Garden Thinking and Baroque Pastoral

Abstract

The term “baroque pastoral” connotes firstly a meeting place of imagination and natural environment arranged and undertaken for the purpose of perfecting one’s material and spiritual existence; and, secondly, a particular labor of distilling the core of nature’s beauty while simultaneously attempting to discard nature’s outer, chaotic exterior. This chapter observes the baroque pastoral in action through what Daddario calls “garden thinking”. This thinking takes place in two physical environments: the garden of Valsanzibio in the Euganei Hills of Padua and the Sacred Wood of Bomarzo outside of Rome. Daddario then follows the transplantation of garden thinking into literature and theatre by analyzing two archetypal works of pastoralia: Francesco Colonna’s Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (c.1499) and Torquato Tasso’s L’Aminta (c.1580).