Petrarch's Fragmenta: The Narrative and Theological Unity of Rerum vulgarium fragmenta by Thomas E. Peterson (review)

New readings that claim to reassess our great literary figures of the past are expected to take their starting point from a perspective that is free of old prejudices and commonplaces that too often cloud our critical approach. This is even more relevant in the case of Petrarch whose poetic authority has not only shaped the course of Italian and European literature, but whose work also stands at the threshold of our modernity.

For these reasons, a new book on Petrarch is bound to generate a degree of expectation for new insights on this great literary figure about whom too much and too little is known. Thus, it is with a sense of disappointment that one reads Thomas Peterson's book on Petrarch because what he proposes, under the guise of a new analysis, is the same old Petrarch that we have always known, if not more conservatively so. What is new in this study is the notion of narrative that, for the author, extends across the length of the fragments. What is old is the notion that this narrative, covering compositions of different types and different themes, is essentially a journey to God.

Rather than taking into account recent scholarship on Petrarch, the author has chosen to rely only on the authority of past and traditional scholars and, in particular, those "(mostly writing in Italian) who corroborate the unitary character of Petrarch's work)." This choice aims to eliminate all those works, mostly non-Italian, that may question both the unity of Petrarch's work and his theological reading of the Fragments. One wonders how this one-sided view can be acceptable as a scholarly contribution to the study of Petrarch.

What is "new" in Peterson's work is problematic because in order to maintain the Fragments's unity of narrative and theology, his reading must necessarily do violence to both the poems and to other key texts. For instance, on the authority of his chosen scholars, Peterson manages to erase Petrarch's critique of Augustine's Confessions in the letter of Mount Ventoux because "the archetype of the spiritual journey it [the ascent] presents is analogous to the journey of the Fragmenta.' He adds that "it is imprudent to insist overly on the emulation of Augustine." He believes, rather, that "the state of saintliness [!] arrived at in the 'climb' by Francesco is thus comparable to that of his namesake and model, St. Francis."

The Secretum, likewise, is not a self-critique in contrast to Augustine's model but "in many respects it is an internal monologue." He downplays the importance of the Secretum as "not a work of self-admonishment but rather a lively discussion of questions of poetic theology grounded in the expectation that poetry can speak to questions of the eternal through a discourse of the will." It is clear from this "new" reading that the author, by essentially restating what (some) past scholars have written before him, has fallen in Petrarch's trap. By now, we should know better than to take Petrarch at his word. Although his claim that he never read Dante or Boccaccio has always been disputed by scholars, its implications for a general reading of his work have also been ignored. The tendency to always take him at his word and to read him literally has only produced the same critical platitudes and has only consolidated the fame and the glory that Petrarch hoped to receive from posterity.

One must keep in mind that Petrarch was not just a great poet but also a great rhetorician. His work does not always mean what it appears to be saying. In order to avoid falling in the trap of reading him literally, one must not be blinded by the aura that centuries of scholarship have created around him and his work. This may be the only way to gage the extent and the depth of his poetic...