Writings
Secundus was a prolific writer, and in his short life he produced several books of elegies, epigrams, odes, verse epistles and epithalamia, as well as some prose writings (epistles and itineraria).
His most famous work, though, was the Liber Basiorum (Book of Kisses, first complete edition 1541), a short collection consisting of nineteen poems in various metres, in which the poet explores the theme of the kiss. The 'Basia' are really extended imitations of Catullus (in particular poems 5 and 7) and some poems from the Anthologia Graeca; Secundus situates his poetry, stylistically as well as thematically, firmly with the Neo-Catullan tradition. Variations on the central theme include: imagery of natural fertility; the 'arithmetic' of kissing; kisses as nourishment or cure; kisses that wound or bring death; and the exchange of souls through kissing. Secundus also introduces elements of Neo-Platonism and Petrarchism into his poems.
Read more about this topic: Johannes Secundus
Famous quotes containing the word writings:
“Even in my own writings I cannot always recover the meaning of my former ideas; I know not what I meant to say, and often get into a regular heat, correcting and putting a new sense into it, having lost the first and better one. I do nothing but come and go. My judgement does not always forge straight ahead; it strays and wanders.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
“A people’s literature is the great textbook for real knowledge of them. The writings of the day show the quality of the people as no historical reconstruction can.”
—Edith Hamilton (1867–1963)
“An able reader often discovers in other people’s writings perfections beyond those that the author put in or perceived, and lends them richer meanings and aspects.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)