Gli “Apologi centum” di Leon Battista Alberti. Saggio di esegesi

This essay (which complements the article entitled Gli Apologi di Leon Battista Alberti. Preliminari all’edizione critica, in Cum fide amicitia. Per Rosanna Alhaique Pettinelli, Roma, Bulzoni, 2015, pp. 155-175) is an applied methodological analysis of a work that radically transformed the age-old ‘genre’ of the fable. The study focuses in particular on XXVII (ex XXXII), LXXIV and LXXV (all published in a critical edition along with corresponding paratexts) and involves an examination of all pertinent bibliographical references to date (i.e. editions, translations and interpretations), textual criticism, constant attention to structure and language, the dismantling of texts, and inter- and intratextuality, in an endeavour to identify the hypotexts and reused materials fashioned in new constructions and thus unveil the overall ‘design’ at work. Hence, the analysis is anchored in objective data. The three texts are re-examined from a humoristic perspective, thereby providing a novel reinterpretation, and Alberti’s ‘reform’ (i.e. using a pithy form to convey a profound thought) reveals itself to be all the more complex and subversive. The Apologi centum are truly one of the great contributions made by Italian Humanism to modern European literature, and yet at the same time they convey a surprising timelessness