This bibliography is intended to include the Dante translations published in this country in 1974 and all Dante studies and reviews published in 1974 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.
Guido da Pisa's Expositiones et Glose super Comediam Dantis, or Commentary on Dante's Inferno. Edited with notes and an introduction by Vincenzo Cioffari . . . Albany: State University of New York Press. lxi, 724 p. illus., front. 24 cm. [1974]
First complete edition of the last known early commentary now
remaining in manuscript. The text is transcribed from the principal
manuscript at Chantilly, Musée Condé, Ms 597 (1424)-
the presentation copy prepared for Lucano Spinola--and controlled
with the only other complete manuscript, British Museum, Additional
Ms 31918, which was copied from the Chantilly manuscript. The
commentary comes with a preface (p. xiii-lxi), in sections
on Description of Manuscripts, Dating of the Commentary, History
of the Project, and Glossary of Variants. Of special interest
is the text of the Inferno quoted by Guido in the course
of his commentary.
De vulgari eloquentia. Translated by A. G. Ferrers Howell. In Classical and Medieval Literary Criticism: Translations and Interpretations, edited by Alex Preminger, O. B. Hardison, Jr., and Kevin Kerrane (New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Company), pp. 412-446. [1974]
The well-known translation (1890), here reprinted without
notes, is preceded by a critical introduction (see below, under
Studies).
[Selected Poems.] In The Age of Dante, An Anthology of Early Italian Poetry Translated into English Verse and with an Introduction by Joseph Tusiani (New York: Baroque Press), pp. 165-208. [1974]
The representative selection includes ten poems from the Vita
Nuova, the three canzoni of the Convivio, and
seventeen pieces from the Rime, including poems of correspondence
and three of the rime petrose. There is a brief introduction
(pp. xvii-xxxiii) on early Italian poetry, and the section
of poems by Dante is preceded, as with the other poets represented,
by a short introductory note.
Acocella, Joan Ross. "The Cult of Language: A Study of Two Modern Translations of Dante." In Modern Language Quarterly, XXXVI, 140-156. [1974]
Analyzes the Ciardi and Sayers versions of Dante's Comedy
as examples of the "critical" or interpretive
school of translating. Using the Ulysses canto as sample, the
author praises Ciardi and Sayers for their revisionist emphasis
(against Victorian literalism) on close attention to Dante's language
and effective interpretation of it in modern English idiom "to
show where the treasure lies," but criticizes the results
for lack of delicacy and dignity and for serious distortions of
the original text.
Auerbach, Erich. Dante, Poet of the Secular World. Translated by Ralph Manheim. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. viii, 196 p. [1974]
Paperback edition of the English version originally published
in 1961 and reprinted in 1969 (see 80th Report, 23).
Baker, David J. "The Winter Simile in Inferno XXIV." In Dante Studies, XCII, 77-91. [1974]
Examines the long opening simile of Inferno XXIV and, contrary
to many critics who have found these verses unimportant, inappropriate,
or even incongruous, interprets them meaningfully both in the
immediate and in the larger context of the poem. Associating the
passage in style and atmosphere with the rime petrose,
the author sees reflected here a spirit of isolation and stagnation
which suggests the possibility of a similar paralysis in the wayfarer
and in the poet at this particular juncture of the poetic journey
if he should lose Virgil's guidance and inspiration. But while
these verses represent a partial and momentary break in continuity,
so that the first fifteen verses tend to stand alone as a discrete
lyrical unit, or pastoral interlude, there are passages in Ristoro
d'Arezzo's Composizione del mondo and Rabanus Maurus' De
Universo which support the significance of the villanello
as a work figure of limited perception and the frost as a symbol
of present tribulation and thus re-inforce the actual association
of the simile to the overall poetic context. On Umberto Cosmo's
suggestion that this prolix image is essentially a time structure
combining phases of "before" and "after,"
the author stresses change and impermanence as the underlying
theme, which relates directly to the dramatic metamorphosis of
the thieves encountered soon after. The opening simile and other
references of impermanence expressed in meteorological terms later
in the canto can be contrasted with the perfectly stabilized climate
of the Earthly Paradise at the top of Purgatory. Finally, verses
20-21 of Inferno XXIV are seen to link this canto
with Canto II, thus integrating the villanello simile with
the broad perspective of the whole journey.
