Petrarch: The Canzoniere, or Rerum Vulgarium Fragmenta - Softcover

"Mark Musa, in editing and translating Petrarch's Canzoniere, has performed a wonderful service to the English-speaking reader. Here, in one volume, are included the poet's own selection of the best lyric verse he wrote throughout his life, accompanied by brief but useful notes ... " - Chronicles "As well as skillful and fluent verse renderings of the 366 lyrics that make up this milestone in the development of Western poetic tradition, Musa offers copious and up-to-date annotation to each poem ... along with a substantial, sensitive, and intelligent introduction that is genuinely helpful for the first-time reader and thought provoking for Petrarch scholars and other medievalists." - Choice

Petrarch's characterization of the hapless lover has become an archetype. Indeed, in many of his poems on the pain and the bitter pleasure of love, we inevitably recognize a vivid and timely picture of ourselves. Humble sinner, aesthete, contemplative, man of the world, secretly tormented spirit, droll observer and advocate of life, Petrarch's protagonist is as richly complex as the age he lived in. The 366 poems of Petrarch's Canzoniere represent one of the most influential works in Western literature. Varied in form, style, and subject matter, these "scattered rhymes" contain metaphors and conceits that have been absorbed into the literature and language of love. In this bilingual edition, Mark Musa provides verse translations, annotations, and an introduction co-authored with Barbara Manfredi.