Petrarch's 'Fragmenta'

Petrarch's Rerum vulgarium fragmenta, a collection of lyric  poems on sacred and profane love and other subjects, has traditionally been viewed as reflecting the conflicted nature of its author. However, award winning author Thomas E. Peterson argues that Petrarch’s  Fragmenta is an ordered and coherent work unified by narrative and theological structures.

By concentrating on the poem’s reliance on...