CIC. To whom then are the rules of Aristotle useful? TANS. To him who, unlike Homer, Hesiod, Orpheus, and others, could not sing without the rules of Aristotle, and who, having no Muse of his own, would coquette with that of Homer." 1 A similar antagonism to Aristotle and a similar literary individualism are to be found in a much later work by Benedetto Fioretti, who under the pseudonym of Udeno Nisieli published the five volumes of his Proginnasmi Poetici between 1620 and 1639.2 Just before the close of the sixteenth century, however, the Poetics had obtained an ardent defender against such attacks in the person of Francesco Buonamici, in his Discorsi Poetici; and three years later, in 1600, Faustino Summo published a similar defence of Aristotle. The attacks on Aristotle's literary dictatorship were of little avail; it was hardly necessary even to defend him. For two centuries to come he was to reign supreme on the continent of Europe; and in Italy this supremacy was hardly disturbed until the days of Goldoni and Metastasio. 1 Opere, ii. 315 (Williams's translation). 2 Cf. the diverse opinions of Tiraboschi, viii. 516, and Hallam, Lit. of Europe, pt. iii. ch. 7. LITERARY CRITICISM IN FRANCE CHAPTER I THE CHARACTER AND DEVELOPMENT OF FRENCH CRITICISM IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY LITERARY criticism in France, while beginning somewhat later than in Italy, preceded the birth of criticism in England and in Spain by a number of years. Critical activity in nearly all the countries of western Europe seems to have been ushered in by the translation of Horace's Ars Poetica into the vernacular tongues. Critical activity in Italy began with Dolce's Italian version of the Ars Poetica in 1535; in France, with the French version of Pelletier in 1545; in England, with the English version of Drant in 1567; and in Spain, with the Spanish versions of Espinel and Zapata in 1591 and 1592, respectively. Two centuries of literary discussion had prepared the way for criticism in Italy; and lacking this period of preparation, French criticism during the sixteenth century was necessarily of a much more practical character than that of Italy during the same age. The critical works of France, and of England also, were on the whole designed for those whose immediate intention it |