Abstract
Giambattista Giraldi Cinzio's Discorso intorno al comporre de i romanzi and De' romanzi delle commedie e delle tragedie ragionamenti, jointly published in 1554, offer two differing positions for the human body as metaphor and scaffolding for the text. The former anticipates by a few decades the emphasis on effetti and affetti that characterizes the theoretical writings linked to or solicited by new musical genres. Additionally, inasmuch as both texts appeared in print, the significance of the presence or absence of the body also deserves consideration. The article argues that, while the Discorso dei romanzi belongs to a losing tradition that features the body in the texts, the Ragionamenti de-emphasize the body and thus indirectly equate writer with text, reducing the former to the latter. Both treatises, however, indicate a new awareness of the writer's position vis-à-vis his text, linked to its status as a printed, not manuscript, work.