‘Materie piacevolissime da leggere e utili da essequire’: The introductory letters in Leonardo Fioravanti's Capricci medicinali

Abstract

AbstractThis contribution examines the changes in the type and sequence of paratexts at the beginning of Leonardo Fioravanti’s Capricci medicinali from the first edition (1561) to the 1680 edition. The aim of this paper is to study the building of a selfimage and promotion of Fioravanti and his medicine via the paratextual letters. This was the first and most published of Fioravanti’s works which spread in Venice, one of the most vital book markets of sixteenth‐century Europe, and attracted the attention of publishers and public. After a description of the different paratextual elements, this contribution briefly focuses on two specific texts, i.e., Dionigi Atanagi’s letter in praise of Fioravanti as an ideal physician and writer of medical matter, and Fioravanti's Ragionamento. Self‐care and self‐fashioning serve each other and collaborate to draw as much attention as possible on the Capricci but also on its author and even on Atanagi, a most popular polygraph at that time, as an ideal reader of the work. The parallel narration of those two texts creates a fruitful echo effect that amplifies the results and possibly contributed to the success of the Capricci medicinali.