Baldassaro, Lawrence. "Dante the Pilgrim: Everyman as Sinner." In Dante Studies, XCII, 63-76. [1974]
Accepting the much argued distinction between Dante-Poet
and Dante-Pilgrim, the author endeavors to define exactly
the nature of the latter as protagonist participating in the action
throughout the Comedy. Even Dante's role as Pilgrim is
dual, that is, as one and every man sharing a common nature with
Adam, who transmitted the flaw of sinfulness to all men. Thus,
as protagonist Dante is seen to participate in the sins portrayed
in the Inferno because as Everyman of flawed nature, he
is capable of having committed them. By keeping Dante-Poet
and Dante-Pilgrim consistently distinct, it is possible to
understand the otherwise ambiguous reactions towards sinners like
Francesca, Filippo Argenti, Brunetto Latini, etc., for what they
are: mimetic responses of the Pilgrim to the particular atmosphere
of each circle of sin and symbolical participation in those sins.
Although the Pilgrim's role is correlated throughout the poem's
structure, the author concludes with a single example from the
Inferno: Dante's participation in the viltà
of non-commitment of the ignavi (Canto III) by hesitating
in his own commitment to the journey with Virgil (Canto II).
Boccaccio, Giovanni, and Lionardo Bruni. The Earliest Lives of Dante. Translated from the Italian by James Robinson Smith New York: Haskell House. [1974]
Reprint of the 1901 edition (Yale Studies in English . . . x;
New York: H. Holt and Company). The work includes "The Embassy
to Venice" (pp. 97-100), a passage from the life of
Dante by Filippo Villani. For other reprints in 1963 and 1968,
see 82nd Report, 49, and Dante Studies, LXXXVII,
155.
Bondanella, Peter E. "Stylistics and Dante's Lyric Poetry." In Forum Italicum VII, No. 4 (Dec. 1973)--VIII, No. 1 (March 1974), 117-129. [1974]
Review-article on Patrick Boyde, Dante's Style in His
Lyric Poetry (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press,
1971), which is extolled here as much for its theoretical discussion
of statistical stylistics in criticism as for the practical results
of such a statistical analysis of Dante's lyric poetry. (For other
reviews of Boyde's work, see Dante Studies, XCI, 180 and
194 and see below, under Reviews.)
Cecchetti, Giovanni. "Dante's Giant-Towers and Tower-Giants." In Forum Italicum, VIII, 200-222. [1974]
Meditates on the reference to Monteriggioni in Inferno XXXI,
40-41, as a tower-image of comparison conveying the
pilgrim's initial perception of the giants ringing the pit of
Hell. The author stresses that this erroneous though suggestive
initial perception stays with Dante so poignantly that it determines
the recurrence of tower imagery in various ways throughout the
canto and even prefigures the most gigantic Lucifer himself. Moreover,
with Monteriggioni are associated in Dante's psyche not only tower
images but also political implications of evil. This is but one
of many instances in the Commedia where things that made
a deep impression on Dante in the real world serve as expressive
devices for translating into palpable terms the extraordinary,
enormous, incredible things encountered on the poetic journey.
Since the figures of Dante-poet and Dante-protagonist
frequently overlap, it is natural for experiences and associations
of earthly reality of the one to be transformed as perceptual
determinants to the other, who thus speaks with the lips of the
poet.
Chaytor, Henry John. The Troubadours of Dante: Selections from the Works of the Provençal Poets Quoted by Dante. With introduction, notes, concise grammar and glossary. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1902. [New York: AMS Press.] xxxvi, 242 p. 23 cm. [1974]
Reprint of the well-known work. The historical introduction
includes a discussion of Dante's relationship to the Troubadours.
