Editing Module:Petrarch (section)

==Dante==
[[File:Dante Luca.jpg|thumb|left|Dante Alighieri, detail from a [[Luca Signorelli]] [[fresco]] in the chapel of [[Orvieto Cathedral#Chapel of the Madonna di San Brizio|San Brizio]], Duomo, Orvieto.]]
Petrarch is very different from [[Dante]] and his ''[[Divina Commedia]]''. In spite of the [[metaphysics|metaphysical]] subject, the ''Commedia'' is deeply rooted in the cultural and social milieu of turn-of-the-century [[Florence]]: Dante's rise to power (1300) and exile (1302); his political passions call for a "violent" use of language, where he uses all the registers, from low and trivial to sublime and philosophical. Petrarch confessed to Boccaccio that he had never read the ''Commedia'', remarks Contini, wondering whether this was true or Petrarch wanted to distance himself from Dante. Dante's language evolves as he grows old, from the courtly love of his early [[Dolce Stil Novo|stilnovistic]] ''Rime'' and ''Vita nuova'' to the ''Convivio'' and ''Divina Commedia'', where [[Beatrice Portinari|Beatrice]] is sanctified as the goddess of philosophy—the philosophy announced by the Donna Gentile at the death of Beatrice.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.insulaeuropea.eu/pulsoni/il_metodo_di_lavoro.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=December 28, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131112102335/http://www.insulaeuropea.eu/pulsoni/il_metodo_di_lavoro.pdf |archive-date=November 12, 2013 }}</ref>

In contrast, Petrarch's thought and style are relatively uniform throughout his life—he spent much of it revising the songs and sonnets of the ''[[Il Canzoniere|Canzoniere]]'' rather than moving to new subjects or poetry. Here, poetry alone provides a consolation for personal grief, much less philosophy or politics (as in Dante), for Petrarch fights within himself (sensuality versus [[mysticism]], profane versus [[Christian literature]]), not against anything outside of himself. The strong moral and political convictions which had inspired Dante belong to the Middle Ages and the libertarian spirit of the [[Medieval commune|commune]]; Petrarch's moral dilemmas, his refusal to take a stand in politics, his reclusive life point to a different direction, or time. The free commune, the place that had made Dante an eminent politician and scholar, was being dismantled: the ''signoria'' was taking its place. Humanism and its spirit of empirical inquiry, however, were making progress—but the papacy (especially after Avignon) and the empire ([[Henry VII, Holy Roman Emperor|Henry VII]], the last hope of the [[Guelphs and Ghibellines|white Guelphs]], died near Siena in 1313) had lost much of their original prestige.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://petrarch.uoregon.edu/|title=The Oregon Petrarch Open Book – "Petrarch is again in sight"|website=petrarch.uoregon.edu}}</ref>

Petrarch polished and perfected the sonnet form inherited from [[Giacomo da Lentini]] and which Dante widely used in his ''[[Vita nuova]]'' to popularise the new courtly love of the ''[[Dolce Stil Novo]]''. The tercet benefits from Dante's [[terza rima]] (compare the ''Divina Commedia''), the [[quatrain]]s prefer the ABBA–ABBA to the ABAB–ABAB scheme of the [[Sicilian School|Sicilians]]. The imperfect rhymes of ''u'' with closed ''o'' and ''i'' with closed ''e'' (inherited from Guittone's mistaken rendering of [[Sicilian School|Sicilian verse]]) are excluded, but the rhyme of open and closed ''o'' is kept. Finally, Petrarch's [[enjambment]] creates longer semantic units by connecting one line to the following. The vast majority (317) of Petrarch's 366 poems collected in the ''Canzoniere'' (dedicated to Laura) were ''sonnets'', and the [[Petrarchan sonnet]] still bears his name.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.webexhibits.org/poetry/home_movements.html|title=Movements : Poetry through the Ages|website=Webexhibits.org}}</ref>