Sujets et savoirs en mouvement. Variations sur le ‹Roman de la Rose› dans la littérature allégorique italienne à la fin du XIIIe siècle (‹Il Fiore›/‹L’Intelligenza›)

Abstract

This article examines two examples of the early reception of the Roman de la Rose in Italy. In Il Fiore (ca. 1285-1295), the core plot sequences from the earlier French text are echoed in 232 sonnets. With its omissions and leaps, the lyrical form undermines any kind of narrative coherence and cohesion; as in the work of Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun, this creates an instable, dynamic “I.” In L’Intelligenza (ca. 1300), the narrator-speaker appears from the beginning to be permeable – a mobile point of view which is threaded through with the world’s diversity and thus disappears almost entirely. In all three texts, subjective knowledge cannot be depicted in the form of a uniformly shaped and linear diagram. Because it is continuously being reconfigured due to its connection to an “I,” this knowledge requires a special form which is simultaneously narrative and non-narrative, one which is open-ended, diverse, and flexible.