MARINO, Giovan Battista.

Lettere del cavalier Marino, gravi, argute, facete, e piacevoli, con diverse poesi del medesimo non piu stampate.

Venice, (appresso Francesco Baba), 1627. Small 8vo, pp. [14], 350, [1], including the 2 internal blank leaves; with a fine engraved portrait of Marino by F. Valosio, and printer's woodcut device on final leaf; with long contemporary Ms. note on front fly-leaf and a tipped in drawing in brown ink of Marino's tomb in the same hand (see below); one quire a little bit browned but a very good, fresh copy in contemporary limp vellum, spine with ornate contemporary ink Ms. lettering, title in contemporary Ms. on front cover. First rare edition of Marino's posthumously published letters printed together with eight previously unpublished poems. Giovan Battista Marino (1567-1625) was the outstanding poet of his day and 'one of the greatest Italian poets of all time' (Cambridge History of Italian Literature). His poetry was considered to be so innovative that his aim to shock and surprise readers through the marvellous and unusual - demonstrated by metaphors and conceits relentlessly assaulting the reader's senses - resulted in a whole literary movement, Marinismo. Marino was well connected in Italian and French literary and artistic circles (he is credited with being the earliest Italian patron of Nicolas Poussin, drawing the painter to Italy). He led an adventurous life, punctuated with two prolonged spells in prison, and violent quarrels, and counted among his patrons Pietro Aldobrandino, the duke of Savoy and Maria de'Medici.This copy has a fine Ms. inscription by one Francesco Amici, recording details of Marino's tomb in S. Agnello in Naples and noting the fine bronze bust of the poet, paid for by his friend, patron and follower Giambattista Manso, marchese di Villa, which adorns the tomb. Amici also tipped in a drawing of Marino's tomb in Naples and recorded in his neat hand Marino's published works on the blank verso of the final leaf.Rare: no copies located in RLIN or OCLC; not in the British Library; COPAC only records the Cambridge University Library copy.

• GBP 2,500.00 > Andere Währungen
• Bestellnummer: A1086

• Antiquariat: Bernard Quaritch Ltd. (GREAT BRITAIN)