This bibliography is intended to include the Dante translations published in this country in 1973 and all Dante studies and reviews published in 1973 that are in any sense American. The latter criterion is construed to include foreign reviews of American publications pertaining to Dante. The listing of reviews in general is selective, particularly in the case of studies bearing only peripherally on Dante.
As a rule, items cited from Dissertation Abstracts International
are registered without further abstracting, especially since the
titles tend to be self-explanatory. Items not recorded in
the bibliographies for previous years are entered as addenda to
the present list.
NOTE. The citation of an individual study from a collected volume
representing several authors is given in brief, while the main
entry of the volume is listed with full bibliographical data in
its alphabetical order. Issues of this journal under the former
title of Annual Report of the Dante Society continue to
be cited in the short form of Report, with volume number.
The Divine Comedy. Text with translation in the metre of the original by Geoffrey L. Bickersteth... Totawa, New Jersey: Rowman and Littlefield. li, 805 p. 17.5 cm. [1973]
Same as the original British edition of 1965, newly revised in
1972--Oxford: Published for the Shakespeare Head Press by Basil
Blackwell. (See Dante Studies, LXXXIV, 73-74, and
for reviews, LXXXV, 114, LXXXVI, 162, and LXXXIX, 124.)
The Divine Comedy. Translated, with a commentary, by Charles S. Singleton. [II.] Purgatorio... Bollingen Series, LXXX. [Princeton, New Jersey:] Princeton University Press. 2 v. (381; [x], 851 p.) illus., pls., diagrs., maps. 21 cm. [1973]
Same as the Inferno volumes (see Dante Studies,
LXXXIX, 107-108, and for reviews, XC, 189, XCI, 193, and
see below, under Reviews).
Vita Nuova. A translation and an Essay, by Mark Musa. A new edition. Bloomington and London: Indiana University Press. xiv, 210 p. 20 cm. [1973]
This is a much revised new edition of Professor Musa's translation
of the Vita Nuova, his original version of which first
appeared in 1957 (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University
Press) and was subsequently reprinted with an introduction in
1962 (Midland Books, MB 38; Bloomington: Indiana University Press).
The present edition comes with a new essay on the work (pp. 89-210)
by Professor Musa. Contents of the volume: Preface; Translator's
Note; The New Life; An Essay on the Vita Nuova--I.
Patterns, II. Aspects, III. Growth; Notes on the Essay.
(On the earlier editions see 76th Report, 40 and 56, 81st
Report, 20, and Dante Studies, LXXXV, 96.)
[Selected poems.] In German and Italian Lyrics of the Middle Ages: An Anthology and a History, Translations and Introductions by Frederick Goldin (Doubleday Anchor Original, A0-71; Garden City, New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday), pp. 364-405. [1973]
Thirteen representative lyric poems from the Vita Nuova, Convivio,
and the Rime, including three of the rime petrose.
The Italian text and English verse translation are given on facing
pages, with very brief notes. See this item also below, under
Studies.
Literary Criticism of Dante Alighieri. Translated and edited by Robert S. Haller. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. xlix, 192 p. 21 cm. (Regents Critics Series.) [1973]
Contains excerpts, in English translation, from Dante's works
(viz., the Vita Nuova, De vulgari eloquentia, Convivio, Divina
Commedia, Letter to Can Grande, and Eclogues) bearing in any
way upon matters of literary criticism, such as the use of the
vernacular and its relation to Latin, prosody, rhetoric, and the
poetic art, and the cultural function of poetry. The excerpted
passages are arranged under the following major headings: Diction
and Prosody; The Rhetorical Strategies of Poetry; Allegory and
Other Poetic Figures; On Poets and the Effects of Poetry. In addition,
there is an Introduction by Professor Haller treating of The Context
of Dante's Criticism, The Cultural Significance of Dante's Works,
The Problem of Vernacular Poetic Art, The Meaning and Justification
of Poetry, and A Note on the Translation; Selected Bibliography;
Appendix A: Illustrations of Dante's Principle of Construction
and Prosody [passages in the original Provençal or Italian,
with English translations, from various poets cited by Dante];
Appendix B: Index of Poets and Poems Cited in Dante's Critical
Writings; Glossary of Technical Terms; and Index--The Works of
Dante and General Index.
Auerbach, Erich. "Dante's Addresses to the Reader." In Parnassus Revisited: Modern Critical Essays on the Epic Tradition, edited and with an introduction by Anthony C. Yu (Chicago: American Library Association), pp. 121-131. [1973]
Reprint of the essay, which originally appeared in Romance
Philology, VII (1954), 268-278. (See 73rd Report,
55.)
Chiampi, James Thomas. "Poetry and Resemblance: The Notion of Reformation in Dante." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIV, 2551A. [1973]
Doctoral dissertation, Yale University, 1973.
Church Richard William. Dante and Other Essays. Folcroft, Pennsylvania: Folcroft Library Editions. [1973]
Reprint of the 1888 edition (London: Macmillan). For another recent
reprint edition, see Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 180.
Cope, Jackson I. The Theater and the Dream: From Metaphor to Form in Renaissance Drama. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press. ix, 331 p. illus. 23.5 cm. [1973]
Contains a chapter on "Theater of the Dream: Dante's Commedia,
Jonson's Satirist, and Shakespeare's Sage" (pp. 211-244,
and notes, pp. 311-320), in which the sixteenth-century
controversy over Dante, particularly as exemplified in the critical-theoretical
writings of Mazzoni and Bulgarini, is related to the author's
general concern with a developing tradition of dream and theater
theory as metaphorical and philosophical visions of the world.
Cosmo, Umberto. A Handbook to Dante Studies. Translated by David Moore. Folcroft, Pennsylvania: Folcroft Library Editions. vi, 194 p. [1973]
Reprint of the 1950 edition (Oxford: Basil Blackwell), which was
translated from the Italian original (Torino: De Silva, 1947).
Contains a brief, classified outline of Dante's life and works,
with useful annotated bibliographies for controlling all aspects
of the subject.
Curtius, Ernest Robert. European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages. Translated from the German by Willard R. Trask. Bollingen Series, XXXVI. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Paper. [1973]
Contains one long chapter and sections of three others on Dante,
as well as references to Dante passim throughout. The original
cloth edition of this translation appeared in 1953 (Bollingen
Series, XXXVI; New York: Pantheon Books). (See 68th-72nd
Report, 45; also 82nd Report, 49-50. Widely reviewed.)
Donno, Daniel J. "Dante's Ulysses and Virgil's Prohibition: Inferno XXVI, 70-75." In Italica, L, 26-37. [1973]
Attempts to resolve Virgil's prohibiting the Pilgrim to speak
to Ulysses and Diomede because "they were Greek," in
terms of the mythical and folklorist Diomedean birds representing
the transformation of Diomede's Greek companions on the islands
subsequently called Diomedean. These birds were friendly only
to Greeks and hostile to all others. Reflecting this situation,
Virgil will avoid the disdain of Ulysses and Diomede by addressing
them in their language, in order to insure Ulysses' compliance
in telling his story to the Pilgrim.
Freccero, John. "Casella's Song (Purg. II, 112)." In Dante Studies, XCI, 73-80. [1973]
Considers the Casella episode as similar to that of Francesca,
that is, a palinodic moment wherein a recall to Dante's previous
poetry serves to designate a rejection of it and a transcendence
to a higher stage Casella's song, followed by Cato's rebuke and
exhortation to move on, far from constituting a recreational interlude,
serves to recall Dante's philosophical position in the Convivio
(where love is directed to Lady Philosophy as the ultimate happiness)
in order to reject that position which has no place at this advanced
stage of the Pilgrim's spiritual journey. Passages are cited from
Boethius' Consolatio philosophiae and from Psalm 54 to
explicate the dove-and wing-similes used in the Casella
episode for expressing Dante's theory of human desire. A word
is added concerning the dove-simile as associated with poetry
as well, which together with its erotic significance in the Dantean
passage points to the inseparability of Eros and poetry on this
"journey that strains both to their limit."