Davis, Charles T. "Ptolemy of Lucca and the Roman Republic." In Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, CXVIII, 30-50. [1974]
Agrees with Beryl Smalley in questioning Hans Baron's affirmation
that Petrarch's rediscovery of pre-imperial Rome effected
a break with medieval thought and in pointing out that in fact
there was a favorable awareness of republican Rome even before
Petrarch. With respect to the considerable wave of enthusiasm
for the Roman Republic around 1300, the author examines historical
and political ideas in the works of Brunetto Latini, Remigio de'
Girolami, Dante, and Ptolemy of Lucca, noting the earlier sources
of influence, mutual relationships, similarities, differences,
and varying motivations among them. Dante, for example, can be
seen, along with Remigio, to be republican in his political theory
by his concern for the res publica, even while he accepted
the Empire as providentially ordained for the preparation of Christ's
coming. However, from the standpoint of historical and political
theory, Ptolemy "was the first self-conscious medieval
republican," although he differed with, say, Dante over the
hierocratic primacy of Pope over Emperor. Despite the common starting
point of Remigio, Dante, and Ptolemy in Augustine's De civitate
Dei V, 18, for their appreciation of Republican heroes, their
classical sources, historical views, and motivations were different
and one cannot speak of their constituting a unified republican
"school" or of their directly determining the course
of Humanist and Renaissance thought on the subject.
De Bonfils Templer, Margherita. "Amore e le visioni nella Vita Nuova." In Dante Studies, XCII, 19-34. [1974]
Rejecting Charles Singleton's reading of the Vita Nuova,
based on the Christian context and centred analogically on the
Christological role of Beatrice, the author seeks to detach Dante's
figure of Amore and its appearances in the visioni from
direct cultural forms and construes the figure merely as an embodiment
of the "fermento spirituale" in the poet-lover
himself. Although Dante makes use of traditional concepts, metaphors,
and terminology pertaining to love/Love, he adapts these elements
to forge a new mode of expression suited to his own needs and
signification for representing his various spiritual states along
the way of his passion for Beatrice. In this working out of a
new style, the mixture of poetry and prose in the libello
is seen to mirror the poetic and the reflective aspects of the
content. Far from being a god or a person (from the world of courtly
love), the figure of Amore is seen by the author as but "il
demone dell'animo del poeta." And as such the figure dynamically
represents the process and development of Dante's personal passion
quite beyond the sphere of courtly love and Christian concerns.
Demaray, John G. The Invention of Dante's "Commedia." New Haven and London: Yale University Press. xvi, 195 p. illus. 24 cm. [1974]
Accepting the commonplace that the Commedia reflects the
pattern of events recorded in the Book of God's Works (the existent
universe) and the Book of God's Words (the Bible), the author
nevertheless contends that many formerly well-known events
and activities in God's Wordly Book which are the figural basis
of Dante's poetic journey in the eternal realm have been overlooked
by modern commentators. This book documents many of those "words"
in God's two books, particularly those associated with the Great
Circle Pilgrimage taken by devout medieval Christians to the Holy
Land and back to Rome. Contents: Introduction; (1) Pilgrimage
in the Source Book of the World; (2) Invention from the Book of
the World; (3) Three Typological Modes of Dante's Commedia:
Biblical Imitation, Internal Recurrence, and Wordly Imitation;
(4) Invention from the Book of God's Words; (5) Through Shadowy
Realms of the Living; Index. The work is furnished with thirty-five
illustrations. Portions of these chapters represent revisions
of three previously published articles: "Pilgrim Text Models
for Dante's Purgatorio," in Studies in Philology,
LXVI (1969), 1-24; "The Pilgrim Texts and Dante's
Three Beasts: Inferno I," in Italica, XLVI
(1969), 233-241; "Patterns of Earthly Pilgrimage in
Dante's Commedia: Palmers. Romers, and the Great Circle
Journey," in Romance Philology XXIV (1970), 239-258.
(See Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 182, and LXXXIX, 111.)
