auto-da-fe

Auto-da-fe

by Francisco Ricci, 1683

noun

[auto-dǝ-fay']

auto-da-fe: The public burning of a heretic who had been sentenced by the Inquisition.—Chambers 21 Century Dictionary

In the popular imagination, "auto-da-fé" has come to refer to burning at the stake for heresy. —Wikipedia

18c: Portuguese, meaning "act of the faith." Also in Spanish: auto-de-fe.

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AUTO-DA-FE IN USE

As [Rush Limbaugh] and Sarah Palin conduct their auto-da-fé of moderate Republicans — “Moderates by definition have no principles,” he told his radio audience on Monday — Limbaugh is more than ever the face of his party, as Rahm Emanuel said.

He’s also the mouth.

—Maureen Dowd. "Who Are You Calling a Narcissist, Rush? OP-ED, The New York Times. November 4, 2009.

Maureen Dowd could have used any number of words or phrases as the direct object of her sentence — dress down, rebuke, remonstrance, lambasting, reproval, censure, repremand, to mention a few — but she was interested in something more dramatic, more attention getting. So she chose the rhetorical figure called hyperbole, which Richard Lanham defines as "exaggerated or extravagant terms used for emphasis and intended to be understood literally; self-conscious exaggeration."

Dowd achieved the hyperbolic effect by using auto-da-fe as an extreem metaphor for the chastisements Rush Limbaugh and Sara Palin had directed at moderate Republicans. What Dowd intends to transfer from the events of an auto-da-fe are not the horrific circumstances of the event (described below), but the element of rigid autocracy, which the Catholic Church exercised to keep its members in line. For Limbaugh and Palin, the authority would be assumed authority.

Later in the article, Dowd delineates the arrogance she sees in the actions of Limbaugh and Palin:

But the tactics of Limbaugh, Palin, Cheney & Fille are more cynical: They spin certainty, ignoring their side’s screw-ups, and they exploit patriotism, labeling all critics as traitors.

•

We also find auto-da-fe used in its extended sense in an editorial title from The Washington Times :

Obama's auto da fe

In a unprecedented move, the Obama administration essentially fired TK Waggoner, the chief executive of General Motors. This is unheard of in American history and sends an ominous signal to millions of shareholders for whom the auto maker is part of their retirement plans.

The Washington Times, March 31, 2009

As with the Limbaugh-Palin example, the author of this editorial title selected out the element of rigid autocracy from the auto-da-fe event, not the horrific circumstances of the ceremony. In addition, auto plays a pun, a type of pun called an•ta•nac'la•sis, which employs a word in two different senses, in this instance, as is obvious, auto, from the Portuguese, meaning act, and auto, from modern English, short for automobile. Clever.

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THE EVENTS OF THE AUTO-DA-FE

Auto-da-fe penitent wearing

san benito and coroza,

in a sketch by Goya.

Dear Reader,

Because the following account describes some truly of horrific events, consider it "optional reading."

—Bloggin' John

[Public execution] was rarely a simple matter of dispatching the victim. Even those who confessed immediately were tortured. Execution was not the sentence – it was an additional sentence. At the end of the trial a public ceremony was held called an Auto-da-fé (Portuguese for Act of Faith). The victim was dressed in a penitential tunic ( san benito) painted with a design. Impenitents wore tunics painted with pictures of their wearers burning in Hell with devils fanning the flames. On their heads they wore 3-foot-long pointed pasteboard caps (corozas), also painted. Around their necks they wore nooses, and in their hands they carried candles. Anyone judged likely to speak out against the Inquisition was gagged. After a procession came a Mass and sermon, in which the Inquisition was praised and heresy condemned. The sentences were read aloud and then carried out. As usual the secular authorities were obliged to burn victims on the Church’s behalf on the grounds that ecclesia non novit sanguinem – the Church does not shed blood. Burning generally took place on Sundays or festivals in order to attract the largest possible audience. Participation was a meritorious act – so for example any persons who helped collect firewood would earn a remission of their sins.