Gaffney, James. "Dante's Blindness in Paradiso XXV-XXVI: An Allegorical Interpretation." In Dante Studies, XCI, 101-112. [1973]
Analyzes the various elements of this episode of blindness before
the dazzling brilliance of the light representing Saint John and
suggests a solution to the much disputed question of the allegorical
meaning of the Pilgrim's momentary blindness at this stage of
the journey by having recourse outside the Thomistic system to
the Platonic-Augustinian mystical tradition, particularly
as most directly available to Dante in Saint Bonaventure's Itinerarium
mentis in Deum. The dramatic contrivance of the Pilgrim being
struck with a momentary literal blindness at this point is seen
allegorically to represent a further stage of his spiritual progress
where he is prompted to seek within himself the lesson of love
he must express, a stage corresponding to the second category
of contemplation, of "what is within the soul," according
to St. Bonaventure's Itinerarium. His vision restored and
spiritually re-directed, the Pilgrim enters the third category
of contemplation "above the soul." Besides St. Bonaventure,
the author summarily cites several other Platonic-Augustinian
theologians, such as Richard of St. Victor, Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite,
St. Augustine himself St. Bernard, and Hugh of St. Victor, from
any of whom Dante could have acquired the part of the tradition
relevant here, characterized by the via negativa, or the
necessity for the soul to withdraw into itself in order to unite
with God through love.
German and Italian Lyrics of the Middle Ages: An Anthology and a History. Translations and Introductions by Frederick Goldin. Garden City, New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday. xvi, 438 p. 20.5 cm. (Doubleday Anchor Original, A0-71.) [1973]
The second half of the volume contains thirteen representative
lyric poems from Dante's works (see above, under Translations),
preceded by a brief historical introduction to the poet (pp. 343-363)
placing him in the lyrical tradition and commenting on the poems
presented, and many other Italian lyrics and their poets, prior
to and contemporary with Dante, presented in the same fashion.
Grandgent, Charles Hall. Dante. Folcroft, Pennsylvania: Folcroft Library Editions. [1973]
Reprint of the 1921 edition. For another recent reprint (1966),
see Dante Studies, LXXXV, 104.
Gugelberger, Georg M. "'By No Means an Orderly Dantescan Rising.'" In Italian Quarterly, XVI, No. 64 (Spring), 31-48. [1973]
Recognizing that no other American or European poet can be so
constantly associated with Dante as Ezra Pound, the author discusses
some aspects of the general relation, in a parallel yet contrastive
sense, of The Cantos to the Divina Commedia. Pound
saw that the same kind of artistic work can no longer be written
because of the change of world views, and so an admired work like
Dante's can only be ingrained in a process of receptive transformation.
Modern poets lack Dante's advantage of a universal language (identified
by T.S. Eliot with medieval Latin and associated by Pound with
the "spirit of Romance") and, more important, they lack
Dante's kind of teleology. Pound could not structure The Cantos
vertically like the Commedia; his work was designed as
a parallel in contrast, deverticalizing Dante's poem in a kind
of "nonteleological rehorizontalized Dantesque commedia,"
but still requiring the latter as a constant parallel for its
understanding. With the loss of the polysemous quality of amor
in an "age of experimentation," Pound could only declare
in the first Pisan Canto: "By no means an orderly Dantescan
rising (74:443). Summarizing, the author observes, "The three
stages of Dante's Commedia are constantly present but interfused
in themselves as with other material, thus forced down on a horizontal
plane." By his work Pound exemplifies the inadequacy of the
poetocentric world view and indicates the necessity of an outside
referential telos for future poets.
Hollander, Robert. "Dante's Use of the Fiftieth Psalm (A Note on Purg. XXX, 84)." In Dante Studies, XCI, 145-150. [1973]
Re-examines the enigma of why Dante does not have the angels
sing beyond "pedes meos" (Psalm 30, Vulgate) to determine
why the verses beyond that point are inappropriate at this moment
of the pilgrim's progress. Citing the poet's use of Hosanna in
Vita Nuova XXIII and at the appropriate moment again in
Purg. XXIX, 51, followed by the use of "Benedictus
qui venis" in XXX, both echoes from the same verses in ark
(11:9), in support of the precision of Dante's use of Scripture,
the author points out that the words following "pedes meos"
in Psalm 30:9 are "Miserere mei Domine" which are also
the opening words of Psalm 50. The three instances of the "Miserere"
found in the Commedia (Inf. I, 65; Purg.
V, 24; Par. XXXII, 12) support a parallel between the penitent
Dante and the penitent David the Psalmist. It is precisely when
Dante must prepare to make final amends, in Purg. XXX-XXXI,
that the same Miserere re-enters the work, indirectly. Reader
and pilgrim, remembering the words--"Miserere..."--that
follow "pedes meos, thereby know why the angels do not sing
beyond "pedes meos"; "because the moment for Dante's
repentance still lies before him"--in Purg. XXXI,
where the "Asperges me" of verse 98 echoes verse 9 of
Psalm 50.
Iannucci, Amilcare. "Dante's Theory of Genres and the Divina Commedia." In Dante Studies, XCI, l-26. [1973]
Examines Dante's several statements pertaining to genre and style
among his works, including the Commedia, and also interpretations
and critical judgments of the early commentators Boccaccio and
Benvenuto da Imola, certain Renaissance and nineteenth-century
critics, and particularly the moderns, Auerbach, Montano, and
De Bruyne. A major source of difficulty with the problem is Dante's
own shifting theoretical position between the De vulgari eloquentia,
where he is concerned more with style, and the Letter to Cangrande,
where his concern is more with moral content. In the latter, he
is found to adopt a stance, with respect to the Commedia,
like that of St. Bonaventure in the De reductione artium ad
theologiam, thus representing a replacement of the allegory
of poets, defined in the Convivio, by the allegory of theologians
in the Commedia, written, as pointed out by C.S. Singleton,
in imitation of God's way of writing. The medieval model for this,
is defined by E. De Bruyne, was the Bible, which contains all
literary genres and all levels of style, in keeping with the essentially
democratic nature of Christianity. Reflecting his change of viewpoint,
"Dante moved from a poetics based almost exclusively on formalistic
and rhetorical preoccupation to one where content was just as
important as, in fact more important than, technical refinements,
since poetry now had to express moral and theological truth."
His poem therefore manifests a mixture, or better, leveling, of
styles, even as a particular style generally predominates in each
of the three cantiche--the low, comic in the Inferno,
the intermediate in the Purgatorio, the sublime in the
Paradiso. To arrive at a characterization of the Commedia
as a whole, the author cites in particular two groups of cantos,
Inferno V and Purgatorio XXVI reflecting Dante's
rejection of the theme of love as the only subject suitable for
the vernacular, and Purgatorio XXI and XXII suggesting
the nature of Dante's new poetics, wherein poetry for him was
no longer simply "fictio rethorica musicaque poita,"
but also the expression of truth. While the genre of Dante's poem
may elude precise definition, in the context of his ultimate attitude
towards poetry as a vehicle of truth, "instead of contradicting
the more solemn designation 'poema sacro,' commedia subsumes
that description of the poem... is, in fact, at once more precise
and more embracing than 'poema sacro, since it reflects on both
the content and the form of the poem." Theoretically in the
Letter to Cangrande as well as poetically in the Commedia,
the classical tradition is retained and assimilated, without destroying
the notion of the separation of styles, and any tension that may
arise is resolved by the leveling effect of the comic, Christian
style.
Kittel, Muriel. "Humility in Old Provencal and Early Italian Poetry: Resemblances and Contrasts." In Romance Philology, XXVII (November), 158-171. [1973]
Examines humility in its medieval significance of being prerequisite
to all other virtues and therefore leading to its natural pairing
with the sublime and examines its use in early Provencal and Italian
lyrics. Among the poets, it was eventually Dante who discovered
"a new significance for humility that would reconcile its
inherent contradictions and point the way to union with the sublime."
The Vita Nuova represents a reconciliation of the lady-lover
relationship of troubadour tradition and the religious value of
humility, where the lady serves a Christologically redemptive
function for the lover.
Lacey, Stephen Wallace. "Structures for Awareness in Dante and Shakespeare." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII, 4421A. [1973]
Doctoral dissertation, State University of New York at Buffalo, 1972.
(Contends that Dante's Commedia mirrors the pattern of
psychoanalytical therapy.)
La Favia, Louis M. "Per una reinterpretazione dell'episodio di Manfredi." In Dante Studies, XCI, 81-100. [1973]
Against the modern interpretation, repeated since the early nineteenth
century, of seeing in the Manfredi episode (Purg. III)
a polemical stance on Dante's part against ecclesiastical authority
whose absolute judgment of excommunication must be overturned
in favor of the victimized individual, the author recalls a more
accurate position of the Church, cites documentary evidence to
confirm this, and re-examines the details of Manfredi's representation
within the canto, to determine a more consistent construction
of the episode, which is actually closer to that of the earliest
commentators who saw here an exemplum reflecting the common
ecclesiastical doctrine on excommunication and the ever-present
possibility of conciliation in the mercy of God. The Decretum
of Gratian, the Decretales of Gregory, and other texts
are cited for the exact details of the Church's position on excommunication
and the extreme condemnation of anathema, neither of which condemned
the individual absolutely to damnation. The Church itself admitted
the possibility of repentance and salvation in a case like Manfredi's,
so long as the excommunicated one performed an act of contrition
before the moment of death. The original source of the relevant
canon is a papal letter (dated 1199) of Innocent III, the contents
of which were incorporated in the Decretales and in the
ecclesiastical ritual for the administration of the sacraments.
