Translating the Ragionamento: Reframing Pietro Aretino as the Castigator of Courtesans

Pietro Aretino (1492-1556) was one of the first Italian writers to make a living from the printing press and had built his fame during his lifetime to such an extent that he had become notorious across Europe as the 'scourge of princes'. In the century after his death, however, Aretino's reputation as a controversial figure changed until, like Machiavelli, his name had became synonymous with Italian vice in the minds of foreign readers. This article will trace a network of translations which were made of one of Aretino's most popular texts: the Sei Giornate, which was reduced to only one third of its original size, and which focused on the lives of whores. I argue that the accumulation of these translations, which all reframed the text as a warning to young men against the dangers of prostitutes, also helped to transform and domesticate the author Aretino from an observer of courtesans into their castigator, through a process of cultural translation.