Between Tradition and Transgression: Amelia Rosselli’s Petrarch

Abstract

This chapter examines the influence of Petrarch on the poetry of Amelia Rosselli. It argues that Rosselli's poetry can be seen to reaffirm the enduring value of the Petrarchan legacy at the close of the second millennium and shows how Petrarchan discourse operates within her poetry as a veritable ghost in the machine. It suggests of Rosselli's three major books, Serie ospedaliera appears to be the one in which the dialogue with Petrarch is more explicitly and productively engaged.