happy one. At all times he had felt himself to be a foreigner in a strange land but, as time went on, after completing the translation of Paradise Lost, this uneasiness became real despair. In a letter to Riva, who had been promoted to a higher post in Vienna, Rolli wrote on 3rd June, 1735:

Sono stanchissimo di questo Fango, e fumo, e umidaccio eterni, dove non è facile ad onesto et abile Forestiero far fortuna neppure mediocrissima, e bisogna spender molto per vivere non da bestia, per non far debito & essere (Obbligato a far il Ministro per proprio scampo, e in conseguenza misera Figura.

In 1736 he again wrote to Riva, asking him to use whatever influence he could to get him appointed at the emperor's court as Zeno's successor. But Metastasio had long since been settled upon for that post, and Rolli's hopes o f any concrete possibility of competing against him were soon ruled out. * 18 19

^ Cfr. P. Rolli, 'L etter to the readers’ in Satire e Rime di M. Ludovico Ariosto, Londra, per Giovanni Pickard, 1716, p.2110.

18 Cfr. G.E. Dorris, op.cit., p.10.

19 Quoted ibidem, p.153.

Rolli's departure from England marked the end of his group; the disruption of Rolli's Italian circle in London was so radical that no points of contacts could be established with it by Rolli's successor as apologist for Italian letters in England, Giuseppe Baretti. The friend of Dr. Johson belonged to a different generation and a different age from that of Rolli, one that took for granted the accomplishments of Arcadia, and could therefore react against its decline: the age of Alfieri and revolution, rather than that of Metastasio and absolutism .^ However, despite the lack of continuity, Baretti found himself in the same antagonistic position as Rolli against Voltaire and in favour of Shakespeare. Through their action great successive steps were made in the parallel process of liberation from the French cultural yoke and increased knowledge of Shakespeare’s work in Italy. It must be recognized that it was no small achievement on Rolli and Baretti's part to have defied the greatest polemicist of the age and to have emerged with some honour from this battle. It is not surprising, on the other hand, that this was accomplished by the first two Italians (apart from Conti's mixed feelings towards Shakespeare) who had a really deep appreciation and understanding of Shakespeare.

As mentioned before,^ 1 Rolli's battle against Voltaire first started with his remarks on the latter's essay on epic poetry. In his essay, Rolli attacked Voltaire's judgments on various Italian authors and also examined, for the first time in Italy, Voltaire's epic poem Henriade. He found it lacked invention while at the same time being strangely crowded with "la Lubricità, la Religione, la Discordia, l'Amore, il Papa, i Profeti, l'Inquisizione, lTnfemo". Rolli was surprised to see that while Voltaire in his essay blamed the Italian epic poets for mixing Christian ideas and pagan mythology, in his own epic poem he had put in "Marte per la guerra, Imeneo per il matrimonio, (...) una spada immersa, nelle acque infernali di Temi (...)".

Cfr. ibidem, p. 157.

Cfr. supra, p.40, footnote no. 10, "The era of translations'.

On the whole, Rolli was able to find a number of inconsistencies and errors in the essay and Voltaire’s reaction was quite reasonable;^ he took all of Rolli's suggestions and corrections into consideration when revising the essay for the French public, so that the final version was quite different from the first.^3 Th¡s meant

"conceding a victory seldom won against the great Frenchman”.

When Rolli finally went back to Italy in the quiet retirement of his home town Todi, he only produced (along with a small collection of poems) one last work there, which was published posthumously in 1776. This was a collection of bitter satirical epigrams on London life under the title Marziale in Albion, and it is not difficult to trace its origin back to Rolli's feelings of discomfort and weariness during his last years in England. Although the circumstances of his past life (the long stay in heretical lands, the classical/pagan flavour of his poetry, the publication of Marchetti's translation of a "fiendish" author like Lucretius, his interest in the "arch-heretic" Milton, as well as in the "barbarian" Shakespeare) did not put him in the best of lights in papal Italy, he deeply enjoyed Todi's quiet life and beautiful climate. The peaceful contemplative mood of his last years is reflected in the following passage from his poem "Ad Aglauro":

Or non respiro aer umido e freddo e denso fumo; ma di colli a cui dier l’utili piante

Bacco, Cerere, Pallade e Pomoruu Paria leggera sott'azzurro cielo. 3

“ Voltaire's "vis polémica", however, could not be entirely absent on this occasion and in a letter to J. Vemet, dated "14 Septembre 1733", in a witty categorization of poets and non-poets, he managed to list Rolli among the latter: "qui concque ecrit en vers doit ecrire en beaux vers, ou ne sera point lu. Les poetes ne reussissent que par les beautes de detail; sans cela Virgile et Chapelain, Racine et Campistron, Milton et Ogilbi (John Ogilby), le Tasse et Rolli seraient egaux". Cfr. The Complete Works of Voltaire, ed. T. Besterman, Correspondence 86, II, 1730-1734, Instituí et Musée Voltaire, University of Toronto Press, 1969.

^ For a detailed discussion of the changes made by Voltaire in the light of Rolli's criticism, cfr. S. Fassini, op.cit., pp.83-99. Cfr. also an appendix following the above article in which Fassini publishes a letter to the Pope's legate in Vienna, Domenico Passionei, in which, rather triumphalistically, Rolli boasts of his victory over Voltaire as follows: "Lo sconsiderato Voltaire ci assail in questa metrópoli, scrivendo in lingua inglese, ma sentí contanto pungersi nella stessa lingua da me ch'ebbe tosto a pentirsene per I'inaspettata ripercossa e non ardl far replica alcuna." p.99.

^ Cfr. G.E. Dorris, p.198-199. Cfr. in pp. 198-203 a very thorough comment on Rolli's essay and his controversy with Voltaire.

^ Quoted by W. Binni, "La letteratura nell'epoca arcadico-razionalista", op.cit., p.404.

Voltaire

It is a well-known paradox in European literary history that Voltaire has been the strongest supporter of classicist dramatic rules and at the same time the greatest contributor to the spread of Shakespeare’s popularity all over Europe.1 An equally well-known fact is Voltaire's contradictory attitude towards an author he had made known outside England for the first time, carried away by enthusiasm on first discovering him1 2, but whom he criticized for his faults and whom, as time went on, he attacked more and more violently.

Voltaire formed his views on Shakespeare just after his friend Pope had published his edition of Shakespeare's works in 1725, and was strongly influenced by Pope's critical approach, according to which Shakespeare affords "the most numerous as well as the most conspicuous instances, both of Beauties and Faults of all sorts" and in his work "many of the Parts are childish, ill-plac'd and unequal to its grandeur".3 This "Beauties-Faults"

1 In his first Lettre, read by D'Alembert at the Académie Française on 25lh August 1776,

Voltaire reminded the distinguished audience that he himself, half a century earlier, had been the first Frenchman to learn English, the first to introduce Shakespeare to the continent and to translate him, the first to make known Pope, Dryden and Milton, even the first who had dared to explain the great Newton, and do justice to the profound wisdom of Locke. All these claims are perfectly justified. A