522 Reviews Ariosto's Orlando furioso in Ferrara and theatrical tastes at the court from 1559. This section also makes valuable observations about Giraldi's moral and didactic attitude towards literature generally, which resisted the prevailing view that its purpose was purely 'recreational'. Here, as elsewhere, it would have been helpful to have provided more background information on the contemporary ltalian literary scene (especially on the growing interest in Aristotelian criticism) for the less specialized reader. Like other plays by Giraldi, the plot of Eufimia?the tale of a villainous king's ambition to dispose of his long-suffering consort (Eufimia), and her subsequent rescue by a chivalrous lover, realizing divine dictates?largely derives from a novella from his Ecatommiti (a source later used by Shakespeare). Significant changes were made to adapt the short story for the stage: besides the addition of chivalric elements and more theatrical devices, of note is the altered representation ofthe female protagonist. This last point is explored in the third introductory chapter, where the stage persona of Eufimia is shown to embody aspects of both the female types delineated 'rather crudely' (p. 41) as recurring in Giraldi's tragedies: formerly,she appeared as a rebel? lious 'free spirit' (in the antefatto) but, in the action, she plays a patient, submissive wife. Compared with the scholarly depth of the firsttwo chapters, the ideas in this section appear less critically developed. Constraints of space and the wish to avoid repetition of material presented elsewhere may well explain the relative lack of atten? tion to the interplay of female roles in the play, and to the way in which Eufimia's representation was affected by contemporary views on staging women, and by the religious crises that had marked Ferrara. Disappointingly, Horne avoids considering recent innovative studies on gender and early modern theatre. It is to be hoped, though, that modern readers will be able to appreciate Giraldi's last remaining neglected plays in equally thorough and informative editions. University of Reading Lisa Sampson Leopardi e 'le ragioni della verita': scienze e filosofia della natura negli scritti leopardiani . By Gaspare Polizzi. Preface by Remo Bodei. Rome: Carocci. 2003. xx + 290pp. ?19.60. ISBN 88-430-2818-9. Gaspare Polizzi, who is Professor ofthe History of Science at the University of Flo? rence, offersthe most substantial study to date of Leopardi's prodigious knowledge of the sciences, of astronomy, physics, chemistry, and biology in particular. Leopardi may have felt isolated in his father's library but counted among his friends and acquaintances some of the finest scientists of his generation. Not only was he familiar with the latest scientific theories and experimentation, but he may have carried out several experiments himself (the catalogue of the exhibition 'Passeggiando con Giacomo tra le Stelle', held in Palazzo Leopardi, Recanati, in 1996, lists the scientific instruments in Casa Leopardi). Polizzi's title seems to echo that of Carlo Ferrucci, Leopardi filosofo e le ragioni della poesia (Venice: Marsilio, 1987), and to a degree the two books cover similar ground, in trying to describe Leopardi's 'temperamento della natura colla ragione' (Zibaldone, 114), his contrasting qualities, so much admired by Calvino, of exactitude and vagueness, his recognition of order and chaos, his rigorous logic, and his powerful imagination. Polizzi's focus on Leopardi's knowledge of scientific writing and its im? pact on the formation of his thought provides a very revealing new perspective from which to view such a complex question. The book divides into two parts. The firstcharts Leopardi's scientific knowledge, the linguaggio of science in his writings, and the second the formation of Leopardi's thought patterns through the lingua of science?a dividing line which, albeit clear MLR, 100.2, 2005 523 in theory, is perhaps not so clear in execution; and there is an element of repetition between the two parts (for example, pages 163-67 repeat sections in Chapter 1). In the firstpart there is a chapter on the natural sciences in Leopardi's early writ? ings (a shorter version of this chapter has been published in the recent Festschrift for Patrick Boyde, Science and Literature in ltalian Culture from Dante to Calvino (Oxford: Legenda, 2004)?both...