A slow roasting was considered preferable to quick incineration. Victims were tied high up on their stakes, partly to give the crowds of faithful a good view, partly to prolong the agony. Sometimes there was further torture before the fire was lit. For example Protestants who refused to recant had burning sprigs of gorse thrust into their faces until they were burned black. The whole event was a popular festival for the devout, who enjoyed the spectacle and ridiculed the victims in their death agonies. The events were closely linked to royal spectacles. The king was obliged by his coronation oath to attend these mass burnings. Such burnings were even held to help celebrate royal marriages.

www.languedoc-france.info/cathar/1209_inquisition.htm

•

Enough about auto-da-fe. I've researched as much about its oppressive ideology and inhumane effects as I can tolerate. —Bloggin' John

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metonymy

Rush Limbaugh:

"the face of his party"

"also the mouth."

—Maureen Dowd

Vanity Fair image.

noun

[ me-ton'-y-my ]

Circa 1831 in popular English literature

metonymy: Substituting the name of an attribute or feature for the name of the thing itself (as in "they counted heads"). —WordNet 1.7.1 Princeton University

From the Greek meta, "change" and onoma, "name"

metonym, noun: a word used in metonymy.

Related forms: metonymic, metonymical, adjectives — metonymically, adverb

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METONYMY IN RECENT USE

"Hollywood metonymy for female characters is "handbags," also known as "girlfriend parts"—in other words, incidental sidekicks."

The New Yorker Oct. 26, 2009 "Man of Extremes: The Return of James Cameron Dana Goodyear 61

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COMMENT

Use of the word metonymy is common enough among teachers of rhetoric and composition, as well as, they hope, among their students. But it is not commonly used in public discourse, so I was surprised — delighted, actually — to read James Cameron use it when he reported that the "Hollywood metonym for female characters is "handbags." By substituting the metonym "handbags" for "female actors," certain Hollywood producers (aka Hollywood) reveal themselves to be cynical and patriarchal.

Although the word metonymy appears infrequently in common usage, common usage shows frequent appearances of actual metonymies, some experts claiming they occur conceptually as frequently as do metaphors.

So I thought I'd dedicate the rest of this posting to words and phrases that appear to be simple enough but which which are actually instances metonymy. To mentally process a metonymy, the reader must become engaged with the word, by drawing an inference, as with "They counted heads," where the reader infers that the reference is to people because people have heads. That brief inferential engagement with the word gives it a touch of emphasis; it gives the reader a sense of ownership because she has had to do some work to "get" it.

The reality is that we are speaking in metonymies all of the time.

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FROM WALTER NASH

Metonymy substitutes the token for the type, substitutes, that is, a particular instance, property, characteristic or association, for the general principle or function. Its terms of reference very often bridge the abstract and the concrete.

Thus

for government read the crown

for law read the bench

for command read flag

for war read the sword

for authorship read the pen

for democracy read the ballot box

for terrorism read the bullet

These are the metonymic cliches that we find in

"The powers of the crown,"

"the dignity and he authority of the bench"

"forces under the flag of General Popgun"

"the pen is mightier than the sword"

"they prefer the bullet to the ballot box"

Walter Nash. Rhetoric: The Wit of Persuasion. Cambridge USA: Blackwell, 1989, 122.

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FROM GEORGE LAKOFF AND MARK JOHNSON

Metonymy: using one entity to refer to another entity that is related to it.

Categories:

THE PART FOR THE WHOLE

The Giants need a stronger arm in right field.

Get your butt over here!

PRODUCER FOR PRODUCT

He's got a Picasso in his den.

I hate to read Heidegger.

OBJECT USED FOR USER

We need a better glove at third base.

The gun he hired wanted fifty grand.

CONTROLLER FOR CONTROLLED

Napoleon lost at Waterloo.

Nixon bombed Hanoi.

INSTITUTION FOR PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE

I don't approve of the government's actions.

Exxon has raised its prices again.

THE PLACE FOR THE INSTITUTION

Wall Street is in a panic.

