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Updated 05-14-08
Antonia Pulci (c.1452-1501)
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"YOU CAN DERIVE MUCH PLEASURE FROM IT AND MUCH FRUIT."
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Antonia Tanini was born to a Florentine banking family, just when the Medici were beginning to make Florence a major financial center. When she was about 18 years old, she was married to 32-year-old Bernardo Pulci, from a family respected for its literary accomplishments. Both her husband and her brother-in-law, Luigi Pulci, were poets, although Luigi, a close companion of Lorenzo de Medici, was the better known. Antonia and Bernardo had no children, but they helped to raise the children of another of Bernardo's brothers.
During the 18 years of their marriage Antonia and Bernardo wrote, separately, several religious plays (sacre rappresentazione). These plays were staged by confraternities, laymen's organizations affiliated with churches or religious houses. They were presented to the public on saints' days and on civic occasions; the audiences were sometimes mixed, but the actors in public performances were always male, probably boys. Religious plays had been presented for centuries; what was new was the increasing splendor of the scenery and costumes, and as in the case of the Pulcis, that the authors were lay persons and that their names were recorded. Bernardo is named in contemporary documents as the author of two plays (one of which is extant), Antonia of three. We know the date of only one of Antonia's plays: Santa Domitilla was composed and perhaps staged in 1483.
In 1488 Bernardo died; although her family wished Antonia to remarry, she remained single. For 16 years she lived either alone or with a group of Augustinian tertiaries (laypersons affiliated with that order). We don't know if she continued to write during this time. In 1501 she went to a convent which she had founded and lived there with seven other women as Augustinian tertiaries. She died during that same year.
Besides the three plays published between 1490 and 1495 (San Francesco, Santa Domitilla, and Santa Guglielma), Antonia Pulci was named as the author of Rappresentazione del figliuol prodigo, a play on the biblical "prodigal son" when that was published in about 1550. Three other plays were printed anonymously but have been attributed to Antonia on the grounds of stylistic analysis: the attribution of Sant' Antonio Abate (Saint Anthony the Abbot) has apparently been accepted by most scholars; Festa di Rosana (Festival of Rosana) is accepted by some; and Santa Teodora is believed to be at least partly Antonia's, perhaps written for her convent. A contemporary wrote that she had also composed laudi (hymns set to popular music), but none of these are known to have survived.
On this page you'll find:
Links to helpful sites online.
Excerpts from translations in print.
Information about secondary sources.
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1. Excerpts from James Wyatt Cook's introduction to his 1996 book, Florentine Drama for Convent and Festival: Seven Sacred Plays, followed by Cook's translation of a passage from the play Domitilla. And at the same site, an essay on Pulci (followed by the same passage from Domitilla).
2. At this alphabetical list from the University of Chicago's "Italian Women Writers" site, go to Pulci and click on "Texts Available"for a link to the Italian original of Pulci's La rapresentazione di Santa Guglielma from an 1872 edition of religious plays (for two translated passages, see below, under "In print").
2. Essays:
(a) A biographical /critical essay on Pulci, by Elissa Weaver, followed by a 2004 bibliography of secondary sources. You can also link to a list of editions of Pulci's works.
(b) "The Concerns of Women in the Plays of Antonia Pulci," (1998), by Cook, which quotes several passages from the plays.
(c) A 2006 essay by Jamelah Earle on Guglielma, in Cook's translation.
4. Reviews (for excerpts from the translation, see "In print"; for more on the collection's treatment of Pulci, see "Secondary sources").
(a) In a 1998 review of several works in the "The Other Voice in Early Modern Europe" series, Constance Jordan on Cook's 1996 translation, Florentine Drama for Convent and Festival.
(b) Fiora A. Bassanese on the 2000 essay collection, A History of Women's Writing in Italy.
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[James Wyatt Cook has translated the seven plays that have been attributed to Pulci. The editors' introduction and bibliography are thorough; the notes are minimally useful. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Pulci, Antonia. Florentine drama for convent and festival:
seven sacred plays; annotated and translated by James Wyatt Cook;
edited by James Wyatt Cook and Barbara Collier Cook (The other
voice in early modern Europe). Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, c1996. (xxx, 281 p.)
LC#: PQ4630.P8 A23 1996; ISBN: 0226685160, 0226685179
Includes bibliographical references (p. 38-46) and index.
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"If you'll be still...."