Dolfi, Anna. "Il canto di Ulisse: occasione per un discorso di esegesi dantesca." In Forum Italicum, VII, No. 4 (Dec. 1973)--VIII, No. 1(March 1974), 22-45. [1974]
Discusses various recent interpretations, especially by G. Padoan
and F. Forti, and seeks to resolve certain lingering questions
on the Ulysses episode. The author insists the canto can not and
must not be read in isolation, stressing that it is structurally
and organically relatable to the larger context of the poem. Other
questions are clarified by establishing certain distinctions in
so complex a figure as Ulysses. The Greek hero met his downfall
in the last voyage for exceeding a limit (the Pillars of Hercules),
but he is condemned to Dante's Hell for previous acts of fraudulent
counsel. This dual aspect of Ulysses, furthermore explains Dante's
ambivalent attitude-admiration for Ulysses' pursuing the ideals
of "virtute e canoscenza" and condemnation of the hero
to Hell. Also, in Ulysses' very account of his last voyage to
Dante is found a continuation of his misuse of eloquence for fraud,
since he dwells only on the positive, noble aspects of his last
act, while omitting the less savory details, just as he did in
persuading his companions to embark on the "folle volo."
Consistent with other sinners in Hell, Ulysses persists in his
nature of exploiting his abilities and eloquence in order to influence
Dante's judgment of him. The author suggestively points out the
parallelism between Ulysses' general speech to Dante and his orazione
to his companions. To explain the violent end conceived by Dante
for Ulysses here, she cites again the dual aspect of the figure:
the violent end of his last voyage is the earthly punishment for
exceeding the limits represented by the Pillars on the one hand,
his ultraterrestrial punishment in Dante's Hell is for his act
of fraudulent counsel on the other. As for Dante's own ambivalent
reaction, his pietà is not compassion, but simply
"turbamento." The Christian poet does not admire sin,
but he can appreciate the power of Ulysses (e.g., his orazione)
which was good in itself, had it not degenerated to sinful instrument
of abuse (e.g., fraudulent counsel).
Eliot, T. S. Dante. New York: Haskell House. 69 p. 20 cm. [1974]
Reprint of the 1929 edition ("Poets on the Poets," No.
2; London Faber and Faber). The self-styled amateur Dante
scholar, who did so much to enhance the interest in Dante in the
English-speaking world, cast this well-known essay in
three parts: I. A Reading of the Inferno; II. A Reading
of the Purgatorio and the Paradiso; and III. A Reading
of the Vita Nuova.
Fisher, Lizette Andrews. The Mystic Vision in the Grail Legend and in the Divine Comedy. [Folcroft, Pennsylvania:] Folcroft Library Editions x, 148 p. front. 20 cm. [1974]
Reprint of the 1917 edition (New York: Columbia University Press).
For another recent reprint edition (New York: AMS Press, 1966)
and analysis, see Dante Studies, LXXXVII, 181.
Fogle, Richard Harter. The Permanent Pleasure: Essays on Classics of Romanticism. Athens: University of Georgia Press. xiii, 225 p. 22.5 cm. [1974]
Contains an essay on "Dante and Shelley's Adonais"
(pp. 87-99), reprinted from Bucknell Review, xv (1967),
11-21 (see Dante Studies, LXXXVI, 143-144).
Hollander, Robert. "Vita Nuova: Dante's Perceptions of Beatrice." In Dante Studies, XCII, 1-18. [1974]
Examines what he perceives to be Beatrice's nine appearances to
Dante in the Vita Nuova--six in actuality, one in dream,
two in fantasy--and the accompanying terminology used by Dante
in each mode of her apparition. Treated separately is the poet's
special vision of Beatrice in the mirabile visione at the
end of the work, which Professor Hollander relates to the Pauline
raptus, or mystical Vision, of 2 Corinthians 12. He further
notes the Pauline context (2 Cor. 12:1 and 2 Tim. 2:15) of Dante's
use of visione and trattare. He submits that the
context of Dante's raptus Pauli must come from John's Apocalypse
(Rev. 7:9-17), which is the basis also for Dante's vision
of Beatrice in Glory in Paradiso XXXI, 70-93. The
final vision of her in the libello is therefore really
primal and so different from the other nine as to be set aside
as epilogue, with a return to the Present tense. Only thus can
Dante show his commitment to the "new life," and so
"the incipit of the Vita Nuova is the unvoiced
explicit as well."
Iliescu, Nicolae. "A proposito di un nuovo studio su Dante. In Dante Studies, XCII, 167-179. [1974]
Review-article on Aldo Vallone, Dante (Milano: Vallardi,
191) applauding the work as a synthetic treatment of the multifarious
aspects of Dante and his works, the many different problems pertaining
thereto, and the various critical interpretations that have appeared
across the centuries. At the same time, certain shortcomings of
the work are reviewed, with the suggestion that the author might
have offered new solutions to some critical problems relating
to Dante by considering more recent approaches from outside Italy.
