Love and exile: Petrarch, Sidney and John Berryman

Exile is a dominant idea in western literature from the ancient epics on down. Petrarch was born in exile and exile becomes a significant theme in his collection of poems known as the Canzoniere. In such writing, the art of poetic creativity goes hand in hand with an attempt at self-recovery or self-completion. One means of finding one’s own voice is to imitate the works of another, earlier poet. In love poetry this also includes the attempt at union with the loved one, as in the case of Petrarch’s longing for Laura. Correspondingly, two things may come together; repossession of a voice that has been heard (in a previous author’s poem), and possession—or repossession—of the desired object, the loved one in the poem. Furthermore, in the works of the poets which will be discussed, the suffering of the hapless lover undergoes a change into that of the beloved, with whose plight the lover comes to empathize. This occurs significantly in a condition of exile.

The Canzoniere of Petrarch (1304-74), the sonnet sequence Astrophil and Stella by Sir Philip Sidney (1554-86) and the work of the modern American poet John Berryman (1914-72) will all be considered.

Further information: publiclectures@york.ac.uk