Gli Asolani (the people of Asolo) are dialogues in three books written between 1497 and 1504[1] by Pietro Bembo in the language of Petrarch[2] and comprise his first important work.
The romantic poet Robert Browning credits Cardinal Bembo with coining the poeticism "asolare" upon which he based his last work "Asolando" published posthumously in 1890.
"...a titlename popularly ascribed to the inventiveness of the ancient secretary of Queen Cornaro whose palace-tower still overlooks us: Asolare—" to disport in the open air, amuse oneself at random."
The objection that such a word nowhere occurs in the works of the Cardinal is hardly important— Bembo was too thorough a purist to conserve in print a term which in talk he might possibly toy with..."[10] Indeed, Bembo's anthropology of human love as divine gift reconciling fallen man to his neighbor (rather than primitive psychological strife in the battle of the sexes) represents an early instance in the development of Christian metaphysics towards an understanding of the experience of human persons in mutual relationship with each other.
His 3-act play The Jeweler's Shop also employs a trio of couples reversing the dramatic order, setting the amore lovers first with the amare lovers second, concluding with a couple from the next generation, a plot twist that provides the experiential material that helps resolve their stand-off of positive vs negative fatalism allowing them to cross the threshold of hope.