Hen. B., “Italian Improvisatri”

In a letter to the editor, a reader comments that he does not believe that the reports he hears of Italian improvisatori are accurate; rather, he supposes that they are simply skilled reciters of existing Italian poetry.

Performer Name:
 
Performance Venue:
 
Performance Date:
 
Author:
Hen. B.
Date Written:
1829
Language:
English
Publication Title:
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction
Article Title:
Italian Improvisatri
Page Numbers:
13:387
Additional Info:
6 June 1829 issue (No. 347)
Publisher:
J. Limbird
Place of Publication:
London
Date Published:
1829

Text:

ITALIAN IMPROVISATRI

(To the Editor of the Mirror.)

Allow me permission, if consistent with the regulations of your interesting miscellany, to submit to you a literary problem. We are informed that there exists, at the present day, in Italy, a set of persons called “improvisatri,” who pretend to recite original poetry of a superior order, composed on the spur of the moment. An extraordinary account appeared a short time back in a well known Scotch magazine, of a female improvisatrice, which may have met your notice. Now I entertain considerable doubt of the truth of these pretensions; not that I question the veracity of those who have visited Italy and make the assertion; they believe what they relate, but are, I conceive, grossly deceived. There is something, no doubt, truly inspiring in the air of Italy:

For wheresoe’er they turn their ravish’d eyes,
Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise,
Poetic fields encompass them around,
And still they seem to tread on classic ground;
For there the muse so oft her harp has strung,
That not a mountain rears its head unsung;
Renown’d in verse each shady thicket grows,
And ev’ry stream in heav’nly numbers flows.

Notwithstanding this beautiful description, my skepticism will not allow me to believe in these miraculous genii.

Lord Byron mentions these improvisatri, in his “Beppo,” but not in a way that leads me to suppose, he considered them capable of original poetry. Mr. Addison, in his account of Italy says, “I cannot forbear mentioning a custom at Venice, which they tell me is peculiar to the common people of this country, of singing stanzas out of Tasso. They are set to a pretty solemn tune, and when one begins in any part of the poet, it is odds, but he will be answered by somebody else that overhears him; so that sometimes you have ten or a dozen in the neighbourhood of one another, taking verse after verse, and running on with the poem as far as their memories will carry them.”

I am, therefore, inclined to think these “improvisatri” are mere reciters of the great Italian poets. It is probable that the persons who give us these extraordinary accounts of Italian genius, are unacquainted with the literature of that country, and of course cannot detect the imposition.

Hen. B.

Notes:

Collected by:
EW