The key passage in the letter is cited by the author here for
the first time in unquestionable support of his interpretation
of the Manfredi episode. The text was known to the early commentators,
in fact Pietro di Dante uses whole phrases from it, but without
mentioning it. The author goes on to analyze the representation
of Manfredi as introduced within the context of the immediate
canto and in the larger structural pattern of the Commedia,
as well as in the light of the historical Manfredi's popular
reputation in the second half of the thirteenth century and of
his own written declaration of faith found in the prologue to
his Latin translation from the Hebrew of the Liber de pomo
sive de morte Aristotelis, done following a grave illness.
Dante's description of Manfredi echoes very closely the description
of David in I Kings 16:12 and other suggestive phrases in Psalm
50 expressing the anxious search for God and the sinner's return
to grace. Finally, Manfredi is emblematic of the poet's theory
of true nobility and its implications as discussed in the context
of courtly love and particularly in the fourth treatise of the
Convivio. In short, the evidence is against the modern
polemical interpretation of the episode, and favors the construing
of Manfredi as exemplum maximum of God's boundless mercy,
an interpretation consistent in every way with the physical, moral,
and psychological presentation of the figure in the immediate
and larger poetic context of the Commedia.
La Piana, Angelina. Dante's American Pilgrimage: A Historical Survey of Dante Studies in the United States, 1800-1944. New Haven, Connecticut: Published for Wellesley College by Yale University Press, 1948. Millwood, New York: Kraus Reprint Co. xi, 310 p. 24 cm. [1973]
This reprint makes more readily accessible the well-known "historical survey of the rise and growth of Dante studies" in America during the period indicated. The bibliographical footnotes are useful for pursuing further the work of individual scholars.
Lipari, Angelo. The "Dolce Stil Novo" According to Lorenzo de' Medici: A Study of His Poetic "Principio" as an Interpretation of the Italian Literature of the Pre-Renaissance Period, Based on His "Comento." New York: AMS Press. [1973]
Reprint of the 1936 edition (Yale Romance Studies, 12; New Haven,
Connecticut: Yale University Press). Contains ample reference
to Dante, who, according to Lipari's thesis, was the model from
whom Lorenzo derived, interpreted, and in turn communicated to
later Renaissance poetry the principle of gentilezza umana.
Minielli, Anthony. "Antoine de Rivarol: Critic and Translator of Dante." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII, 3659A-3660A. [1973]
Doctoral dissertation, Fordham University, 1972.
Montano, Rocco. "Italian Humanism: Dante and Petrarch" In Italica, L, 205-221. [1973]
Rejecting the romanticizing view of many critics since the nineteenth
century who have discerned Dante's "humanism" in the
Commedia in terms of his sympathetic representation of
such sinners as Francesca, Farinata, Brunetto, and Ulysses, even
against God's condemnation, Professor Montano seeks to define
Dante's humanism according to the poet's belief in the Thomistic
tenet that whatever is lofty, noble, and just in man--virtue or
knowledge, philosophy or love or glory--will, when combined with
the faith, meet with God's approval and reward. The earthly ideal
represented by "Rome," or the earthly city with its
humana civilitas and the heavenly Jerusalem are not inconsistent
for Dante. Francesca is condemned because her love is too passionate,
Farinata because he is too partisan and bound exclusively to the
earthly city, Brunetto because he is limited to a naturalistic
culture devoid of God, Ulysses because he made wrong use of his
intellect. If any sympathy is manifested for such figures in the
Commedia it is only by Dante-wayfarer, who is undergoing
edification, not by Dante-poet, who has attained proper wisdom.
In the second part of the essay, Professor Montano contends that
for Petrarch, in similar fashion, the studia humanitas,
the best to be inherited from Antiquity in terms of moral values
and knowledge for perfecting man, were necessary for preserving
and strengthening the Christian civilization, then in decline,
against the inroads of the new Aristotelianism and sterile Scholasticism.
His coolness towards Dante is attributable to his own divergence
from the aesthetics and mental orientation of the Middle Ages,
not from the Christian religion. Setting the tenor of Italian
Humanism, Petrarch was the founder of a new Christian vision and
of a new aesthetics which eventually determined the whole world
of the Renaissance up to Shakespeare's time.
Montgomery, Marion. The Reflective Journey toward Order: Dante, Wordsworth, Eliot, and Others. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press. xv, 312 p. [1973]
Contains two essays of Dantean interest: "The Poet as Odysseus:
Dante's Long Shadow" (pp. 131-141), reprinted from Discourse,
XI (1968), 3-9 (see Dante Studies, LXXXVII, 164),
and 'Wordsworth's False Beatrice: From Circumspection, Infinite
Delay" (pp. 142-161), reprinted from Arizona Quarterly,
XXVII (1971), 211-218 (see Dante Studies, XC,
186). There is also frequent reference to Dante passim.
On the premise that the romantic age extends from Dante through
Wordsworth to T.S. Eliot, throughout these essays the author considers
the Divine Comedy as the source of the romantic literary
tradition that makes the poet's own self the focus of his work.
Myrsiades, Kostas John. "The Ursa Minor of Takis Papatsonis and Its Dantean Parallels." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII, 6321A. [1973]
Doctoral dissertation, Indiana University, 1972.
Needler, Howard I. "Translators' Hell: Three Recent Versions of Dante's Inferno." In Italica, L, 375-399. [1973]
Carefully examines the English versions of the Inferno
by Allan Gilbert, Mark Musa, and Charles S. Singleton (see Dante
Studies, XXXVIII, 176, XC, 175, and LXXXIX, 107-108,
respectively), evaluates the scholarly apparatus of each, and
offers some theoretical observations on translation in general.
Singleton's work is found to be superior by far both in the accuracy
of his translation and the scholarly comprehensiveness of his
annotations.
Pellegrini, Anthony L. "American Dante Bibliography for 1972." In Dante Studies, XCI, 163-194. [1973]
With brief analyses.
Picchio Simonelli, Maria. "La prosa nutrice del verso: dal Convivio alla Divina Commedia." In Aquila (Chestnut Hill Studies in Modern Languages and Literatures), II, 117-176. [1973]
Documents many parallels between the Convivio and the Commedia,
showing that the first, far from a mere abortive work launched
in a false direction, constitutes a valuable preparation for the
masterpiece, to which it can for us serve as an important exegetical
key. Passage after passage in the Commedia is seen as the
poeticized version of equivalent prose passages in the Convivio.
This is most readily apparent with respect to the Purgatorio
in particular, but obtains also in the Inferno and the
Paradiso, the last of which the author considers as "una
specie di sintesi poetica del Convivio." Dante is
a moralist in both works; in the Commedia he is a poet
as well. Indeed, the same aesthetic principles enunciated in the
Convivio obtain throughout the Commedia. More important,
a virtually complete correspondence of spiritual-philosophical
thought and purpose can be seen between the treatise and the poem,
both in general configuration and in details. In fact, the author
finds it difficult to conceive of how the Commedia could
have been composed without the preparation of the Convivio,
in which the poet resolved in prose all the physical and metaphysical
problems he later set forth in verse. She closes on the note:
" . . . mi pare di poter giungere alla conclusione che l'opera
debba essere guardata e studiata come una Pre-Commedia:
il lavoro preparatorio necessario e indispensabile per l'autore
a tradurre poi in immagini il proprio mondo fantastico."
Picchio Simonelli, Maria. "La sestina dantesca fra Arnaut Daniel e il Petrarca." In Dante Studies, XCI, 131-144. [1973]
Contends that, while Dante in his sestina Al poco giorno
imitated, with improvements, Arnaut's sestina Lo ferm voler,
he does not cite the latter, for example, in the De vulgari
eloquentia, because he knew he had imitated Arnaut only in
part and superficially. In support of this position, the author
does a technical analysis of the two poems showing that Dante
preferred to rely on direct semantism, while Arnaut limited himself
to phonic elements. In this relatively greater interest in meaning
than in phonic values on Dante's part, the author sees a reflection
of his larger Aristotelian posture with regard to various philosophical
problems. With the changed philosophical climate after Dante's
death and Petrarch's neo-Platonic reaction to Aristotelianism,
she finds that, whereas Petrarch's first sestina A qualunque
animale alberga was directly influenced by Dante, that influence
is limited to the choice of rhyme words; for the rest of the verse
Petrarch favored the intricate verbal play and phonic effects
of Arnaut. The author concludes: "mi pare di potere intravedere
che la ricerca semantica infra/suprasegmentale si faccia più
impegnata in periodi dominati da poetiche di tipo platonico o
neoplatonico; mentre il semantismo verbale diretto risponde meglio
a poetiche di tipo aristotelico." Hence the greater affinity
between Petrarch and Arnaut, with Dante standing alone between
them.
