Voices and Texts in Early Modern Italian Society

This book studies the uses of orality in Italian society, across all classes, from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, with an emphasis on the interrelationships between oral communication and the written word. Part 1 concerns public life in the states of northern, central, and southern Italy. Part 2 centres on private entertainments and considers the practices of the performance of poetry sung in social gatherings and on stage with and without improvisation. Part 3 concerns collective religious practices and studies sermons in their own right and in relation to written texts, the battle to control spaces for public performance by authorities, and singing texts in sacred spaces.