I was taught your version of the history of the language (with the
>difference that at the University of Toronto they told me that the
>acceptance of the Florentine dialect as normative for Italian was due to
>the influence of I Promessi Sposi), but I'm curious what evidence there is
>for the stability of the pronunciation of vowels, given that we have no
>voice recordings from Dante's time.
....Toronto is a wonderful university but literary informations and/or
notions sometimes travel in an odd way:
the authentic story is this: When Alessandro Manzoni wrote his I Promessi
Sposi, being "Lombardo" (from the region Lombardia where Milan is), and
therefore talking a language affected by Austro-Hungaric influences, before
publication, he more or less stated (exactly) this: "I shall go to clean my
work in the waters of the Arno river...” , a quite striking statement that
became legendary because Manzoni was such an intellectual and a master of
style that this modest submissive attitude towards the classics has always
been used by teachers in school to stimulate the students to do the same….
Manzoni meant to say that he felt the need to refine his style on the model
of the classics provided by the Florentine writers....
Therefore, it is not I Promessi Sposi a model for Italian, but vice-versa
it was the Florentine and Florentine writers the model for Manzoni's I
Promessi Sposi.
Now, I wonder who taught you this twisted information....
: )
(Ah, I have such a sore-throat tonight...I went for the third time to
watch "Capitan Corelli's Mandolin " here in Oxford and I really fell in
love with Nicolas Cage, cried and wanted to heal his wounds...)
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