Poetry and Censorship in Counter-Reformation Italy

Jennifer Helm, Ph.D. (2010), Göttingen University, Germany, is lecturer in Romance Literary Studies at the same university. She has published articles on Catholic censorship of literary works.

Preface
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
Document Finding List

1 Control of Literature as a Strategy of Catholic Reformation
Motives and Modes of Influence
2 Approaching Censorial Reading
2.1 The Virgin Text
2.2 Who is the Author of a Sinful Text?
2.3 The Author in Censorship Practice
2.4 Tracing the Imagined Reader
3 Mechanisms of the Roman Index
3.1 The “Libri-Omnes”-Principle
3.2 On the Censorship of Literary Genres
3.3 Manipulation of ‘Stylistic’ Modes of Writing?
3.4 Reflections on Criteria of the Inquisitio of Text
4 Censures of the Marvellous
4.1 A Prohibition of Wonders?
4.2 The Marvellous, Characters and Action
4.2.1 Human Characters and Animals with Supernatural Powers
4.2.2 Supernatural Beings
4.2.3 Objects and Places
4.3 Marvel and Fate
4.4 Censorship and Guided Reading
4.5 Shaping Narrative Structures – On the Fantastic
5 Censures of Love
5.1 On Freedom and ‘Reality’ of the Word
5.2 Forbidden Goddesses
5.3 Disillusioning the Lover
5.4 Intimacy Locked Away: Trimming Literary Genres
6 Censoring Laughter
6.1 Sensitivity for Verbal Expression
6.2 Privileged Treatment and National Sentiment
6.3 Hidden Danger in Comic Poetry
7 Self-Censorship and Poetic Counter-Strategies
7.1 Between Publication and Censorship
7.2 A Poetic Apology of Love Lyrics?
7.2.1 Embedding the Story and Defining Love
7.2.2 Love and Freedom
7.2.3 Contemplation and Enlightenment
7.2.4 Self-Reflection and Anticipated Conversion
7.2.5 Martyrdom and Deification
7.2.6 An Attempt to Speak of Two Loves at the Same Time
7.2.7 A New Way of Contemplation and an Untypical End
7.3 A New Book Project or Censorship?
Conclusion
Appendices
Editorial Notes
Documents 1: Cases and Judgements
Documents 2: Relating Documents
Bibliography
Index of Names