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[From the prologue to St. Anthony the Abbot. An actor previews the play's plot and tries to convince the members of the audience that if they will only keep quiet, they'll enjoy the show; that he needs to say this suggests a lively group of viewers:]
I pray you be attentive and desire
To look upon this noble history
So you may keep it in your memories.
We wish to represent some of the life
Of that most holy abbot, Anthony
Of Egypt, famous hermit glorious,
So you'll be able, having looked on it,
To follow Jesus....
You'll see how quickly he replied to God,
Feeling himself called, and faithfully
Gave all of his possessions to the poor....
You'll see how he gave excellent advice
To three fell robbers to flee avarice...
...If you'll be still,
And think about it carefully, you can
Derive much pleasure from it and much fruit.
[ll.6-13,17-18, 25-26, 30-32; pp.155-56]
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"Young and rich and with a courteous wit...."
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[From St. Domitilla. The heroine, a niece and ward of the Roman emperor Domitian (81-96CE), is preparing to become a Christian but is engaged to a pagan. Domitilla praises marriage; you can see online the response of her Christian servants to this speech:]
What greater sweetness could be, I don't know,
Than having a husband worthy to be yours
And sharing with him the flower of his youth,
Young and rich and with a courteous wit,
Then later children, who in in your old age
Will be your life's support, its staff; and who
Can cease to value certainties? Who would
Exchange them for uncertainties to come?
[ll.97-104, p.78]
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"In giving it to these, you've not done well."
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[In each of the three plays that are certainly Pulci's, the playwright makes a rather modern distinction between the "deserving" and the "undeserving" poor. On stage the effect is surely humorous, but the scenes suggest the problem facing the new merchant class of the 1400s: would they get a return on their investment? In St. Francis the hero gives money to a group of poor men:]
One poor man says:
For this, Christ will reward you, Father,
And may he give you merit up in heaven.
Another poor man says to his comrades:
My friends, take note of what is going one;
I see much charity in progress here,
I want to go at once and leave my drink,
Come on, my friend, and bring your little sack.
A poor man says to St. Francis:
O holy Father, do us some small good,
For we're abandoned, useless, and infirm,
And in great suffering our lives we'll end,
And be tormented by appalling woes;
In giving it to these, you've not done well,
Because, soon, they'll have gambled it away;
O holy Father, please give it to us,
And we shall always pray to God for you. [ll.283-96,
p.57]
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"See that you pray to God for us."
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[And in St. Domitilla, after the heroine has become a Christian:]
Many poor people come to the house of Domitilla for alms
and they say:
Good lady, a paltry pittance for this old,
Infirm one who cannot see, a little bread,
A little of your wine for Jesus Christ,
In whom we all believe.
Domitilla says to one of her house servants:
Arrange to have that needy wretch attired,
Those others too, since they are of our faith,
For God has granted us much good, and if
For him we use it not, we may be lost.
The one [servant] who is giving alms says to one of the
poor:
Take this, see that you pray to God for us,
For her, as well, that she in chastity
May live, and all of you share out these gifts,
And don't behave like fools about these things.
One of the mentioned poor answers:
We'll pray to God together with his saints,
For heaven will reward such charity.
Another of the poor persons mentioned answers and says:
Let's go from here, why need we parley more?
Promise him to do what she desires.
[ll.265-80, p.83]
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"You do not know what's in store for you."
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[And in St Guglielma, a king's seneschal is ordered to give alms as part of a wedding celebration:]
Many poor persons go for alms to the one who distributes them. They crowd around him. After he has distributed the alms, the seneschal says:
You lazy louts, get out of here and work;
Whatever one gives to you is thrown away.
A poor man says:
You should not with reproach give charity;
You do not know what's in store for you.
The seneschal says:
You ugly loafer, didn't I see you gambling?
Of that folly do you want a cure from me?
Another poor man says:
Hey, you're the mad one, giving us these gifts. [ll.143-49; p.108]
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"And who fall in their hands---him woe betide!"
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[St. Guglielma tells of a virtuous queen who is dishonored and who later cures of leprosy the man who had dishonored her. However, the audience is given a chance to laugh at that perennial figure of fun, the pompous physician. The king invites many doctors to examine the leper:]
When the doctors are assembled before the king, having seen the symptoms and examined the sick man, one of them says to the stricken man:
This is indeed a very serious case,
And cautiously must we proceed, as in
His second volume Avicenna notes,
And on the problem Galen much remarks---
But have no fear, you will at last be cleansed,
And will be treated very skillfully.