The White House isn't saying anything.

THE PLACE FOR THE EVENT

It's been Grand Central Station here all day.

Remember the Alamo.

George Lakoff and Mark Johnson. Metaphors We Live By. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1980 --pages 38 and 39

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METONYMIES IN THE CURRENT ISSUE OF THE NEW YORKER, ferreted out by Bloggin' John

The other day, I went hunting for metonymies in the pages (39-44) of The New Yorker's "The Talk of the Town," Nov. 2, 2009, written by Louis Menand, David Remnick, and Lizzie Widdicombe. Here's what I found:

The Talk of the Town

(Talk: THE PART FOR THE WHOLE)

(Town: THE PLACE FOR THE INSTITUTION)

(Town = THE PLACE FOR THE EVENT)

That is the voice of the fringe, and the fringe is exactly where you want the opposition to set up permanent shop.

(voice = THE PART FOR THE WHOLE)

One line of objection to the White House's effort to ostracize Fox News is that presidential wars against the press are always futile and self-defeating.

(White House = INSTITUTION FOR THE PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE)

(Fox News = INSTITUTION FOR THE PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE)

(the press = OBJECT FOR THE USER)

A self-fashioned "scholar-bluesman," [Cornel West] travels from lecture hall to church pulpit and on to Barnes & Noble, wearing a formal and elegant uniform — black suit, white shirt, French cuffs, black tie, black scarf.

(lecture hall, church pulpit = THE PLACE FOR THE INSTITUTION)

(Barnes & Noble = INSTITUTION FOR THE PEOPLE INVOLVED)

Of the many roles that West has played in the academy and the media lately, it's been his ongoing support-slash-critique of Barack Obama that is the most curious.

(the academy, the media = INSTITUTION FOR PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE)

"Who are the major victims of that? The poor—disproportionately black and brown and red." Quoting Cornel West.

(poor, black, brown, red = THE PART FOR THE WHOLE)

"Guy Lombardo can be nice on a certain night, but you're going to need Duke Ellington and Count Basie." Quoting Cornel West.

(Guy Lombardo, Duke Ellington, Count Basie = CONTROLLER FOR CONTROLLED)

I [Rob Pruitt] love all the conventions: the red-carpet aspect, and the speeches, and the cameras catching the expressions of the people that didn't win."

(red-carpet, cameras = THE PART FOR THE WHOLE)

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sprezzatura

The writer who coined sprezzatura,

Baldassare Castiglione (1478-1529),

portrait by Raphael (Louvre Museum)

What Baldassare Castiglione learned about political interactions in the hallways of royalty during sixteenth century Italy, he put into his courtesy book, The Book of the Courtier, presenting in Book III a newly minted necessity, the word sprezzatura, a word that succinctly defines the much observed but previously undefined "studied carelessness" of successful courtly behavior. And those of us since who have discovered sprezzatura and have taken it up and employed it, now treasure it as an irreplaceable bon mot for identifying certain equilibrious moments of human interaction.

Here's how Castiglione explained it:

It is an art which does not seem to be an art. One must avoid affectation and practice in all things a certain sprezzatura, disdain or carelessness, so as to conceal art, and make whatever is done or said appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it ... obvious effort is the antithesis of grace.

Ever since Castiglione, lexicographers, scholars, conductors, directors, critics, and even bloggers of all sorts have been steering the word into the accommodations of their own ports of call — of rhetoric, music, portrait painting, dance, and modern film, to list just a few — where the word easily adapts itself to new surroundings and performs with effortlessly effectiveness and grace. Following are a few definitions of sprezzatura from select dictionaries, as well as descriptions from various ports of call that illustrate the word's graceful adaptability and efficiency.

