Embodying freedom of expression in art and life, the figure of the Italian improvvisatrice exerted an important influence on British women writers of the Romantic period. Extemporaneous authors such as Teresa Bandettini, Fortunata Sulgher Fantastici and her daughter Massimina, and Corilla Olimpica were celebrated in Italy, as well as in Britain, for their public performances and opened up new expressive possibilities for contemporary women writers. This essay examines the phenomenon of the Italian improvvisatrici as models for British women writers, and thus as an important source for the development of a female Romanticism in British literature. An initial reconstruction of the distinctive features of this popular figure in the Italian tradition provides an introduction to its diffusion in British culture, where it flourished in narrative and fictional forms, rather than in practice. The differences, as well as the contacts, between the Italian and British traditions will be highlighted through references to the figures of Corilla Olimpica, the inspiration for Madame de Staël’s Corinne, and Letitia Elizabeth Landon, who often represented improvvisatrici in her poems, and whose methods of composition were frequently compared with those of an extempore poet.
The Influence of Italian Improvvisatrici on British Romantic Women Writers: Letitia Elizabeth Landon's Response
BAIESI, SERENA
2005
Abstract
Embodying freedom of expression in art and life, the figure of the Italian improvvisatrice exerted an important influence on British women writers of the Romantic period. Extemporaneous authors such as Teresa Bandettini, Fortunata Sulgher Fantastici and her daughter Massimina, and Corilla Olimpica were celebrated in Italy, as well as in Britain, for their public performances and opened up new expressive possibilities for contemporary women writers. This essay examines the phenomenon of the Italian improvvisatrici as models for British women writers, and thus as an important source for the development of a female Romanticism in British literature. An initial reconstruction of the distinctive features of this popular figure in the Italian tradition provides an introduction to its diffusion in British culture, where it flourished in narrative and fictional forms, rather than in practice. The differences, as well as the contacts, between the Italian and British traditions will be highlighted through references to the figures of Corilla Olimpica, the inspiration for Madame de Staël’s Corinne, and Letitia Elizabeth Landon, who often represented improvvisatrici in her poems, and whose methods of composition were frequently compared with those of an extempore poet.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
