ARETINO, the first pornographer é

Speranza

Italian pornographic works had been circulating in England since at least 1584, when JOHN WOLFE published the firrst collected edition of

PIETRO ARETINO
RAGIONAMENTI

in London.
These "Rationamenti" were two sets of three dialogues between an older woman and a younger, more inexperienced one in which the lives of women in various occupations or roles are explained in a realistic and satirical, but not obscene, manner.

The two parts had been published separately in Venezia in 1534 and 1536.

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The earliest trace of ARETINO's work in ENGLISH was:

"The Crafty Whore; or, the Misery and Iniquity of Bawdy Houses laid open".
London: Henry March, 1658.

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This is a rather free rendering of the third dialogue of the first part of the "Ragionamenti".

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As this particular dialogue deals with the life of whores, it enjoyed enormous popularity as a separate entity from the rest of the book and went through numerous editions.

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The only COMPLETE _English_ edition of the "Raginamenti" appeared in 1889, when it was published and translated by Isidore Liseux at Paris, in SIX VOLUMES.

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PIETRO ARETINO (1492-1556), called "FLAGELLO DE' PRINCIPI" -- the scourge of princes -- because of his biting, satirical wit, was the _ne plus ultra_ of pornography, especially in England, but NOT for the Ragionamenti, rather for something that he actually played only a PERIPHERAL part in.

These were the so-called

POSTURES OF ARETINO.

In 1524, Giulio ROMANO had Marcantonio RAIMONDI engrave sixteen plates from drawings that Romano had executed of

EROTIC POSTURES,

scenes in which various positions for love-making were graphically portrayed.

Aretino saw the engravings and felt moved to compose a series of sonnets, one for each engraving. These became known as the "Sonneti lussuriosi".

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By November 1527, a book incorporating both the sonnets and engravings was in print.

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Despite Aretino's marginal connection with these illustrations, his name was nevertheless associated with them.

Aretino is cited in "The Alchemist" (1612 -- Ben Jonson), in "The Country Wife" (Wycherley, 1675), and "The Rambling Justice" (Learnard, 1678). In "Sodom", the first takes place in "an antechamber hung round with "Aretin's Postures"".

The "Rettorica delle puttane" (1642) of Ferrante Pallavicino recommends "Le figure dell'Aretino", but the English adptation of this work, first published in London by George Shell (i.e. John Wickers) in 1683 as "The Whore's Rhetorick", completely reverses this advice and has the bawd Mother Creswel say: "ARETIN'S FIGURES have no place in my RHETORICK, and I hope will find no room in my pupils' apartment. They are calculated for a hot region a little on this side of SODOM, and are not necessary to be seen in any Northern Clime."

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After these xenophobic strictures, Mother Creswell describes the 'postures' and refers to them endearingly and numbering "Six and Thirty Geometrical Schemes" which is considerably more than the original sixteen.

A hundred years later, in a letter in the "Correspondence de madame Gourdan" (1784), this number is increased again:

------- From Monsieur de B****, student
---------------at the School of Painting
----------Paris, May 1st, 1776

I have, madame, a collection of Aretin's Postures in
forty oval-shaped illustrations. As I am to leave
shortly for Rome, I am anxious to dispose of them.

It occurs to me that they would prove ideal
for decorating your boudoirs.

The price is one thousand écus.

Last year I refused an offer of one hundred louis for them from the Duke of ***.

Should you wish to examine them, I will be at home this evening after dinner and all tomorrow morning."

Someone had clearly been adding to them, or else different sets of illustrations entirely were being circulated under the same name.

A full account of the history of the "postures" is given by David Foxon.

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Aretino's "Sonneti lussuriosi" by themselves, which may have been originally entitled "La corona di cazzy" under which name they appeared at least once in the 16th century and subsequently, have never been satisfactorily translated.

Wayland Young in his "Eros Denied" mentions an ENGLISH version of Aretino's sonnets fancifully ascribed to Oscar Wilde.

The mark left on the erotic literature of the 17th century by ARETINO, and in particular his RAGIONAMENTI, was considerable, for the dialogue form that he used was followed by almost all the important works in the genre up unil 1697 when the novel "Le Zombi" was published.