Montemayor's Diana, Music, and the Visual Arts by Bruno Mario Damiani (review)

Book Reviews91 literature: if one is a dedicated reader of theory, there can hardly be time enough in life to read literature, and it is no wonder some scholars have specialized in theory where others have specialized in poetry. Of course, most contemporary literary scholars are energetic readers of theory and most critical analysis is explicitly identified with rarities of critical debate. The result is the emergence of metatheoretical commentary to assess the nature of the theories and the consequences of their application to various forms of literature. As a metametatheoretical commentator, Culler undertakes to scrutinize dominant modes of metatheoretical discussion. His own discoursive mode is deconstruction. This is not so much the ponderous epistemological excursus of the Derridian discourse, but an organizing metaphor for concentrating on all the range of theoretical discussion that focuses on the act of criticism in such a way as to evaluate its premises, its tropes, and its strategies. (I would have also included here the phrase "its ideologies," but Culler appears studiously to eschew the Jamesonian versions of the debate. One could also wish his superb reading of stages in the development of feminist criticism, as one form of deconstructionist reading, had been extended to ethnic and Third-World critical-ideological programs, at least in their deconstructive rather than partisan aspects.) This genre consequently assumes the structure of a classical reading of a range of theoretical and metatheoretical works toward both elucidating the ways in which deconstructionism may be considered the dominant mode of contemporary criticism and how using it as a major metaphor of such criticism allows for the continuity among a large body of theoretical writings. Culler does not provide a programmatic statement concerning deconstructionism, but rather a lucid and internally coherent assessment of the issues and texts involved. As a consequence, this book will receive the same enthusiastic reception his previous contributions to the genre of metametatheoretical commentary have had. DAVID WILLIAM FOSTER Arizona State University Bruno Mario Damiani. Montemayor's Diana, Music, and the Visual Arts. Madison: The Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, 1983. 115p. Bruno Damiani's study of La Diana focuses on music and the visual arts as they influence the composition of the novel and as they find their way into the text. Jorge de Montemayor, leaving his native Portugal to become a chapel singer in Spain, serves in the courts of Charles V and Philip II and travels extensively throughout Europe. His time in Italy is especially significant in terms of exposure to the arts, and, according to Damiani, the Diana clearly conveys the work of a master musician and a master of verbal portraiture. Critics such as Bruce Wardropper and Enrique Moreno Báez use the imageof the tapestry to characterize the structureof the Diana; Damiani amplifies the image to foreground the interweaving of the plastic and lyrical arts in the pastoral art of Montemayor. The first of the two essays, "Music in La Diana," explores the relationship of musical developments in the sixteenth century with the treatment of music in the novel. Musical "accompaniment" serves several purposes. Monody and polyphony with a variety of instruments complement the emotions of the pastoral figures, placating grief and making suffering intelligible. A specific instrument may indicate the social rank and quality of the person who plays it, linking music and 92ROCKY MOUNTAIN REVIEW characterization. Lyrical interludes regulate plot development and narrative direction, as musical and staged performances become part of the story. For Damiani, the inclusion of the enchanted Orpheus in the Diana may represent an early form of opera, which historically makes use of both the Orpheus legend and pastoral settings. The ultimate manifestation of Montemayor's background in music is the musicality of his language, a literary discourse that may be classified as a type of "recitar cantando." "La Diana and the Visual Arts" accentuates reading as a visual experience, following the Horatian principle of ut pictura poesis as expounded by the Cinquecento theorist Lodovico Dolce. Material objects function decoratively and symbolically. Not only is elaborate description a verbal analogue of painting, but Renaissance literary artists rediscover and "reinterpret" classical motifs and themes, reconciling Platonic thought with Christian theology. The naviform earrings of Felismena, for...