Wizja natury w pismach Francesca Petrarki
The Image of Nature in Petrarch’s Writings

Author(s): Marta Zyśko
Subject(s): Cultural history, Studies of Literature, Theory of Literature
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: Petrarch; letter; image of nature; biography; anthropocentric analysis; locus amoenus; locus horridus; rus – urbs; natura naturata; poet’s stance
Summary/Abstract: The dissertation explores the images of nature in Petrarch’s writings. It concentrates on the texts which present the poet himself. Thus the article does not focus on the image of nature in the poems, but on its place in the author’s system of ideas. The works analysed are primarily letters and prose, which contain much biographical information and allow a profound insight into Petrarch’s philosophical exploration and his beliefs. Thus we can see where Petrarch places nature as a poet, thinker, man and friend. Epistolae Matricae written in verse and lyrical Bucolicum Carmen are analysed with regard to biographical information, life guiding principles and philosophical stances and not nature symbolism as an element of poetic language per se. The essence of Petrarch’s writings are clear tensions and oppositions: locus amoenus – locus horridus and rus – urbs. He concentrates on presenting the idea of natura naturata and identifies nature with wildlife, flora and landscape. Its beauty should not dissuade an artist and a sage from the true religious and intellectual ideal. Petrarch in his anthropocentric analysis appears as torn between the image of a stoic sage – the ideal rejecting worldly joys and a poet, who often confessed love to fame􀁢 – a laurel wreath and, at the same time, reacted angrily to all criticism. His devotion to the idea of self-improvement is doubtless, whereas nature is one of the means on the path to true wisdom.

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