Dolce style nuovo

“Dolce style nuovo” ( Italian: Dolce stil nuovo - “sweet new style”) is a literary trend that arose on the verge of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in the large trading cities of Tuscany and Romagna - Florence, Arezzo , Siena, Pisa, Pistoia, Bologna and others .

Presented by the lyrical products of numerous poets of the XIII-XIV centuries. ( Guido Guinicelli , Onesto de Bologna , Guido Cavalcanti , Lapo Giani , Cecco Angolieri , Dante Alighieri , Dante de Mayano , Guido Orlandi , Chino da Pistoia , etc.). It is characterized by a completely peculiar solution to the central problem of medieval lyrics - the relationship of "earthly" and "heavenly love." While the religious lyric poetry of mariolatry flourishing in this era glorifies Madonna in terms of earthly passion, calling for renunciation of carnal sin, while courtly poetry, praising the chivalry of the lady, glorifies the joy of physical possession, - poetry Dolce stil nuovo finds permission the conflict of both worldviews in the complex symbolism of images. The image of the earthly mistress is not eliminated, but turns into a symbol - into the incarnation and revelation of the deity accessible to sensory perception. Worshiping the divine essence in her, the poet in love worships God himself. Thus, love for a woman is sanctified - “earthly love” merges together with “heavenly love”. This peculiar "philosophy of love" Dolce stil nuovo defines all the features of its plot and form. He is characterized by the majestic image of his beloved, “noble and honorable,” “clothed with humility” (Dante), “shining more than the stars” (Gvinitselli), “carrying love in his eyes” (Dante); in praising her - always under an assumed allegorical name (beloved Cavalcanti is called Spring - Primavera, beloved Dante - Blessed - Beatrice) - poets often resort to the epithets of church hymns: “pia”, “gentilissima”, “benedetta”. He is also less typical of the image of his beloved - a poet, philosopher and secular theologian, who penetrated into all the subtleties of the intricacies of a love scholasticism, who knows how to capture and capture the deepest twists of secret love. Discussion of the problems of love in the form of the exchange of sonnets is one of Dolce stil nuovo's favorite tricks. To "everyone whose spirit is submissive and noble in heart," draws, for example. Dante has his mysterious sonnet about his beloved, who tasted his flaming heart from the hands of Love, and receives answer-unraveling sonnets from Guido Cavalcanti, Chino da Pistoia and Dante da Mayano. Loving relationships in Dolce stil nuovo lack the forms of vassal ministry that are so typical of courteous lyrics: the love, usually embodied in the form of a beautiful young man, is conceived by the poets of Dolce stil nuovo as a elemental force “penetrating through the eyes into the heart” and inflaming it with the desire of “that came down from heaven to earth - to reveal a miracle ”(Dante). But this love is at the same time imbued with purely earthly obscurity (Dante glorifies God as “sire de la cortesia”), it entails so alien to monastic asceticism and the mystical ecstasy of “virtue” of joy and fun (allegrezza, leggiadria, gajezza).

The plot Dolce stil nuovo defines its tonic, style and language. Complex symbolism of images, sometimes threatening to go into confused allegorism; uniformity and frequent recurrence of situations and symbols; combination of epithets and formulas of secular and religious lyrics; an introduction to the pathetic high style of philosophical, theological and even legal terms; a play on words and the general mystery of expression - all this combines in dolce stil nuovo with the depth and sincerity of lyrical emotion, with amazing brightness of vision (researchers call Guido Guinicelli “un visuale”), with a pantheistic perception of the world. In Dante’s sonnets, a magic boat glides along the sea, taking the poet with his friends and lover, and in the moment of his grief the stones, sympathizing with “intoxication of great trepidation”, “shout: die, die!”

To determine the cultural and historical foundations of this peculiar phenomenon, it is necessary to recall that it originates and flourishes in the centers of commercial capital of this era - in urban communes of central Italy. “These communes knew how to protect themselves from the claims of church authority as well as from the assassination attempt of emperors. The life of the prosperous bourgeoisie was unfolding in them magnificently, the urban culture was conceived in them, from which humanism and the Renaissance later had to draw their strength ”( Wexler ). While only the rising urban class of the northern countries either blindly masters the forms of knightly culture or, struggling with it, contrasts it with resurgent forms of church ideology, in particular the mystical cult of the Madonna, the merchant bourgeoisie of Italian cities, “these notaries submissive to the love of love and wealthy citizens” (as Fossler wittily characterizes them), he already feels strong enough to, having assimilated the cultural elements of both other classes, push himself away from them and create a new form on this basis - prov herald of the ideology of the Renaissance . New forms of love relationships, alien to reminiscences of the feudal system, the absence in the image of a beloved of a noble lady - the wife of the seigneur - and her ascension through other complex symbolism borrowed from religious lyrics; sincerity of lyrical emotion, due to the free choice of the heroine and absent in the eulogies of the troubadours ; less attention to the external form and deepening of the philosophical content of the lyrics - all this, as Wexsler (E. Wechsler , Das Kulturproblem des Minnesanges, 1909) convincingly proved, arises from the completely different economic situation of a senior troubadour knight dependent and financially secure " trade patrician "free cities of Tuscany and Romagna.