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Author: Guido Baldo Bonarelli.
Title: Filli di Sciro, favola pastorale Del conte Guidubaldo de' Bonarelli, Detto l'Aggiunto, accademico intrepido : Da essa Accademia dedicata al sereniss. signor don Francesco Maria Feltrio dalla Rovere, Duca Sesto d'Urbino.
Language: Text in Italian.
Publisher: In Venetia : Presso Pietro Miloco, 1623.
Size : 5.5 "X 3 ".
Pages: 165 pages.
Binding: Very good original full vellum leather binding (hinges fine, overall slightly worn and scuffed - as shown) under a removable protective mylar cover.
Content: Very good content (bright, tight, and clean, name of a previous owner on the blank page on the front of the title page - as shown, rare light foxing or staining - as shown).
 

The book: Scarce early 17th-century edition of Guidubaldo Bonarelli's "Phyllis of Scyros" (Filli di Sciro) -- one of the highpoints of Italian drama and helped to define the pastoral mode. This quasi-elegiac tragicomedy was first performed in 1605 in the new ducal theater at Ferrara. In 1607 it was published under the auspices of the Academy of Intrepid Spirits (Accademia degli Intrepidi). "Phyllis" is a masterpiece of word-play, wit, wonderfully flowing verses, gentle musicality, parody, and irony. It was also groundbreaking for its moral and psychological portrayal of a character seized by a furious double passion - one of them incestuous. Bonarelli was forced to defend his work, and in his Discorsi he boldly claimed for poetry the right to treat life, love, death, furor, and ardor in their full complexity rather than as perfect ideals.

The author: Guidobaldo Bonarelli della Rovere was born in Pesaro on Christmas 1563. He was the brother of the tragidian Prospero Bonarelli (1588-1659). In 1579, destined by his father for a place in the priesthood, he was sent to Paris to study philosophy and theology, but he rejected these plans and pursued a courtly life of ambassadorial missions. He first entered the service of Cardinal Francesco Borromeo and then of the Este. But a series of secret personal intrigues led to his banishment. He then took up the literary life in earnest around 1601. He published "Phyllis" in 1605. Unfortunately his remaining time was short, and he died in 1608 at the age of forty-five. His "Discorsi in difesa del doppio amore di Celia" appeared postumously in 1612.