Alessandra Scala

Alessandra Scala (1475–1506) was a Florentine humanist and scholar of Latin and Greek in the late fifteenth century. She was an amateur actress during the 1490s, portraying Electra in a Florentine performance of Sophocles's Electra. The only two pieces of Scala's work that survive are her letters to her fellow writer Cassandra Fedele and a poem written in the Greek language.

Quotes about Scala

• An admirable Electra was the youthful Alessandra; admirable for the manner in which she, an Italian, pronounced the speech of Athens; in the just intonations of her voice, in preserving the illusion of the scene, in faithfully portraying the character, and regulating the expression, gestures and movements, proper to her part; in keeping the language of passion within the bounds of decorum, in awakening the pity of the audience by the sight of her tearful face. All were deeply moved, but oh! what envy did I feel within my heart when she clasped Orestes to her breast and cried, 'Do I hold thee in mine arms?' and he replied, 'Oh, mayest thou ever hold me thus!'
• At last I have found that which I desired, that which I have always sought, the love long sighed for, the love beheld in my dreams! A maiden of perfect beauty, of grace which is natural and not acquired; a maiden learned in Greek and Latin, excellent in the dance, skilled in music, in which qualities, veiled by her modesty, she is the rival of the Graces. I have found her! But what doth it profit me, if I, who burn for her, can see her scarce once a year?
  • Greek verses by Poliziano, reported in Isidoro Del Lungo, Women of Florence, tr. Mary C. Steegmann (London: Chatto and Windus, 1907) pp. 182–3