PALLAVICINO (Ferrante). *La retorica delle puttane* [The Rhe - Lot 470

PALLAVICINO (Ferrante). *La retorica delle puttane* [The Rhetoric of Prostitutes, Composed According to the Precepts of Cyprian. Dedicated to the College of the Most Famous Courtesans. Cambrai [actually published in Venice], 1642. 12mo, calfskin, decorated ribbed spine. First edition (damage from the book clamp on the front cover, top of the spine, and headband; title page restored) “The most pornographic and most Aretinian work of the 17th century ” (Q. Marini, *P. Aretino nel '600*, in: *P. Aretino nel cinquecentenario della nascita*, p. 486). “The Rhetoric of Prostitutes,” a scandalous and anti-Jesuit work, “demonstrates why Pallavicino was the only Italian author of his time capable of a coherent vision integrating satire, skepticism, and naturalist morality ” (Muir, *Culture Wars* [Cambridge: Harvard, 2007], p. 90). The book takes the form of a dialogue between an elderly prostitute and her naive apprentice. The elderly prostitute’s fifteen lessons are inspired by Cipriano Suárez’s *De arte rhetorica*, a textbook used in Jesuit schools. Muir aptly notes: “By systematically exploring the parallels between rhetorical persuasion and erotic seduction, Pallavicino demonstrates how the noble art of rhetoric has the same instrumental character as the prostitute’s vile deceptions.”