Praz, Mario. The Flaming Heart: Essays on Crashaw, Machiavelli, and Other Studies in the Relations between Italian and English Literature from Chaucer to T.S. Eliot. New York: Norton. 390 p. [1973]
Contains a final essay on "T.S. Eliot and Dante." Reprint
of the original paperback edition, "Doubleday Anchor Original
A132," of 1958 (Garden City, New York: Doubleday) . (See
77th Report, 51 and 58, 78th Report, 40, 79th
Report, 59, and 80th Report, 36.)
Priest, Paul. "Looking Back from the Vision: Trinitarian Structure and Poetry in the Commedia." In Dante Studies, XCI, 113-130. [1973]
Prompted by the final Vision to seek more traces of the Incarnate
God than immediately meet the eye along the poetic journey, the
author has succeeded in determining a series of Trinitarian structural
patterns in the Commedia. As outlined in the text of the
essay and in graphic detail in an accompanying appendix, each
cantica seems to fall into a pattern of three major divisions
or canto groups representing the Trinity in the set order of Father,
Son, and Spirit. Each major division is in turn divisible into
smaller canto groups in which Father and Spirit may vary in order,
but with the Son group always at the center of each Trinitarian
sub-series. A sampling of characters, situations, structural
elements, and images are cited and construed according to this
general Trinitarian pattern. The author observes: " . . .
each one of these images either falls in a canto dominated by
its appropriate Person, or functions significantly in a group
of cantos so dominated. For the hundred cantos seem not only to
be assigned each to a Person, but to combine in groups of three
or more, each group having its Person; these groups in turn combine
in larger divisions, three filling a cantica; finally, the Inferno
is for the Father, the Purgatorio for the Son, the Paradiso
for the Spirit." The first ten cantos of the Inferno
are scrutinized more closely in this perspective. Given the centrality
of the Incarnation to the doctrine of the Trinity, Dante's allegory
is vindicated as inseparable from his poetry, since a poem that
sets forth the Trinity must imitate it together with the same
symbolism and metaphor the Trinity uses in the world.
Ragg, Lonsdale. Dante and His Italy. New York: Haskell House Publishers. xxii, 380 p. illus. 22.5 cm. [1973]
Reprint of the 1907 edition (London: Methuen). Attempts to "present
a vivid picture of life in Italy in Dante's day, based, as far
as possible, upon original authorities." Contents:
The year of Jubilee-Poet and Pontiff; Dante's Century: I. Kings,
Emperors and Popes; Dante's Century: II. The Legacy of Innocent
III; Dante's Italy: I. The Sterner Side of Life; Dante's Italy:
II. The Gentler Side of Life; Dante's Florence; Dante's Literary
Antecedents; Dante's Literary Circle; Dante's Hosts; Dante's Last
Refuge. Indexes.
Ralphs, Sheila. Dante's Journey to the Centre: Some Patterns in His Allegory. New York: Barnes and Noble. viii, 65 p. 19 cm. (Publications of the Faculty of the University of Manchester, No. 19.) [1973]
Examines the pattern of certain images and symbols, their significance,
interrelationship, and progression, which serve as the means of
expression for Dante's allegorical journey of the soul to its
fulfillment. The three chapters of the essay, with sub-sections,
are as follows: I. "Conversion-- Inferno": The
False Image and the True, The Ruined World, The Appearances of
Lucifer, The Hero Myths (The Cretan labyrinth; The Rape of Proserpina;
Perseus and the Gorgon, the Giants and Lucifer; Aeneas, Ulysses
and Christ); II. "Ascent--Purgatorio": The Island,
The Mountain, The Circle of Flame and the Garden, The Tree; III.
"The End of the Journey--Paradiso": Beatrice
and Mary, The Spheres, The Wheel and the Rose, The Circle and
the Squaring of the Circle, Secondary Images. There is an index
of "Proper Names" and "Principal Themes."
Richards, I[vor] A[rmstrng]. "Thoughts on Dante." In Michigan Quarterly Review, XII, 205-214. [1973]
In this essay excerpted from a forthcoming book, Beyond,
while recognizing the wonderful unity of Dante's great poem, the
author discusses some fundamental difficulties inhering in the
Comedy for many readers: the historical situation of the
poem and the Western Christian tradition, the ideological absolutism
of the poet, and the liberalized relativistic attitudes of today.
He is particularly sensitive to the nature of beliefs and the
variability of individual believing, which complicate the very
principles of gauging beliefs, and to the same ambiguity obtaining
in the matter of judgment and requital basic to Dante's Christian
system. Thus, the Comedy is the most challenging of Hellenocentric
masterpieces because of the institutional status of its ideology,
the incommensurabilities of varying readers' views, and the reflexive
character of the key concepts in the poem. All this makes it especially
difficult to show the relevance of Dante's work to our present
situation. The author includes a brief account of his experience
in composing three cantos in terza rima, with accompanying
prose gloss( which will appear in the book), refuting the intellectual
and spiritual bases of Christianity and the Comedy. The
essay concludes with the suggestion that, by analogy with the
Complementary Principle of modern physics, a much broader, more
charitable, vision of man's nature and destiny may be gained from
the very irreconcilability of contrasting approaches, e.g., medical
as well as theological.
Robbins, Tony. "Tennyson's 'Ulysses': The Significance of the Homeric and Dantesque Backgrounds." In Victorian Poetry, XI, 177-193. [1973]
Contends that the mood and attitude in Tennyson's poem "Ulysses"
about the heroic spirit were inspired in part by Homer's Odysseus,
but especially by Dante's Ulisse (Inf. XXVI). The poem's
structure and medium of symbolical suggestion evinces a series
of oppositions--ease and rigor, weakness and energy, age and vigor,
etc.--but there dominates finally a feeling inspired by the ideal
of heroic action and by the dead Achilles. In his last endeavor,
Ulysses is seen to prefer possible death at sea to inaction.
Ruditzky, Rhoda. "Those Infernal Plagues: A Proposal." In Italica, L, 222-241. [1973]
Cites a number of passages from Scripture and from medieval exegetical
writings to establish the typology of Egypt in terms of this life,
earthly carnality, and sin, and suggests the association of Dante's
first cantica tropologically with "Egypt." She
then examines several structural elements and forms of punishment
throughout the Inferno which parallel or echo in varying
degree the pre-Exodus plagues wrought upon the Egyptians.
While the matter bears more investigation and comparison of exegetical
texts, there seem to be enough elements in the Inferno
to indicate the presence of the typology of Egypt used by Dante
to dramatize the punishments of the sinners.
Russell, Rinaldina. Tre versanti della poesia stilnovistica: Guinizzelli, Cavalcanti, Dante. Bari: Adriatica Editrice. 246 p. 19 cm. (Bibliotechina di filologia romanza, N. 25.) [1973]
Analyzes the characteristics of the lyric poetry of each of the
major exponents of the dolce stil novo, striving especially
to define their differentiating individual modes of inspiration
and concomitant metrical and stylistic means of expression. Contents:
I. Il versante del didatticismo immaginifico: Guido Guinizzelli;
II. Il versante del tormento intellettualizzato: Guido Cavalcanti;
III. Il versante della narratività consolata: Dante; IV.
Conclusione; V. Indice dei nomi; VI. Indice.
Sayers, Dorothy L. Further Papers on Dante. London: Methuen; New York: Barnes and Noble. ix, 221 p. 22 cm. (Methuen Library Reprints.) [1973]
Reprint of the 1957 edition (London: Methuen; New York: Harper)
(See 76th Report, 52 and 57, 77th Report, 58 and
63, and 79th Report, 54.)
Scott, John A. "Dante's Allegory." In Romance Philology, XXVI (February), 588-591. [1973]
Review-article on: Roger Dragonetti, Dante pèlerin
de la sainte face (Romanica Gandensia, XI; Gent, Gand: Romanica
Gandensia, 1968), and Robert Hollander, Allegory in Dante's
"Commedia" (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton
University Press, 1969). (On the latter, see Dante Studies,
LXXXVIII, 185-186, LXXXIX, 125, XC, 191 and 197, and
XCI, 182.) In addition to the two works under consideration, the
author reviews several other approaches to Dante's allegory and
offers a rich selection of bibliographical references.
