ABSTRACT
If Mr. Ludovico Ariosto could come back to see things down here on earth, even for just a little while, Oh! How his keen eyes would be filled with wonder! Because those fanciful imaginings of his—which Cardinal Este originally called ‘foolish nonsense’ and later came to describe with greater respect as ‘lovely fantasies’—those fanciful imaginings, those dreams, are now reality. The monstrous and gigantic Orc, who swiftly dives to the depths of the sea, swallowing up knights and ladies in the ample recesses of his belly, has now become the submarine, this new and terrifying mechanical sea creature that itself contains men of great daring who are ready to kill or to be killed. 2 And that enchanted Brigliadoro—the steed who breathed flames from his nostrils and who, in running, competed with the winds—what is to become of him when faced with the 120-horsepower engine of an automobile hurling through space like a flash of lightning? 3 And Ruggero and Astolfo, who flew through the sky on the back of the hippogriff—that large and bizarre bird—how confused and surprised would they be to find themselves surrounded on all sides—near and far, above and below—by monoplanes and biplanes of every make, every kind, every size? And when the good fairy Melissa, in the chamber where the spirit and the bones of Merlin the Magician were resting, made an endless series of shadows and shapes parade past the astonished stares of Bradamante at the command of her magical incantation, was the good fairy not perhaps making some timid experiments in cinema for the distant future?
