The «theatre of the world» of a Venetian Horace: on the book of Odes by Guido Casoni

Abstract

Guido Casoni’s Ode are the first book of Italian vernacular rhymes to be entirely inspired by the model of Horace, understood as an element of modern classicism in dialogue with the lyric books and poems by Bernardo and Torquato Tasso, Giovan Battista Marino and Antonio Bruni. The essay traces the editorial history of the collection and reflects on the emergence of such founding concepts of Casoni’s classical-baroque poetics as friendship, serious hinting and the dissemination of knowledge, the competition between sister arts, and the relationship between artistic creation and divine Creation.