Stephany, William A. "A Note on Paradiso XVI, 151." In Dante Studies ,XCI, 151. [1973]
Points out that the original Florentine flag of Cacciaguida's
time mirrors the situation here on the planet Mars (red) with
the white cross formed by the radiances of saintly Christian warriors,
whereas the contemporary colors are reversed to a white field
with a red quatrefoil lily, suggesting a present falling away
from the ideal of Christian warfare represented by the planet
and also from the ideal of the Christian city represented by the
old flag.
Terdiman, Richard. "Problematical Virtuosity: Dante's Depiction of the Thieves (Inf. XXIV-XXV)." In Dante Studies, XCI, 27-45. [1973]
Examines the two transformation cantos, showing with what impressive
artistry Dante makes good his boast over the ancient poets, even
though he owed certain important elements to them. But the poet
is pridefully carried away by his personal achievement here, thus
creating a crucial tension within the theological framework of
the Commedia; while the balance between the earthly and
the divine is righted elsewhere in the poetic synthesis, it is
an uneasy balance. The problem, inhering in Christian humanism,
of the relationship between the exaltation of man's power and
his required humility before God is evidenced throughout the Commedia
by Dante's struggles to keep that very problem under control.
Indeed, especially in these two brilliant cantos does the poetry
draw attention to itself quite apart from the moral implications
of what is represented in the Seventh Bolgia, thus bespeaking
impulses of artistic independence. As the author concludes, "These
were impulses which increasingly admitted poetic genius as an
independent, self-validating faculty of the mind, and led--whatever
the ultimate consequences of the change upon the quality of poetry
itself--to its replacing faith as the supreme capacity of the
spirit."
Truscott, James G. "Ulysses and Guido (Inf. XXVI-XXVII)." In Dante Studies, XCI, 47-72. [1973]
Analyzes the general character as well as particular transgressions
of Ulysses and Guido da Montefeltro as revealed by Dante's representation
of them in their two cantos taken together as a complete poetic
unit, in an attempt to identify the sin for which the two figures
are assigned to the Eighth Bolgia. Agreeing with Professor Hatcher
(see Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 109- 117) that the traditionally
accepted classification of Ulysses and Guido as fraudulent counselors
is not adequate in itself, the author maintains that no single
category can really define either of them, but can only serve
as a clue to a profile of their complex personalities. While their
dual portrayal is rich in contrasts, it is also rich in parallels
of poetic structure, language, and moral nuance. Here in the Afterlife,
the two figures reveal themselves by their speech and language
rather than by their acts; their style of expression is an index
of their mode of being. The flame which is both their punishment
and their tongue-like means of articulacy symbolically reflects
the paradox of their being hidden from men, in death as in life,
by that which distinguishes them: "the gift they possess
of supreme skill in tactical rhetorical application of language."
The particular sin of "false counsel" that relegates
Guido to the Eighth Bolgia constitutes no more than "advice
to use false promise," and is but a specific category
deriving from the more general sin of presumption that flaws his
character. The same pattern of a particular kind of transgression
with other character flaws reflected in it obtains in Ulysses
as well. His three transgressions mentioned by Virgil, the ambush
of the Trojan horse, the scheme to lure Achilles away from Deidamia,
and the theft of the Palladium, are construed in the same terms
of giving counsel to use false promise. And Ulysses' vaunted skills
as a dissembler and rhetorician are related, from a Christian
viewpoint, to hubris, which is another name for Guido's
parallel sin of presumption. In sum, "Both Ulysses and Guido
participate in careers of deceit, of counsel to use false promise
and of presumption, all of which [ironically] revert to their
own damnation and moral (as well as physical, political, and military)
harm to others."
Vogel, Lucy E. Aleksandr Blok: The Journey to Italy. With English translations of the poems and prose sketches on Italy. Ithaca, New York, and London: Cornell University Press. xix, 279 p. illus. 22 cm. [1973]
Includes references to Dante's impact on Blok and his poetry,
especially on pages 93-97, at the time of his Italian journey.
Wilhelm, James J. "Pound's Middle Cantos as an Analogue to Dante's Purgatorio: Purgatories Fictive and Real." In Italian Quarterly, XVI, No. 64 (Spring), 49-66. [1973]
Contends that Pound's Middle Cantos (31 -71) reveal a wide
variance from Dante's Purgatorio, although both works deal
with strivings towards perfection--of the soul in Dante's, of
societies in Pound's, with the difference that the Purgatorio
is Christian and the Middle Cantos Neoplatonic and Confucian.
While Professor Wilhelm comments on a number of Dantean echoes
in the Middle Cantos (Sordello, Cunizza, Arnaut Daniel, the Eagle,
Geryon), he finds that the ritual aspects of Purgatory are not
imitable to Pound. It is only in the Later Cantos, the Pisan
Cantos that a truly purgatorial nature obtains, for as the
Utopia anticipated by Pound receded historically from possible
reality, the poet discovered his humanity. The tone of his writing
changed markedly, as he abandoned his earlier defiant, confident
voice and sought to find what had gone wrong within himself. He
thus found a new proximity to Dante and his references to him
increase considerably in these later cantos, with characters introduced
especially from the Inferno (e.g., Guido da Montefeltro,
Ugolino, Farinata, Bertran de Born, and even a more Dantean perception
of Fortuna). In the Pisan Cantos, when Pound was forced
to re-assess his life and his values, can be seen his first
true assimilation of Dante in his work, whereas in the Earlier
and Middle Cantos he had merely toyed with Dantean figures and
themes. These later cantos constitute a true purgation of the
work, like Dante's ritual at the top of Mount Purgatory.
Wlassics, Tibor. "La 'percezione limitata' nella Commedia." In Aevum, XLVII, 501-508. [1973]
Examines a number of devices by which Dante limits the perception
of the Pilgrim, of the shades encountered, and even of the reader,
in order to engage the participation of the reader and enhance
the sense of reality of the poetic journey. Although the Commedia
has a foregone conclusion, it is above all a narratio which
involves many twists and turns and distractions from the ultimate
goal, in order effectively to preserve the element of adventure.
The devices of limited perception, of expressions of ignorance,
of uncertain seeing, of questions seeking clarification, the use
of pare and credo and the conjectural forse
expressing ignorance or only limited or defective knowledge, are
all poetically efficacious, for that which is seen is set in sharper
relief by that which remains unseen.
La Divina Commedia. Edited and annotated by C.H. Grandgent; revised by Charles S. Singleton. Cambridge: Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1972 (See Dante Studies, XCI, 163-164.) Reviewed by:
[Anon.], in Times Literary Supplement, 22 June, p.716.
The Divine Comedy. Translated, with a commentary, by Charles S. Singleton. [I.] Inferno . . . Bollingen Series, LXXX. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1970. 2 v. (See Dante Studies, LXXXIX, 107-108, XC, 189, and XCI, 193.) Reviewed by:
Morton W. Bloomfield, in Speculum, XLVIII, 127-129;
J. M. Hatwell, in Italian Studies, XXVIII, 108-112.
Dante's Inferno. Translated, with notes and commentary, by Mark Musa. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1971. (See Dante Studies, XC, 175 and 189, and XCI, 180 and 193.) Reviewed by:
Morton W. Bloomfield, in Speculum, XLVIII, 127-129.
Barberi Squarotti, Giorgio. L'artificio dell'eternità: studi danteschi. Verona: Fiorini, 1972. 544 p. (Quaderni veronesi di varia letteratura, 3.) Reviewed by:
Luigi Peirone, in Italian Quarterly, XVII, No. 66 (Fall-Winter),
55-57.
Bergin, Thomas G. A Diversity of Dante. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1969. (See Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 177--178, LXXXIX, 124, XC, 189 and 197.) Reviewed by:
Paolo Cherchi, in Modern Philology, LXXI, 70-71.
Cambon, Glauco. Dante's Craft: Studies in Language and Style. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1969. (See Dante Studies LXXXVIII, 179, LXXXIX, 125, XC, 190, and XCI, 181.) Reviewed by:
John A. Scott, in Romance Philology, XXVI (May),744-745.
Charity, A. C. Events and Their Afterlife: The Dialectics of Christian Typology in the Bible and Dante. Cambridge, England: University Press, 1966. (See Dante Studies, LXXXVI, 155, LXXXVIII, 196, and XCI, 181.) Reviewed by:
Lionel J. Friedman, in Romance Philology, XXVII (Nov.),
235-238.
