Agnolo Firenzuola

Firenzuola, Agnolo 

Born Sept. 18, 1493, in Florence; died June 17 or 27, 1543, in Prato. Italian writer.

Firenzuola, who was a monk from 1518 to 1526, is the author of Discourses on Love (1523–24; published 1548), a book of short stories modeled on Boccaccio’s Decameron. The stories are narrated by aristocrats who profess Firenzuola’s own aesthetic ideals of Neoplatonic love and beauty. Traditional in plot, they depict the joys of sensual love and the hypocrisy of monks.

Firenzuola had a superb command of the classical Italian literary language. His most artistically important books of short stories were The Golden Ass (published 1550) and First Version of the Discourses of the Animals (1541), which he described as “translations in a modern version” of Apuleius and the Panchatantra. Firenzuola formulated aesthetic ideals typical of the literature and art of the High Renaissance in his Discourses on Women’s Beauty (1540). He also wrote the comedies Trinuzia and I Lucidi (an adaptation of Plautus’ Menaechmi).

WORKS

Opere. Edited by A. Seroni. Florence, 1958.
In Russian translation:
Soch. Introductory article by A. K. Dzhivelegov. [Moscow-Leningrad] 1934.

REFERENCE

Fatini, G. “A. Firenzuola.” In Autori vari: I minori, vol. 2. Milan, 1961.

R. I. KHLODOVSKII