One of the most accomplished poets of the Renaissance – and probably the most accomplished woman ever to write in Italian – Gaspara Stampa had a brief but tumultuous life. In an era when the chaste widow Vittoria Colonna provided the dominant model for women poets, Stampa's poetry of tormented passion directed to not one but at least two men offered an intriguingly original and for many, no doubt, unacceptable perspective. The three hundred and ten sonnets, canzoni, madrigals, and
capitolipublished posthumously by her sister Cassandra as
Rime di Madonna Gaspara Stampain 1554 convey an immediacy and frankness rare for their time. This is clear from the opening sonnet, which deliberately echoes the first poem of Petrarch's
Canzonierewhile refusing to convey Petrarch's tone of…
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Citation: Tylus, Jane. "Gaspara Stampa". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 09 September 2009 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=12294, accessed 13 December 2024.]