Editing Ludovico Ariosto (section)

==Poetic style==
[[File:Ariosto.jpg|thumb|left|210px|Statue of the poet in [[Reggio Emilia]]]]

Throughout Ariosto's writing are narratorial comments dubbed by Daniel Javitch as "Cantus Interruptus". Javitch's term refers to Ariosto's narrative technique to break off one plot line in the middle of a canto, only to pick it up again in another, often much later, canto. Javitch argues that while many critics have assumed Ariosto does this so as to build narrative tension and keep the reader turning pages, the poet in reality defuses narrative tension because so much time separates the interruption and the resumption. By the time the reader gets to the continuation of the story, he or she has often forgotten or ceased to care about the plot and is usually wrapped up in another plot. Ariosto does this, Javitch argues, to undermine "man's foolish but persistent desire for continuity and completion". Ariosto uses it throughout his works.<ref>Daniel Javitch, "Cantus interruptus in the ''Orlando Furioso''", ''[[Modern Language Notes]]'', 95 (1980)</ref>

For example, in Canto II, stanza 30, of ''Orlando Furioso'', the narrator says:
{{poemquote|But I, who still pursue a varying tale,
Must leave awhile the [[Paladin]], who wages
A weary warfare with the wind and flood;
To follow a fair virgin of his blood.}}
[[File:Cristofano dell'altissimo, ludovico ariosto, ante 1568.JPG|right|thumb|Portrait of Ludovico Ariosto by [[Cristofano dell'Altissimo]]]]
Some have attributed this piece of [[metafiction]] as one component of the "Sorriso ariostesco" or Ariosto's smile, the wry sense of humor that Ariosto adds to the text.

In explaining this humor, Thomas Greene, in ''Descent from Heaven'', says:
{{Blockquote|text=The two persistent qualities of Ariosto's language are first, serenity – the evenness and self-contented assurance with which it urbanely flows, and second, brilliance – the Mediterranean glitter and sheen which neither dazzle nor obscure but confer on every object its precise outline and glinting surface. Only occasionally can Ariosto's language truly be said to be witty, but its lightness and agility create a surface which conveys a witty effect. Too much wit could destroy even the finest poem, but Ariosto's graceful ''brio'' is at least as difficult and for narrative purposes more satisfying.|sign=Thomas Greene|source=''The Descent from Heaven, a Study in Epic Continuity''}}