Page:A History of Italian Literature - Garnett (1898).djvu/438

Rh Histoire de la Litérature du Midi de l'Europe; numerous editions and translations, but hardly equal to its reputation.—Ginguené, Histoire litéraire d'Italie, 14 vols., 1811–35 [the last four volumes by Salfi]. A work of extraordinary diligence and erudition, on no account to be neglected by the few who may have time to read it, though written from an eighteenth-century point of view now entirely antiquated. The chief literary defect is the immoderate space devoted to unravelling the plots of uninteresting epics and dramas; this excess of diligence, however, renders it a valuable source of information concerning minor authors frequently omitted.—This is also a valuable feature of Corniani, I Secoli della Letteratura italiana, 1832–33.—Bartoli, Storia della Letteratura italiana, 1875. This unfinished work is the best authority for the history of the early period, beyond which it does not as yet extend. It is full of learning and research, but prolix.—Gaspary, Geschichte der italienischen Litteratur, &c., 1885. Another important work unfortunately left incomplete, breaking off in the Cinque Cento. The best of all the larger Italian literary histories, but deficient in form, rather a quarry of material than a regular edifice. An English translation by H. Oelsner is in preparation.

Crescimbeni, Istoria della volgar Poesia, 1730. Quadrio, Della Storia e della ragione d'ogni Poesia, 1739–52. Standard histories long out of print, but to be found in all good public libraries.—Muratori, Della perfetta Poesia, 1821. Characterised at p. 295.—Ruth, Geschichte der italienischen Poesie, 1844–47.—Loise, Histoire de la Poésie en Italie, 1895.—Carducci, Studi Letterari, 1880. Valuable criticisms on various periods of Italian literature.—An excellent anthology of the dicta of modern Italian critics has been compiled by Morandi, Antologia, &c., 1893.

Emiliani-Giudici, Compendio della Storia della Letteratura italiana, 1855. Very sound, but verbose.—Settembrini, Lezioni della letteratura italiana, 1877. Perhaps on the whole the most recommendable of all the minor Italian literary histories. The author, an exile lately restored to his country, is inspired with a spirit of patriotism which renders his work smgularly vital and energetic, and the young men to whom his lectures are addressed are ever before him.