Giovanni Pontano (1429–1503) stands out as one of the most prolific representatives of southern Italian humanism in the Quattrocento. His love of the Naples region and its people is particularly present in two of his works, modeled after Vergil: the Eclogues and the horticultural poem Garden of the Hesperides. The new I Tatti edition by Luke Roman combines both Latin texts and their English translations for the first time.
As is typical of the series, the introduction (vii–xxx) provides a concise overview of Pontano's life and the texts edited. Pontano's family background, his ties to the Aragonese monarchy, and his literary affiliations are highlighted, describing his private, public, and poetic careers. Particular attention is paid to recurring features of his poetry, his link to the classical legacy, and Naples as his main “literary geography.” Both the Eclogues and the Garden of the Hesperides are appropriately contextualized as expressive examples of the growing aesthetic and philosophical appreciation of the countryside during the Quattrocento.
With regards to the Eclogues, the reader gets an informed picture of how Pontano's six poems, of varying length and topic, relate to the ancient pastoral tradition. A short description of each poem's content and history of origin—each drafted at a different moment in Pontano's life—further facilitates the reading of the individual pieces. With regards to the Garden of the Hesperides, the reader learns about the Neo-Latin tradition of the horticultural didactic poem, next to Pontano's prime concern of cultivating citrus trees. Pontano's two-book poem is situated within the context of classical mythology, especially surrounding the death of Adonis, who is transformed into an orange tree by Venus, and Pontano's own biography, as the gardening described, for instance, can be taken as an allegory of Pontano's poetic efforts.
The edited texts themselves (Eclogues, 1–141; Garden of the Hesperides, 143–223) are aligned in the usual way, with the Latin text on the left and the English translation on the right side. The translation remains relatively close to the Latin text, which occasionally makes the English rendering a bit stiff. In general, though, the English translation reads quite fluently.
The ensuing notes on the text (225–29) contain information on the lost autographs, the missing manuscripts (except for one surviving Hesperides manuscript from the Biblioteca Provinciale di Avellino), and the three Aldine editions of Pontano's poems (1505, 1513, 1533). The edition by Monti Sabia (1973) is cited as the main model for the constitution of the Eclogues text, with changes made regarding the punctuation and the consonantal use of u/v. For the Hesperides text, Roman designed his own version of the text based on a combination of the faulty edition by Soldati (1902), the Aldine editions, and the Avellino manuscript. The French online edition and translation by Georges Tilly (2021) could not be considered for the constitution of the Hesperides text, as it was only published after the finalization of Roman's edition.
The notes to the text explain the editor's conjectures and his choice of certain variations concerning the Garden of the Hesperides. The notes to the translation take into account both the Eclogues and the Garden of the Hesperides, even though the former receive slightly more attention. For the most part, these notes comprise interpretations of the content and intertextual references, as well as geographical and allegorical explanations.
In sum, this edition delivers the usual quality of bilingual editions from the I Tatti series. It offers a valuable contribution to philological and literary studies, of interest to both the scholarly community and a broader readership. Editions of Pontano's Dialogues, his poetry collection Baiae, his love elegies On Married Love and Eridanus, and his moral essay The Virtues and Vices of Speech have previously been published in the I Tatti series, and this edition of his two major pastoral poems is a welcome addition.
