Ricerc@Sapienza

The Platonic Legacy about Poetry is transmitted

to the Middle Ages by Boethius : at the beginning of

the Consolatio, Philosophy pushes away the poetic

Muses, too close to passions, according to Plato’s prescription

in Rep. 398 A : the poet « able to imitate every

aspect of life » is dangerous for the City and must be kept

out of the community. On the one hand Poetry is close to

the Revealed Truth ; on the other hand it is close to passions,

according to the « melancolic» pattern of Aristotle,

Probl. 10.1 : here’s the main Platonic challenge about Poetry

herited by the Middle Ages. Petrarch refuses the

« melancholic » model of solitude by emphasising the

Stoic-Christian solitude purified from the passions. On

the contrary, Boccace leads Poetry to meet again contingence.