Pietro Bembo's Gli Asolani was printed by Aldus Manutius in Venice in 1505. Framed as elegant conversations on love at Asolo, it used Petrarchan language to shape aristocratic taste. The book helped define an ideal of polished Italian prose at a time when vernacular writing sought classical dignity.

Bembo's work deeply affected Renaissance lyric by strengthening Petrarch as a model for love poetry. Its dialogue form also showed how philosophical debate, social performance and literary style could merge in courtly writing.