Jenaro-MacLennan, L. The Trecento Commentaries on the "Divina Commedia" and the Epistle to Cangrande. Oxford: At the Clarendon Press. ix, 154 p. 22 cm. (Oxford Modern Languages and Literature Monographs.) [1974]
Without accepting or rejecting the "Letter to Cangrande" as Dante's, the author seeks to study the textual relation of the early commentators on the Comedy to the Epistle and to determine whether those commentaries "presuppose the epistle." Contents: Introduction--1. Purpose of the Study, 2. The Basic Material; I. The Dating of Guido da Pisa's Commentary--1. Guido on 'quedam glosa super Persium,' 2. Guido on the Decline of Pisa, 3. Guido on Bonacolsian Mantua, 4. Guido on Inf. XIII, 143-7, 5. Guido's Links with Pisa, 6. Conclusions; II. The Textual Transmission of the Epistolary Fragments; III. Pietro Alighieri's Use of the Epistle to Cangrande--1. His Commonplace Accessus, 2. Libri titulus; IV. Boccaccio and the Epistle to Cangrande--1. The Fragments of the Epistle in Boccaccio's Commentary, 2. Boccaccio's Use of Epistle to Cangrande; Appendix I. Guido da Pisa's Proemium according to the Chantilly Ms; Appendix II. Note on Some Early Glosses on the Inferno; Bibliography; Addenda; and Index.
Kaske, Robert E. "Dante's Purgatorio XXXII and XXXIII: A Survey of Christian History." In University of Toronto Quarterly, XLIII, 193-214. [1974]
Brings certain external documents, Scriptural and exegetical,
to bear upon cryptic passages and cruxes in Purgatorio XXXII
and XXXIII and offers readings and interpretations of them. The
treatment includes a summary of the author's previous construction
of the DXV riddle (Purg. XXXIII, 31 ff.)--in terms of the
monogram (capital V and D joined by a cross) of the Vere dignum--as
Christ's second coming and thus as an allusion to a time very
late in the ages of the Church and in human history. Explications
of further passages are offered in this article: e.g., correspondences
of sections of these two cantos allegorically to the seven ages
of the Church (status ecclesiae); the Griffon representing
Christ, the Deus-homo; the tree representing the desiccated
Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and, by extension, fallen human
nature itself (i.e., deprived of original justice); the renewal
of the tree as re-justification through Christ; mythological
images of Ovidian echo and their relationship to the larger theme
of Fall and Redemption, suggesting Dante as representative of
Christian mankind and the parallel pattern of mankind afflicted
by the Fall and rescued by Christ; the restored tree suggesting
the fruitful appletree that was Christ in contrast to the desiccated
tree signifying fallen human nature. What emerges from this elaborate
pattern of allusions in these two cantos, Professor Kaske suggests,
is an extended figurative elaboration of the spiritual regeneration
of mankind through the Atonement. All this celebration of the
beginning of Christianity is an accurate prelude to the allegory
of the seven ages of the Church, beginning a few lines later.
Whereas the mystical procession of Sacred Scripture in Purgatorio
XXIX can be construed to represent "history" as it exists
in the mind of God, the chronological pattern contained in Cantos
XXXII-XXXIII can be seen to represent history as it evolves in
the material universe.
Kleinhenz, Christopher. "Dante's Towering Giants: Inferno XXXI." In Romance Philology, XXVII (Feb.), 269-285. [1974]
Relates the pattern of highly refined visual and verbal images
of giant and tower informing Inferno XXXI to various similar
images in the Inferno signifying pride brought low and
immobilized and to further aspects of the Comedy as a whole,
structurally, morally, and aesthetically. In Inferno XXXI
itself, the verbal metaphor of confused speech and its visual
correlative, tower, are centred on the human figure of Nimrod,
who caused the confusion of tongues (Babel) and, according to
Augustine, founded Babylon. Paralleling the pilgrim's growth as
he journeys through the three realms, achieving the recognition
of evil, discernment of the good, and contemplation of the divine,
respectively, is a transmutation of allusions to Nimrod in each
of the three cantiche: from the historical figure of the
proud, confused architect of the Tower of Babel in the Inferno
to the moral example of superbia laid low in the Purgatorio,
to the example of the vanity of great human designs in relation
to God's plan in the Paradiso--or in terms of larger significance,
"to the allegorical victory of the true eternal kingdom over
the infernal city of Babylon, and to the triumph of communicability
over confusion."
