The author examines the (poetica) and (poesia) of Torquatto Tasso (1544-95) in the context of the historical and cultural climate in which he lived. His epic theory is explored from the point of view of the three rhetorical faculities current in 16th-Century poetics: (inventio, dispositio) and (elocutio.) His discussion of (dispositio) reveals a fascinating similarity with ideas on art expressed by the Russian Formalists in the 1920"s, a coincidence that can be attributed to the lasting influence of Aristotelian writings on plot. Dr Gunsberg draws on methodologies based on Freud, Lacan and the ideology of body language in her analysis of the (Gerusalemme liberata.