«Ti muova il pianto che dai lumi io verso». Epic Models in Fortunata Sulgher Fantastici

Abstract

The present contribution aims to investigate the models, sources and forms of a part of the poetic production of Fortunata Sulgher Fantastici, known with the Arcadic name of Temira Parraside. After tracing the outlines of the cultural context in which the acclaimed improviser fits, we propose a small review of the Homeric and Virgilian texts which seem to have informed her poems of 1785, republished in 1794. We then proceed with an analysis of the compositions: through the characters of Andromache, Briseis, Achilles, Penelope and Dido, we trace a plot of returns to the past resulting from a wise mind and cross-used models, that make Sulgher’s lyrical discourse perfectly consistent with the culture of her time.