Lansing, Richard H. "Two Similes in Dante's Commedia: The Shipwrecked Swimmer and Elijah's Ascent." In Romance Philology, XXVIII (Nov.), 161-177. [1974]
Elaborating on the interpretations of Freccero, Thompson, Nardi,
and Damon, the author links the figure of the shipwrecked swimmer
in the prologue scene with the Elijah figure and Ulysses in Inferno
XXVI, underscoring the structural centrality of the latter
episode to the whole Commedia. Specifically, in the opening
conversion scene Dante-poet is identified with Dante-pilgrim,
and later the figure of Elijah ascending with divine grace is
related contrastively to that of the fallen Ulysses deprived of
grace on an analogy with Adam and Lucifer. Taking the Commedia
as the poet's palinode and rectification of his earlier mode of
thought represented by the Convivio and Monarchia,
the author holds that the two similes in question reflect the
poet's own moral and intellectual failure of misconceiving the
function of philosophy and his eventual conversion at the brink
of perdition, in contrast to the fate of Ulysses, representing
the pursuit of natural philosophy without the wisdom of Christ
and symbolizing man's inability to reach the Earthly Paradise
(and Salvation) without the grace of God. Dante himself resembles
Ulysses in his original pursuit of natural philosophy without
theology as the way to truth and happiness; and Elijah and Ulysses
are similar in attempting to ascend to heaven, with the crucial
difference that one succeeded with the grace of God while the
other failed without the grace. In sum, the shipwrecked swimmer
and Ulysses represent stages in the pilgrim's (and Dante's) experience.
Levy, Bernard S. "Beatrice's Greeting and Dante's 'Sigh' in the Vita Nuova." In Dante Studies, XCII, 53-62. [1974]
Reviews certain allusions relating Beatrice to Christ in the Vita
Nuova and suggests that Dante may have had in mind John 20:19-31,
where the resurrected Christ breathes the Holy Spirit to the Disciples.
By making Beatrice analogous to Christ and alluding to this Scriptural
passage, the poet raises the sweet spirit of love emanating from
Beatrice's lips from an earthly to a heavenly love, thus elevating
her inspiration to a divine level. And the poet-lover's sigh
is correspondingly transformed into a spiritual entity capable
of transcending earthly limitations, as we see expressed in the
final sonnet, Oltre la spera (XLI).
Locock, Frances. A Biographical Guide to the Divina Commedia of Dante Alighieri. New York: Haskell House. 77 p. 20 cm. [1974]
Reprint of the 1874 edition (London: Provost). This general work
as originally published in 1871.
Martindale, C. "The Semantic Significance of Spatial Movement in Narrative Verse: Patterns of Regressive Imagery in the Divine Comedy." In Computers in the Humanities, edited by J. L. Mitchell (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press), pp. 57-64. [1974]
Uses elements of quantitative psychoanalysis and depth psychology
to examine regression-progression patterns in Dante's Comedy
in terms of movement from secondary process (abstract, logical,
Conscious etc.) to primary process (concrete, sensation, unconscious,
etc.) thought. With the help of the "Regressive Imagery Dictionary
and other indices as well as computer-assisted statistical
analysis for translating Dante's imagery into the psychoanalytical
language of regression, the fluctuating pattern of imagery according
to secondary and primary process is determined among the three
cantiche and also among the three main characters. In addition,
for explaining changes in word choice across the cantiche
the moral metaphor, but across cantos within each cantica
the regression metaphor, is found more useful.
