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7 Marinism and the Madrigal, I (Book VII) The New Poetics of Book VII Tempro la cetra, e per cantar gli onori di Marte alzo talhor lo stil e i carmi, ma invan la tento, ed impossibil parmi ch'ella gia mai risuoni altro ch'amori. I tune my lyre, and to sing the honors of Mars sometimes I uplift my style and songs; but in vain I strive, and it seems hopeless to me that it will ever resound with anything but love songs. Non e di gentil core chi non arde d'amore. Ma voi che del mio cor 1'anima sete, e nel foco d'amor lieta godete, gentil al par d'ogn'altre havete il core, perch'ardete d'amore. He is not of graciousheart who does not burn with love. But you, the spirit of my heart, happily frolicking in the flame of love, you have a heart as gracious as any other, because you burn with love. 165 At first thought, love may hardly seem anoteworthy new subject in Monteverdi 's music. But in fact most of the amorous "carmi" of Book VII treat it in a way that sets this collection apart from Book VI. They abandon the laments, brokenhearted separations, and nostalgic remembrances found there and rejoice instead in carefree ruminations on Cupid's pleasures. The suffering and loss of Book VI have given way to stylized flames flickering in happy, refined souls—as in this feeble madrigal, placed right after "Tempro la cetra" seemingly in order to confirm and extend its program: N 1614 MARINO had announced the themes of the third part of La lira with these Anacreontic lines. Five years later, set to music in the guise of an operatic prologue complete with instrumental s'mfome and ritornelli, they signaled the novel poetic themes and musical styles of Monteverdi's Concerto. Settimo libra de madrigali a i. 2. j. 4. etseivoti, con altrigeneri decanti. I THE EMERGENCE OF NEW IDEALS Dunque non e, non e di gentil core Thus he is not, is not of gracious heart chi non arde d'amore.' who does not burn with love. The reappearanceof poetic madrigalslike this one among Monteverdi's texts of 1619 is symptomatic of the new orientation. As we have seen, they had been entirely absent from Book VI, displaced there by the weightier genre of the sonnet. Also revealing of new trends is the fact that nine of the seventeen madrigals set in Book VII are by Guarini and Marino. Guarini had been completely absent from the Sixth Book; indeed that collection stands alone among the eight madrigal books Monteverdi published during his lifetime in this lacuna, an especially striking fact if, as seems likely, two of the Guarini settings published in Book VIII (1638) were composed before 1614.2 We shall seebelow how this return to Guarini in Book VII betokens a new musico-poetic direction rather than a simple return to the epigrammatism of the Fourth Book. The role of Marino's lyrics in determining this new orientation also needs qualification since his eclogue-like sonnets had done so much to set the very different tone of Book VI. Only two of Marino's six poems in Book VII are sonnets, however: "Tempro la cetra," the dedicatory lyric that proclaims Marino's and Monteverdi's amorous stil novo, and "A quest'olmo, a quest'ombre, et a quest 'onde," a sonnetto boschereccio reminiscent of Book VI in poetic theme and musical setting. Perhaps Monteverdi set this text in Mantua, orjust after he arrived in Venice , while still occupied with the publication of the Sixth Book. In any case, thereis no doubt that it breathes the nostalgic pastoral ethos of that earlier collection and stands out as a striking anomaly among the other works of Book VII. The remaining four poems by Marino are allmadrigals of the most modern and fashionable sort: miniature lyrics enumerating through varied situation and conceit the erotic delights of the kiss. Monteverdi's settings of these poems—"Vorrei baciarti , o Filli," "Perche fuggi tra' salci," "Tornate, o caribaci," and "Eccomi pronta ai baci"—mark his principal encounter with the Marino cherished by his younger contemporaries. In Book VI Monteverdi had explored a more tradition-bound side of Marino's poetic personality, lyrics that attracted him for the serendipitous formal possibilities they offered, for their evocation of rich pastoral topoi, and for their melancholic cast. Now, at fifty, he was initiated into the sensual...

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