DIALOGUE
BOOK REVIEW: ITALIAN DIALOGUES
the depth of the word with giordano bruno Giordano Bruno counts as one of the most famous figures from the late 1600’s, but also as one of the figures who is hardest to interpret. His colourful life, his comprehensive, though not simple work in two languages, his polemic actions and the horrible end of his life, all contribute to this. The interpretation that Bruno would be a charlatan, a would-be magician, still obscures the critical image of the author.
F
ilippo Bruno was born in the southern Italian town of Nola near Naples in 1548. He never kept silent about his origin in the least. Family members figure in his works and give them a dramatic liveliness and a very personal ring. […] At the age of fifteen, Filippo entered the monastery of the Dominicans in Naples, and adopted the monastic name Giordano. Soon, he rebelled against monastic life and was accused of having a bad influence on his fellow brothers. Due to the threat of a process on a charge of heresy, he fled to Rome and later to Northern Italy. Finally, he took refuge in less catholic places: in Geneva, he joined the Calvinists and, after a short while, came into conflict with their leaders according to a recipe that would often be repeated in London and elsewhere: attacking a leading theologian, whom
he wholly floored in discussions or writings, and a forced flight and/or apology. A Venetian patrician, Giovanni Mocenigo, invited him to come to Venice but, after a few months, reported him to the inquisition which subjected him to a lengthy process, first in Venice and next in Rome. After initially having shown remorse, Bruno refused to revoke his ideas and was burnt at the stake, a common punishment for heretics. Bruno’s works were partly written in Latin and partly in Italian, and although Latin was the common language at the university, Italian had an important function as the cultural language at the French and English courts. His dialogues often have more layers and meanings on different levels. As an example, let us look at a dialogue from his Spaccio de la bestia trionfante (Removal of the triumphant beast). the depth of the word with 47