DEFINITIONS

noun

[sprez-za-TU-rah]

[Italian]

Ease of manner, studied carelessness; the appearance of acting or being done without effort; spec. of literary style or performance. — Oxford English Dictionary

◊◊◊

Studied nonchalance : perfect conduct or performance of something (as an artistic endeavor) without apparent effort. Merriam-Webster's Unabridged Dictionary

◊◊◊

Effortlessness or ease, esp. in art or literature; careless grace; nonchalance. — Webster's New World College Dictionary, 2005

◊◊◊

Sprezzatura is an Italian word originating from Castiglione's The Book of the Courtier, where it is defined by the author as

• “a certain nonchalance, so as to conceal all art and make whatever one does or says appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it.”[1]

• It is the ability of the courtier to display “an easy facility in accomplishing difficult actions which hides the conscious effort that went into them.”[2]

• Sprezzatura has also been described “as a form of defensive irony: the ability to disguise what one really desires, feels, thinks, and means or intends behind a mask of apparent reticence and nonchalance.”[3] — Wikipedia.com

◊◊◊

ANTONYM

The opposite of sprezzatura is affectazione (that is, affectation). Dr. Richard Nordquist, Armstrong Atlantic State University.

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IN MUSIC

A term used in 17th century Italy describing a free style of performing compositions that ignored strict tempo and rhythm but embraced freedom of tempo and expressiveness.— Virginia Tech Multimedia Music Dictionary.

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IN RHETORIC

A coinage by Baldesare Castiglione in his Il Libro del Cortegiano, to describe the well-practiced naturalness, the rehearsed spontaniety, which lies at the center of convincing discourse of any sort, and which has been the always-sought but seldom well-described center of rhetorical "decorum," since Aristotle first tried to describe it. — Richard A. Lanham. A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms, 2nd Ed.

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IN RENAISSANCE PORTRAITURE

mmmm

The Renaissance portraits of the late 1400s and early 1500s by Leonardo and Raphael, for example, show sprezzatura-in-spades. Take for example, the two portraits above; Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa 1502-1519 and Raphael’s Portrait of Maddelena Doni 1506. Note how the sitter really doesn’t look at you, but past you and looks almost bored. That’s sprezzatura. — Travelmarx: A Sabbatical Year in Italy and Beyond trabelmarx.blogspot.com

◊◊◊

IN THE MOVIES

mmmm

Pictured are Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.[left] and Adolphe Menjou [right]. Both movie stars, both sophisticated, both with extensive wardrobes, both well dressed, both mustachioed, both dandies.

Yet when we look at them today, Fairbanks remains vibrant and stylish, while Menjou looks fussy and fastidious. Fairbanks could walk into a cocktail party today and charm the ladies and make the men envious. Menjou would come across as a relic.Why? In a word, sprezzatura.

As Count Ludovico says in Castiglione’s “Book of the Courtier,” sprezzatura “is an art which does not seem to be an art. One must avoid affectation and practice in all things a certain sprezzatura, disdain or carelessness, so as to conceal art, and make whatever is done or said appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it. Obvious effort is the antithesis of grace.”

Dandies by definition take great care choosing their attire, and as a result are prone to looking too perfect. The Beau’s injunction against looking too tight and too stiff is even truer today than it was two centuries ago. The goal, as we see it, is to emulate Dougie Fairbanks and avoid being mistaken for Adolph Menjou. —www.dandyism.com

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IN DANCE

From the moment [Diana Vishneva] stepped on stage, one could feel the tragedy of her situation. The power of her emotive grace was palpable, even from three tiers away in the mezzanine gallery. Her face and gracefully broken angles screamed a slow resignation. This was a wonderful articulation of the Italian concept of sprezzatura: The glory of an incredible, technically skilled dancer applying all her skill to demonstrate the tragic beauty of a graceful death, while making it look effortless. —Laura Taylor. —"Columbians 'Fall for Dance' at City Center Festival." Columbia Spectator, 4 October 2009.

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COMMENTS

Gone are the coutiers of the renaissance, those sophisticated factotums who pleased their monarchs with every deep bow and apt compliment. But with us today are handlers, staff assistants, aides, and press officers who continue to aspire to and sometimes achieve a form of dark sprezzatura, as they mediate business executives and political personages with their respective publics, each word carefully chosen and syntactically in place, each physical gesture calm and natural, while, perhaps beneath the calculated show, some uncertainty ruminates about the wisdom of their superior's intentions and competence.

