Prof Peter Brand and Dr Davide Messina
Prof Peter Brand and Dr Davide Messina will make a presentation of two recent publications, joining in a well-tempered conversazione on Italian pastoral and rustic poetry.
Prof Brand will illustrate his metrical translation of Torquato Tasso’s Aminta (1573) with readings and music. Aminta is a seminal play in the pastoral genre with a long and successful history of musical adaptations, and played a pivotal role in the development of Italian opera between the Renaissance and the Baroque.
Dr Messina will present his critical edition of the rediscovered autograph manuscript of La Tina (1637), a sequence of fifty bawdy sonnets in the rustic style by Antonio Malatesti, also known in the Florentine academies as Aminta Setaiolo. The manuscript was presented to John Milton on the occasion of his visit to Florence in 1638, and is now preserved at the National Library of Scotland. In keeping with a moderately dithyrambic spirit, wit and wine will blend in a reception to follow.
Prof Peter Brand has been Chair of Italian and Vice-Principal of the University of Edinburgh. He is Fellow of the British Academy and Commendatore della Repubblica Italiana. His translation of Aminta has been published as part of the volume Overture to the Opera: Italian Pastoral Drama in the Renaissance (UCD Foundation for Italian Studies, 2013).
Dr Davide Messina is Senior Lecturer in Italian at the University of Edinburgh. His edition of La Tina has been published by the MHRA (Critical Texts, 2014).
Free event but booking essential: rsvp.iicedimburgo@esteri.it