‘Volto di Medusa’: Monumentalizing the self in Petrarch's Rerum vulgarium fragmenta

• Published in: Forum italicum Vol. 47; no. 3; pp. 497 - 521
• Main Author: Feng, Aileen A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.11.2013; Sage Publications Ltd. (UK)
• Subjects: Analysis; Patron and client; Petrarch, Francesco; Portrayals; Self; Italy; Petrarch; Medusa; patronage

Scholarship on Petrarch has generally intepreted the figure of Laura-as-Medusa as a projection of the poet's internal conflict between sacred and profane love. Such a reading takes Medusa as a threat to Petrarch's agency. Yet Petrarch's Laura-Medusa is suggestively figured as only her...