Collected Essays on Italian Language and Literature Presented to Kathleen Speight. Edited by Giovanni Aquilecchia, Stephen N. Cristea, and Sheila Ralphs. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1971. Contains three essays of Dantean interest by B. Corrigan, A. Freedman, and M.F.M. Meiklejohn. (See Dante Studies, XC, 181, 182, and 185.) Reviewed by:
Nicolas J. Perella, in Modern Language Journal, LVII, 437-438.
Fallani, Giovanni. Dante e la cultura figurativa medievale. Bergamo: Minerva Italica, 1971. (Saggi e ricerche di lingua e letteratura, 3.) Reviewed by:
Thomas G. Bergin, in Dante Studies, XCI, 153-158.
Florilegium Historiale: Essays Presented to Wallace K. Ferguson. Edited by J.G. Rose and W.H. Stockdale. Toronto: University of Toronto Press . . . 1971. Contains: Denys Hay, "The Italian View of Renaissance Italy," with references to Dante. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 182 and 188, under Hay.) Reviewed by:
Joan Kelly Gadol, in Renaissance Quarterly, XXVI, 295-297.
Jack, R.D.S. The Italian Influence on Scottish Literature. Edinburgh: University Press, 1972. 256 p. Contains references to Dante. (See below, under Addenda.) Reviewed by:
Matthew P. McDiarmid, in Comparative Literature Studies,
X, 263-265
Pecoraro, Marco. Saggi vari da Dante al Tommaseo. Bologna: R. Pàtron 1970. 514 p. Reviewed by:
Natalia Costa-Zalessow, in Forum Italicum, VII, 132-135;
Marianne Shapiro, in Romance Philology, XXVI (Feb.), 622-626.
Pépin, Jean. Dante et la tradition de l'allégorie. Montreal: Institut d'Etudes Médiévales, 1970. (See Dante Studies, LXXXIX, 118, and XCI, 184.) Reviewed by:
Giuseppe Mazzotta, in Italica, L, 590-594.
Perella, Nicolas J. The Kiss Sacred and Profane: An Interpretative History of Kiss Symbolism and Related Religio-Erotic Themes. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969. Contains sections of Dantean interest. (See Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 190-191, LXXXIX, 126, XC, 191, and XCI, 194.) Reviewed by:
Alfred Foulet, in Romance Philology, XXVII (Nov.), 233-235;
Nicolae Iliescu, in Forum Italicum, VII, 124-126.
Quinones, Ricardo J. The Renaissance Discovery of Time. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1972. Contains a chapter on Dante, pp. 28-105. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 176-177 and 184.) Reviewed by:
[Anon.] in Choice, IX, (Jan.), 1442;
[Anon.] in Virginia Quarterly Review, XLIX (Winter), xxiv;
Marvin Mudrick, in Hudson Review, XXVI, 219-224.
Renaissance Studies in Honor of Hans Baron. Edited by Anthony Molho and John A. Tedeschi. DeKalb, Illinois: Northern Illinois University Press, 1971. Contains: Cecil Grayson, "Machiavelli and Dante," pp. 361-384. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 182.) Reviewed by:
Gene A. Brucker, in Renaissance Quarterly, XXVI, 297-301;
Lauro Martines, in American Historical Review, LXXVIII,
87-89.
Robinson, Ian. Chaucer and the English Tradition. Cambridge, England: University Press, 1972. xi, 296 p. 22 cm. Discusses Chaucer and Dante on pp. 253-265, with further references to Dante passim. Reviewed by:
Peter G. Beidler, in Italica, L, 446-448.
Rotili, Mario. I codici danteschi miniati a Napoli. Napoli: Libreria Scientifica Editrice, 1973. 187 p. illus. 29 cm. (Miniatura e arti minori in Campania, 7.) Reviewed by:
Pompeo Giannantonio, in Dante Studies, XCI, 159-161.
Vallone, Aldo. Lettura interna delle Rime di Dante. Roma: Angelo Signorelli Editore, 1971. 127 p. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 185.) Reviewed by:
Glauco Cambon, in Italian Quarterly, XVII, No. 65 (Summer),
96-98.
Vallone, Aldo. Dante. Milano: Francesco Vallardi, 1971. xi, 626 p. (Storia letteraria d'Italia.) (See Dante Studies, XCI, 184.) Reviewed by:
Joseph Chierici, in Italica, L, 589-590.
Wlassics, Tibor. Interpretazioni di prosodia dantesca. Roma: Angelo Signorelli Editore, 1972. 161 p. 20.5 cm. (Bibliotechina di studi danteschi, 2.) See below, Addenda, under Studies. Reviewed by:
Francesco Corda, in La Procellaria, XXI, No. 2, 117;
Giulio Herczeg, in Lingua nostra, XXXV, Fasc. 2 (giugno), 68-69;
Ermanno Scuderi, in Rivista di studi crociani, X, Fasc.
2 (aprile-giugno), 232-233.
Wlassics, Tibor. "I silenzi del verso di Dante." In Giornale storico della letteratura italiana, CXLVII (1970), 481-495. (See Dante Studies, LXXXIX, 124.) Reviewed by:
Mario Fubini, in Scritti in onore di Luigi Ronga (Milano:
Riccardo Ricciardi).
The Selected Works. Edited with an introduction by Paolo Milano. London: Chatto and Windus, 1972. xiii, 662 p. 19 cm.
The collection was originally published as The Portable Dante
in 1947, with corrections and a new bibliography in 1968 (New
York: Viking Press) . (See Dante Studies, LXXXVII, 153-154.)
For a review, see below, under Reviews.
[Selected sonnets.] In Charles Tomlison, The Sonnet, Its Origin, Structure, and Place in Poetry, with Original Translations from the Sonnets of Dante, Petrarch, etc., and Remarks on the Art of Translating (Folcroft, Pennsylvania: The Folcroft Press, 1970).
Six sonnets from the Vita Nuova and the Rime in
verse translation (pp. 6-7, 46-47, 50-51, 53, and
54) done in the early 1870's (from defective texts).
Bell, Sarah F. "Francesca Revisited: Dante's Most Notable Successors." In Studies in Honor of Alfred G. Engstrom, edited by Robert T. Cargo and Emanuel J. Mickel, Jr. (University of North Carolina Studies in the Romance Languages and Literatures, No. 124; Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1972), pp. 13-25.
Noting that literary works inspired by Dante's Francesca and Paolo
episode (Inf. V) have most notably assumed dramatic form,
the author discusses briefly to what extent the episode influenced
seven selected plays by such Romantic and post-Romantic authors
as Silvio Pellico, G.H. Boker, Stephen Phillips, Gabriele D'Annunzio,
F.M. Crawford, José Echegaray, and Maurice Maeterlinck.
Boswell, Charles S. An Irish Precursor of Dante: A Study on the Vision of Heaven and Hell, Ascribed to the Eighth-Century Irish Saint, Adamnán, with Translation of the Irish ext. New York: AMS Press, 1972. xiii, 262 p.
Reprint of the 1908 edition (London: D. Nutt).
Browning, Oscar. Dante: His Life and Writings. New York: Haskell House Publishers, 1972. vii, 104 p.
Reprint of the work, originally published in 1891 (Dilettante
Library; London: Macmillan). General introduction to the poet,
expanded from the author's article on Dante in the Encyclopedia
Britannica (9th ed.).
Carpenter, Nan Cooke. "Milton and Music: Henry Lawes, Dante, and Casella." In English Literary Renaissance, II ( 1972), 237-242.
Submits that in Milton's sonnet "To Mr. H. Lawes, on his
Aires" the obscurity of the last three lines, referring to
Dante, Casella, and Purgatory, is clarified by the Casella episode
in Purgatorio II, especially verse 126 ("se nuova
legge . . . "), which reveals Milton's good-humored
punning in two languages with particular wordplays on Lawes' name.
Chapin, Diana D. "Metamorphosis as Punishment and Reward: Pagan and Christian Perspectives." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXII (1972), 6369A.
Doctoral dissertation, Cornell University, 1971. (Contains a chapter
showing how Dante utilized a "poetic" metamorphosis
derived from Ovid and his commentators and a "divine"
metamorphosis derived from medieval theologians and commentators.)
Cioffari, Vincenzo. "Interpretazione del canto VIII del Paradiso." In L'Alighieri, XIII, No. 2 (luglio-dic. 1972), 3-17.
An English version of this appeared as "Lectura Dantis: Paradiso
VIII," in Dante Studies, XC (1972), 93-108.
(See Dante Studies, XCI, 167.)
Comer, David B., III. "'Quali colombe'--Doves, Venus, and the Holy Ghost: A brief Speculative Note on Inferno V, 82-87." In South Atlantic Quarterly, LXXI (1972), 496-503.