Though the word has moved into wider usage during recent years, we find it defined mainly in unabridged dictionaries, most collegiate dictionaries currently being edited by etemologists who need to be thunked into alertness about the usefulness of this emerging word.

◊◊◊

[Finally] IN PUBLISHING:

Sprezzatura: 50 Ways Italian Genius Shaped the World. Mary Desmond Pinkowish Peter D'Epiro. New York: Anchor, 2007.

Publisher Comments:

“Sprezzatura,” or the art of effortless mastery, was coined in 1528 by Baldassare Castiglione inThe Book of the Courtier. No one has demonstrated effortless mastery throughout history quite like the Italians. From the Roman calendar and the creator of the modern orchestra (Claudio Monteverdi) to the beginnings of ballet and the creator of modern political science (Niccolò Machiavelli), Sprezzatura highlights fifty great Italian cultural achievements in a series of fifty information-packed essays in chronological order.

Table of Contents

Preface

1 Rome gives the world a calendar—twice

2 The Roman Republic and our own

3 Julius Caesar and the imperial purple

4 Catullus revolutionizes love poetry

5 Master builders of the ancient world

6 “Satire is wholly ours”

7 Ovid’s treasure hoard of myth and fable

8 The Roman legacy of law

9 St. Benedict: Father of Western monasticism, preserver of the Roman heritage

10 Salerno and Bologna: The earliest medical school and university

11 St. Francis of Assisi, “alter Christus”

12 “Stupor mundi”: Emperor Frederick II, King of Sicily and Jerusalem

13 St. Thomas Aquinas: Titan of theology

14 Dante’s incomparable Comedy

15 Banks, bookkeeping, and the rise of commercial capitalism

16 Petrarch: Creator of the modern lyric

17 Boccaccio and the development of Western literary realism

18 The mystic as activist: St. Catherine of Siena

19 Inventors of the visual language of the Renaissance: Brunelleschi, Donatello, Masaccio

20 Lorenzo Ghiberti and the “Gates of Paradise”

21 Cosimo and Lorenzo de’ Medici, grand patrons of art and learning

22 Sigismondo Malatesta: The condottiere with a vision

23 Leonardo da Vinci: Renaissance man, eternal enigma

24 A new world beckons: Columbus, Cabot, Vespucci, Verrazano

25 Machiavelli and the dawn of modern political science

26 Michelangelo: Epitome of human artistry

27 Sprezzatura and Castiglione’s concept of the gentleman

28 Aretino: Self-publicist, pornographer, “secretary of the world”

29 Giovanni Della Casa’s Galateo: Etiquette book par excellence

30 Andrea Palladio and his “bible” of building

31 Catherine de’ Medici: Godmother of French cuisine

32 Peri’s Euridice: The birth of opera from the spirit of tragedy

33 Galileo frames the foundations of modern science

34 Two sonorous gifts: The violin and the piano

35 Claudio Monteverdi, father of modern music

36 The Baroque splendors of Bernini

37 Pioneers of modern anatomy: Eustachio, Fallopio, Malpighi, Morgagni, et al.

38 Founder of modern penology: Cesare Beccaria

39 Trailblazers in electricity: Galvani and Volta

40 Venice: Rhapsody in stone, water, melody, and color

41 Europe’s premier poet of pessimism: Giacomo Leopardi

42 Giuseppe Garibaldi: A united Italy emerges

43 The last “Renaissance” prince—D’Annunzio at Fiume

44 La Dottoressa: Maria Montessori and a new era in early childhood education

45 Marconi invents the radio

46 Enrico Fermi: Father of the atomic age

47 Roberto Rossellini: Neorealist cinema and beyond

48 An unlikely international bestseller: Lampedusa’s The Leopard

49 Ferrari—on the road to perfection

50 La moda italiana: The art of apparel

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