Contact details
- Name:
- George Brocklehurst
- Institute:
- Warburg Institute
- Email address:
- george.brocklehurst@postgrad.sas.ac.uk
- Studies:
- Student
- Publication Details
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Publications available on SAS-space:
Date Details Dec-2024 Convivial Humanism: Giovanni Pontano (1426-1503) on the Art of Living Together NonPeerReviewed
This thesis examines the art of the literary banquet as it was practised and theorised by the fifteenth-century humanist, Giovanni Pontano (1426-1503) and his academy in Naples. Formed by men attached to the Aragonese court of Naples, the Accademia Pontaniana assembled regularly over the course of half a century for evenings of conversation, readings, and music, accompanied by food and wine. Drawing on Pontano’s treatises, dialogues, and poetry, this study surveys the scholarly and creative activities that Pontano and his circle pursued during their convivial gatherings. The first chapter considers the history of literary banqueting in the fifteenth century from the perspective of classical reception, surveying the efforts by humanist communities like the Accademia Pontaniana to re-enact the ancient philosophical ritual of the symposium. The thesis examines Pontano’s views on the social, educational, and psychological benefits of conviviality (Chapters 2-4), the status of the banquet as a setting for the production of poetry, music, and theatre (Chapters 5-6), and its religious character (Chapter 7). The epilogue draws some conclusions about the influence of the Accademia Pontaniana and the role of convivial coteries in the intellectual culture of the Renaissance.
- Research Projects & Supervisions
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- PhD Topic:
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Convivial Humanism: Giovanni Pontano (1426-1503) on the Art of Living Together
Renaissance humanists aspired to revive and imitate classical antiquity in a number of cultural fields, including in the field of social relations. During the fifteenth century, the social ritual of the symposium, or literary drinking party all'antica, flourished in humanist centres throughout Italy. My project explores the convivial practices of the Accademia Pontaniana, the earliest and among the most influential academies of the Italian Quattrocento. This academy received its name from Giovanni Pontano, first minister at the Aragonese court of Naples, humanist, astrologer, neo-Latin poet, and symposiast. My aim is to understand how conviviality shaped Pontano’s social outlook, scholarly practice, and poetics, and to shed light upon a humanist revival with enormous consequences for European intellectual history.
- Supervisor:
- Sara Miglitetti
- Research interests:
- Classics, Cultural memory