Examines the dove simile associated with the flight of Paolo and
Francesca in Inferno V and submits that, while deriving
from the Aeneid, the doves are altered allegorically by
Dante into ambivalent symbols of human desire (the dove as the
bird of Venus) and divine love (the dove as symbol of the Holy
Ghost). This antithesis would allow the contrast "amor"
vs. "disio," with suggestive implications of dual meaning
in Francesca's triple invocation of "Amor." Re-inforcing
this symbolic interpretation is the parallel seen between the
illicit love of Paolo and Francesca and that of Dido and Aeneas
evoked earlier in the canto.
Coulton, George Gordon. From St. Francis to Dante. Translations from the Chronicle of the Franciscan Salimbene (1221-1288). With notes and illustrations from other medieval sources. Second edition, revised and enlarged. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972. xlii, 446 p. 21 cm.
Reprint of the 1907 edition (London: D. Nutt), with a new introduction
by Edward Peters. For another recent reprint (1968) see Dante
Studies, LXXXVII, 156.
Ferrucci, Franco. "Comedía." In Yearbook of Italian Studies (Montreal), I (1971), 29-52.
Seeks to construe the meaning of Dante's title, Comedía,
through the only two occurrences of the term within the poem,
in Inferno XVI, 128, and XXI, 2, rather than the subsequent
explanation given in the Letter to Cangrande. Interpreting the
word particularly in association with the episode of Geryon (taken
both morally as symbol of fraud and aesthetically as a personification
of the poetic lie, in keeping with the identity of Dante's journey
and the telling of it), the author contends that Dante uses the
term comedía in recognition of the fact that he
must resort to the menzogna of fable and metaphor for communicating
his story to the reader. In sum, the poet called his poem comedía
to reflect the utter inadequacy of human language to his lofty
theme, the "divine tragedy" itself, the expression of
which by such futile means can only be a comedy (without comic
or blasphemous connotations) .
Friedman, John Block. "Antichrist and the Iconography of Dante's Geryon." In Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXXV (1972), 108-122.
Construes the "sozza imagine di froda" (Inf. XVII,
7), Geryon, as a symbol of Antichristus mysticus (as opposed
to the Antichristus apertus) predicted by the Franciscan
Spirituals. Through substantial evidence in the Scriptures, exegetical
texts, and ancillary iconography, the author succeeds in identifying
and interpreting the sources of Dante's monster in the episode
of Inferno XVI-XVII, the three major parts of the
monster as described by the poet and their significance, and the
decorative details of its hide. All elements of Geryon's description
connect him with the traditional lore of Antichrist, even to the
draconopede form of the latter assumed by Satan in the Temptation
of Eve and to Antichrist's association with a watery habitat as
suggested by Scriptural references and exegetical commentaries
to Leviathan (also identified with Satan-Antichrist). Among
other details, a parallel is drawn between Job's funis
for raising the Leviathan and Dante's Franciscan cord for raising
Geryon, while Virgil and Dante Pilgrim are construed as figurative
representations of the two Apocalyptic witnesses Enoch and Elias,
traditionally depicted in medieval eschatology as denouncing the
Antichrist. Enoch and Elias, furthermore, played important roles
figuring Dominic and Francis in the sixth status Ecclesiae
on the eve of the renovatio, for example, in the Franciscan
spiritual Ubertino da Casale's Arbor Vitae. Finally, the
various similes used by the poet during Geryon's descent are seen
by the author as re-enforcing the idea of Virgil's controlling
the figure of fraud as with a directing cord, thus confirming
a connection with the Franciscan corda in the poem and
the funis which binds the tongue of Leviathan-Antichrist.
"It is precisely by the tongue that fraud and the Antichrist
operate and it is by the tongues of the teaching and preaching
orders, and their founders, that he will, in the eschatalogical
traditions we have been discussing, be exposed, combated, and
destroyed." The study comes with plates of fourteen illustrations.
Gitter, Elisabeth G. "Rossetti and The Early Italian Poets." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII (1972), 2325A.
Doctoral dissertation, Yale University, 1972. (Rossetti's translation
of early Italian poets was prompted by the Dante vogue in nineteenth-century
England as well as by his Italian background.)
Hathaway, Baxter. The Age of Criticism: The Late Renaissance in Italy. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, [1972]. xii, 473 p. 23 cm.
Reprint of the 1962 edition (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University
Press). Contains two chapters on the interpretation of Dante during
the sixteenth-century literary controversy. (See 81st
Report, 23 and 32, 82nd Report, 57, and 83rd Report,
59.)
Herford, Charles Harold. Dante and Milton. [Folcroft, Pennsylvania:] Folcroft Library Editions, 1971. 45 p. 26 cm.
Reprint of the essay which first appeared in the John Rylands
Library Bulletin (Manchester, England), VIII (1924), 191-235.
("A lecture based upon this essay was delivered in the John
Rylands Library, March 14, 1923.") The author considers the
two Catholic and Protestant geniuses as parallels in greatness,
while distinguishing their differences, and concludes that Dante
was the greater spirit, in part because of his completeness.
Honig, Edwin. Dark Conceit: The Making of Allegory. Providence, Rhode Island: Brown University Press, 1972. xii, 210 p. 20 cm.
Reprint of the 1959 edition (Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern
University Press); also--Cambridge, Massachusetts: Walker-de
Berry, 1960, and a "Galaxy" paperback, New York: Oxford
University Press, 1966. Includes considerable reference, passim,
to Dante. (See 78th Report, 32, and 79th Report,
53.)
Iliescu, Nicolae. "Gli episodi degli abbracci nelle strutture del Purgatorio." In Yearbook of Italian Studies (Montreal), I (1971), 53-63.
Examines the three episodes of embraces, or attempted embraces,
between Dante and Casella (Purg. II), Virgil and Sordello
(VI), and Virgil and Statius (XXI), and explains why only the
second is possible of consummation. Virgil and Sordello, although
both are shades, succeed in embracing because at that moment they
are in the intermediary area of Anti-Purgatory, where the
shades, not yet having reached the stage of penitence, are in
suspension under the four stars representing the cardinal, human,
virtues; Dante cannot embrace Casella because, as a living person,
he does not participate in the purgatorial condition of his old
friend; Virgil and Statius cannot embrace because, coming before
Christ, Virgil is separated from the condition of his fellow-Mantuan
by the three theological virtues and the "religione de la
montagna." All this is consistent with the poet's rigorous
observation of the structure and metaphysical implications of
the various realms through which the Pilgrim passes.
Jack, R.D.S. The Italian Influence on Scottish Literature. Chicago: Aldine-Atherton, 1972. vii, 256 p. 23 cm.
Identical with the original British edition (Edinburgh: University
Press, 1972). Contains references to Dante, passim. Indexed.
For a review, see above, main section, under Reviews.
Johnson, Charlotte F. "Leonardo and Dante." In American Imago, XXIX (1972), 177-185.
Relates Leonardo's famous dream about the kite, or "vulture
phantasy," to his preoccupation with birds and their sexual
symbolism as reflected in many of his art works. The author cites
Leonardo's reading of kindred passages in Inferno IV and
V and Purgatorio LX to account for the particular form
the "vulture phantasy" assumed in the artist's psyche.
Comes with six plates of illustrations.
Lorenzatos, Zissimos. "Solomos' Dialogos: A Survey." In Modern Greek Writers: Kazantzakis, Solomos, Calvos, Matesis, Palamas, Cavafy, Seferis, Elytis, edited by Edmund Keeley and Peter Bien (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1972), pp. 23-65.
Finds strong parallels between the early nineteenth-century
Neo-Greek poet Solomos' Dialogos and Dante's De vulgari
eloquentia, their linguistic position, spiritual ideals, and
influence in their respective countries. Like Dante, Solomos recognized
that the written language of a nation must be a formulation of
the common spoken language of the time. Paralleling Dante again,
Solomos demonstrated by his own writing that the common vernacular
can compete with the artificial or learned language.
Mancini, Sharon G.B. "Finnegans Wake as Dante's Purgatorio." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXI (1972),6435A.
Doctoral dissertation, Kent State University, 1971. (Treats of
some thematic and structural correspondences between Dante's Purgatorio
and Joyce's Finnegans Wake.)
Means, Michael H. The Consolatio Genre in Medieval English Literature. Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1972. x, 105 p. 23 cm. (University of Florida Humanities Monographs, No. 36.)
Contains a section on "The Divine Comedy" in
a chapter devoted to the latter and the Roman de la Rose
as "Transmitters of the Genre" (pp. 32-48), the
genre being the didactic consolatio as established by Boethius'
Consolation of Philosophy, in which the experience of the
narrator undergoing education by consolers or guides provides
instruction in turn to the reader. Dante's poem, while less directly
influential than the Roman on medieval English writers,
adds a major structural variation to the pattern of the Boethian
consolation by providing the use of typological characters instead
of personifications.