Another doctor say to the sick man:
It's black bile in the blood that causes this;
It can't be cured except at great expense.
A servant tells the king that he should send away the physicians and take his brother to a woman who performs miracles at a nunnery [Guglielma, of course]:
Forgive me, sir, if I am over bold.
None of these men have understood the case.
Their science seems entirely false to me,
For all these doctors have no consciences,
And who fall in their hands---him woe betide!
His purse at last will be the penitent,
For long or fatal they'll his illness make.
O lord, believe me; send them all away.
[ll.578-94; pp.124-25]
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[Among the essays in this collection is Judith Bryce's "'Or altra via mi convien cercare': Marriage, Salvation, and Sanctity in Antonia Tanini Pulci's Rappresentazione di Santa Gugliema," which describes the changes Pulci made from earlier vitae written about Gugliema (changes Bryce sees as indicating that the play was intended to be staged) and which discusses the play's presentation of a Christian marriage as"another suitable way to seek" perfection. Bryce's bibliographical notes provide a summary of recent critical studies. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Theatre, opera, and performance in Italy from the fifteenth
century to the present: essays in honour of Richard Andrews /
edited by Brian Richardson, Simon Gilson and Catherine Keen (Occasional
papers; no. 6). Egham: Society for Italian Studies, c2004. (312
p.)
LC#: PN2671 .T54 2004x; ISBN: 0952590166
Includes bibliographical references and index
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[This collection contains an earlier essay by Bryce, "Adjusting
the Canon for Later Fifteenth-Century Florence: The Case of Antonia
Pulci," which looks at Pulci's writing career against the
background of contemporary Florentine play-writing and play-producing.
In doing this, Bryce considers possible connections between Pulci
and the ruling Medici family:]
The Renaissance theatre: texts, performance, design / edited
by Christopher Cairns. Aldershot, Hants, England ; Brookfield,
Vt. : Ashgate, c1999-. (v. <1- > : ill., map)
LC#: PR653 .R46 1999; ISBN: 0754600068 (v. 1)
Papers first presented Sept. 12-14, 1997 at a Society for Renaissance
Studies conference at the Globe Theatre, England. Includes bibliographical
references and index. Contents v. 1. English and Italian theatre
-- v. 2. Design, image and acting
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[A third essay by Bryce, "The Fifteenth Century: Vernacular Poetry and Mystery Plays," is included in this history, which briefly discusses Pulci's plays and compares them with those of Lucrezia Tornabuoni. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
A history of women's writing in Italy
/ edited by Letizia Panizza and Sharon Wood. Cambridge [England];
New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000. (xvi, 361 p.)
LC#: PQ4055.W6 H57 2000; ISBN: 0521570883, 0521578132
Includes bibliographical references (p. 282-350) and index
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[Although this essay collection is directed at instructors who use in their teaching the works from the "Other Voice in Early Modern Europe" series, Elissa Weaver's contribution, "Antonia Pulci (ca. 1452-1501), the First Published Woman Playwright," may be of interest to the general reader in its discussion of the relationship between Pulci's plays and contemporary public theater, in Florence and elsewhere (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Teaching other voices: women and religion in early modern
Europe / edited by Margaret L. King and Albert Rabil, Jr (Other
voice in early modern Europe). Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 2007. (vii, 244 p.: ill.)
LC#: BL458 .T43 2007; ISBN: 9780226436326
Includes bibliographical references (p. [217]-233) and index
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[Bernard Toscani's 9-page entry on Pulci in this reference work is a valuable introduction to the plays. Toscani accepts four of the plays as Pulci's; he summarizes these and briefly discusses Pulci's themes and critical reception. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Italian women writers: a bio-bibliographical sourcebook /
edited by Rinaldina Russell. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press,
1994. (xxxi, 476 p.).
LC#: PQ4063 .I88 1994; ISBN: 0313283478
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[An older collection includes an essay by Elissa Weaver, "Spiritual
Fun: A Study of Sixteenth-Century Tuscan Convent Drama,"
which focuses on plays presented in convents, but which also
gives useful background on Florentine public theater:]
Women in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance: literary and
historical perspectives / edited, with an introduction by Mary
Beth Rose. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1986. (xxviii,
288 p.: ill.)
LC#: HQ1148 .W66 1986; ISBN: 0815623526, 0815623518
Includes bibliographies and index
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Updated 05-14-08