SOURCE: "Francesco Guicciardini in Modern Critical Literature," Annali d'Italianistica, Vol. 2, 1984, pp. 7-18.

In the following essay, Bondanella traces the publication history of Guicciardini's writings, noting that while some of his editors have been interested in the moral content of his work, others have concentrated on his style and method.

Guicciardini's place in Italian and European literary history owes as much to extraliterary factors as it does to a reasoned assessment of the merits of his works. Given the peculiar publication history of his works, a comprehensive view of Guicciardini's contributions to Italian Renaissance culture was perhaps not even possible until only very recently. It is too often forgotten that Guicciardini's critical reputation was originally based upon a small portion of his total work—only the Storia d'Italia was ever published in its entirety during the Renaissance. The editio princeps appeared in Florence in 1561, followed in rapid succession by...