Newton, Richard G. "The Date Assumed for Dante's Allegorical Journey." In Dissertation Abstracts, XXVII (1966), 1791A.
Doctoral dissertation, The Johns Hopkins University, 1966. (Studies
the historical, astronomical, and liturgical references in Dante's
poem and concludes that only the historical have direct pertinence
for determining the assumed date of Good Friday, 1300.)
Paolucci, Anne. "The Women in the Divine Comedy and the Faerie Queene." In Dissertation Abstracts, XXVII (1966). 1791A.
Doctoral dissertation, Columbia University, 1963.
Parkes, Henry Bamford. "Freedom and Order in Western Literature." In Denver Quarterly, IV, No. 2 (Summer 1969), 1-18.
Considers the interaction of freedom and order as one of the themes
of the history of civilization and cites Dante and Shakespeare
as exemplifying medieval and Renaissance conservatism and Rousseau,
liberalism. Pointing out that Dante's vision of an orderly universe
and Shakespeare's support of an orderly society have lost their
appeal, the author suggests that a new combination of conservatism
and liberalism might invigorate American intellectual life.
Parr, Johnstone. "Chaucer's Semiramis." In Chaucer Review, V (1970), 57-61.
Contends that the reference to Semiramis in the "Man of Law's
Tale" derives not from Dante (Inf. V, 58-60),
as J.L. Lowes suggested (Modern Philology, XIV [1917],
705-735), but from medieval historians who, like Chaucer
here, cited her as a figure of treachery rather than lust.
Roncaglia, Aurelio. "Lectura Dantis: Inferno XXI." In Yearbook of Italian Studies (Montreal), I (1971), 3-28.
Offers a close reading of Inferno XXI, analyzing particular
aspects of scenario, structure, style, and language and their
inter-relationships. Contrary to certain critics, the author
does not see this episode among the demons in the nature of a
digression or comic relief. Rather, he finds a heightened artistic
detachment on the part of the poet, with the comic element objectified
and distantiated and, concomitantly, a widened distinction and
distantiation between Dante-poet and Dante-protagonist. Professor
Roncaglia demonstrates that Dante's art here, far from diminished,
remains sustained and uncompromised.
Salvidio, Frank Anthony, Jr. "Dante, Milton, and Kazantzakis: Poets of Salvation." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII ( 1972), 2903A-2904A.
Doctoral dissertation, University of Connecticut, 1972.
Storch, R.F. "The Fugitive from the Ancestral Hearth: Tennyson's 'Ulysses.'" In Texas Studies in Literature and Language, XIII (Summer (1971), 281-297.
Seeing a conflict between the contrary Western ideals of individual
striving and commitment to home community as the ground of poetry
for the Victorian poet in his "Ulysses," the author
draws parallels with the latter's chief literary source, Dante's
Ulysses episode (Inf. XXVI), which also evinces an affinity
between the explorer's restlessness and the poet's imagination
just as in Tennyson's poem.
Tomlinson, Charles. The Sonnet, Its Origin, Structure, and Place in Poetry, with Original Translations from the Sonnets of Dante, Petrarch, etc., and Remarks on the Art of Translating. [Folcroft, Pennsylvania:] The Folcroft Press, 1970. xvii, 227 p. 23 cm.
Reprint, "Limited to 150 copies," of the 1874 edition
(London: John Murray) . Includes translations of six sonnets of
Dante (see above, Addenda, under Translations) as
well as frequent reference, passim, to Dante in the context
of his general treatment of the sonnet as a metric genre.
Torrens, James. "T.S. Eliot and the Austere Poetics of Valéry." in Comparative Literature, XXIII (Winter 1971), 1-17.
Contends that, although Eliot was very much interested in Valéry
in his early years, the influence of Dante and Arnold prevented
his surrendering uncritically to the French critic's ideas of
poésie pure.
Waller, G.F. "The Strong Necessity of Time." In Dalhousie Review, LII (1972), 469--477.
Review-article on Ricardo J. Quinones, The Renaissance
Discovery of Time (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press,
1972), which contains a chapter on Dante (pp. 28-105). (See
Dante Studies, XCI, 176-177 and 184.)
Wilson, James F. "Poets and Poetry in Purgatory." In Bulletin of the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association, XXVI (1972), 9-15.
Noting that the reader finds five poets (Dante himself, Virgil,
Statius, Guinizelli, and Arnaut Daniel) in the moral context of
the Purgatorio (Canto XXVI) which is temporal, involving
change and progress, the author contends that the poets are suggestive
of Dante's own poetic development as well as serving as moral
exempla within the poem's didactic framework. In the Pilgrim's
departure from Guinizelli and Arnaut to the Terrestrial Paradise
can be seen both a moral ascendance through Beatrice's intercession
as grace and a corollary progression of Dante's poetry with Beatrice's
help as inspiration. Dante thus takes leave of love poetry of
the stil novo and, with the purgatorial experience behind
him, is ready to achieve loftier poetic heights.
Wlassics, Tibor. Interpretazioni di prosodia dantesca. Roma: Angelo Signorelli Editore, [1972]. 161 p. 20.5 cm. (Bibliotechina di studi danteschi, 2.)
Contains eight studies, the first seven of which, with some variation
in title, were previously published in various periodicals, as
duly indicated in the preface. The fairly self-explanatory
titles are as follows: I. Le caratteristiche strutturali della
terzina.--II. Consonanze e assonanze nella Commedia.--III.
La rima e l'onomatopeia nella Commedia.--IV. Le rime composte,
tronche e sdrucciole di Dante.--V. Le anomalie fonetiche nel rimario
dantesco.--VI. La rima di Dante nell'Ulisse di James
Joyce.--VII. Interpretazioni dell'enjambement dantesco.--VIII.
I monosillabi della Commedia. For I, III, VI, and VII,
see, respectively, Dante Studies, XCI, 193; XC, 189; XC,
188-189; and LXXXIX, 124. For reviews, see above, main section,
under Reviews, and see below, under Reviews.
Dante. The Selected Works. Edited by Paolo Milano. London: Chatto and Windus, 1972. (See above, Addenda, under Translations.) Reviewed by:
[Anon.],in Times Literary Supplement, 14 April 1972, p.429.
Dante da Maiano. Rime. Introduzione, testo critico e commento di Rosanna Bettarini. Firenze: Le Monnier, 1969. xxxviii, 270 p. (Cf. relation to Dante, particularly the poetical exchange.) Reviewed by:
Michelangelo Picone, in Yearbook of Italian Studies (Montreal),
I (1971), 329-333.
Florilegium Historiale: Essays Presented to Wallace K. Ferguson. Edited by J.G. Rowe and W.H. Stockdale. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. . . 1971. Contains: Denis Hay, "The Italian View of Renaissance Italy," with references to Dante. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 182 and 188, under Hay.) Reviewed by:
Cecil H. Clough, in Italian Studies, XXVII (1972), 124-126.
The Meaning of Courtly Love. Edited by F.X. Newman. Papers of the first annual conference of the Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance Studies, State University of New York at Binghamton, March 17-18, 1967. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1968. Contains: Charles S. Singleton, "Dante: Within Courtly Love and Beyond," pp. 43-54. (See Dante Studies, LXXXVII, 170-171, XC, 191, and XCI, 169, under Frappier, and 183.) Reviewed by:
Werner von Koppenfels, in Archiv für das Studium der neueren
Sprachen und Literaturen, CCIX (1972), 138-139.
The Rarer Action: Essays in Honor of Francis Fergusson. Edited by Alan Cheuse and Richard Koffler. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1970. Contains an essay, "Dante's Purgatorio as Elegy," by E.D. Blodgett, and a translation of Paradiso XXXIII by John Ciardi. (See Dante Studies, LXXXIX, 108 and 109-110.) Reviewed by:
Newton P. Stallknecht, in Yearbook of Comparative and General
Literature, XXI (1972), 81-83.
Wlassics, Tibor. Interpretazioni di prosodia dantesca. Roma: Angelo Signorelli Editore, 1972. (See above, Addenda, under Studies.) Reviewed by:
G. Finocchiaro Chimirri, in Le ragioni critiche, II, No. 5 (luglio-settembre 1972), 439-440;
Mario Fubini, in Giornale storico della letteratura italiana, CXLIX (1972), 576-584;
Dino Papetti, in Alla Bottega, X, No. 6 (nov.-dic.
1972), 80-81.
State University of New York
Binghamton, New York