Historic Writers and the World Around Them
Writers are sometimes known to be products of their society, meaning that what they write on paper is a direct reflection of what is transpiring around them. May it be social events, tragic occurrences, or even personal loss, a writer’s interaction with the world will more often than not find its way onto paper. In this essay we will examine writers such as Francesco Petrarch, William Butler Yeats, and Saint Augustine, and analyze the ways and assess the impact that each of these authors have had on the world through their personal interactions with it.
Francisco Petrarch is regarded by some to be the father of Humanism. The majority of Petrarch’s works focuses primarily on the value and welfare of the individual. His literature centers on an ideology that rejects religious beliefs and embraces the interests, needs, and welfare of humans. Petrarch adopted this humanistic viewpoint during his climb of Mont Ventoux. At the top of this mountain he declares, “…angry with myself that I should still be admiring earthly things who might long ago have learned from even the pagan philosophers that nothing is wonderful but the soul…” (Kallendorf, The Historical Petrarch). This event, coupled with his survival of the historical Bubonic Plague and the sudden, tragic death of Laura (his un-met lover), inspired him to write The Canzoniere, which is a collection of over 300 poems. The central theme of The Canzoniere is Petrarch’s love for Laura, a woman he allegedly met in the Church of Saint Claire. Not only did his interaction with this woman result in the production of more than 300 sonnets, but his love for this woman coined the term “Petrarchan Love,” which means an unattainable love. Although Petrarch was unaware of it at the time, the Sonnets he created in memory of Laura