Meeker, Joseph W. The Comedy of Survival: Studies in Literary Ecology. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. xxi, 217 p. 24 cm. [1974]
Contains a chapter on "The Comedy of Dante's Comedy" (pp 163-183) and some further reference to Dante, offering a reading of the poem from the standpoint of the new ecological philosophy Seeking to identify patterns within human art and thought consistent with a diverse and stable natural ecology and finding that our survival must be based on the comic mode with its emphasis on continual and flexible adaptation to the given environmental conditions, the author considers the Commedia as a comprehensive ecological vision in its recognition and acceptance of cosmic diversity. "But the poem is also comic in the sense used throughout this book: it is an image of human adaptation to the world and acceptance of its given condition without escape, rebellion, or egotistic insistence upon human centrality." Suggestive parallels are drawn between Dante's Inferno and the predicament man has created for himself in the world, and between the Purgatorio and Paradiso and the better order envisioned as possible by the new ecologists. Portions of this book were pre-printed in the North American Review--for Dante,
see "The Comedy of Survival," in Vol. CCVII, No. 2 (Summer
1972), 11-17 (p. 17), registered below, under Addenda.
Musa, Mark: Advent at the Gates: Dante's Comedy. Bloomington and London: Indiana University Press, xx, 167 p. illus. 21.5 cm. [1974]
Presents studies of cantos "that have provoked the greatest
interest in my students." Contents: Introduction;
I. A Lesson in Lust; II. Behold Francesca Who Speaks So Well;
III. From Measurement to Meaning: Simony; IV. At the Gates of
Dis; V. In the Valley of the Princess; VI. The "Sweet New
Style" That I Hear; Notes. The studies deal with Inferno
V, V bis, XIX, VIII-IX, Purgatorio VI-VIII, and
XXIV respectively. Of particular relevance to the title of the
volume, chapters IV and V deal specifically with the climactic
event in Inferno IX (coming of the heavenly messenger)
and the parallel event in Purgatorio VIII (coming of the
two angels) as figuring the First and second Comings of Christ--with
Beatrice's appearance in Canto XXX representing Christ's Third
Coming on Judgment Day. (On this general Advent pattern in the
poem, see also his previous study, "Advent at the Gates,"
in Poetic Theory/Poetic Practice, Papers of the Midwest
Modern Language Association, No. 1[1969], pp. 85-93 [see
Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 189].) Chapter VI offers a new
interpretation of "dolce stil novo" in terms of spiritual
growth by "an escape from self into Love" (p. 128).
These studies are printed here for the first time except for chapter
III, the material of which was published in an earlier form as
"E questo sia suggel ch'ogn'uomo sganni (Inferno XIX,
21)," in Italica, XLI (1964), 134-138 (see 83rd
Report, 56). The accompanying four half-tone illustrations
are reproduced from illuminations by Guglielmo Giraldi (Vat. Ms
Urbino Latino 365) and others (Vat. Ms Latino 4776).
Nolan, Barbara. "The Vita Nuova and Richard of St. Victor's Phenomenology of Vision." In Dante Studies, XCII, 35-52. [1974]
Following Charles Singleton's general reading of the Vita Nuova,
the author examines the series of visions and revelations of love,
particularly in chapters III and XII, as an analogue of the modi
visionum defined by Richard of St. Victor. She thereby finds
confirmation of the prophetic nature of the visions, which comment
on the poet-lover's history and lead up to the final revelation
of beatitude .The graded series of "sights" marking
the way from human nature to divine vision and love are supported
by parallels in Richard's treatises such as "In Apocalypsim,"
"De IV Gradibus violentae charitatis," and "Benjamin
Major," as well as in representations of the Pietà
in contemporary devotional iconography and in Mechtild of Magdeburg's
meditation on personal participation in Christ's suffering and
death. Thus, Professor Nolan submits that Love' s enigmatic apparitions
in chapters III and XII, with the cruxes of the eating of the
heart, the circle image, and the command to abandon simulacra,
are meaningfully resolved when considered spiritualiter.
Incidentally, the imaginazione of chapter IX is seen as
a parallel of the prophet Daniel's vision along the Tigris. Dante's
final vision in chapter XLII, construed anagogically in Richard
of St Victor's terms, completes the movement from the previous
imaginative apparitions, or simulacra of Truth, to a fully
spiritual vision, a seeing of Beatrice in pure contemplation.
Pellegrini, Anthony L. "American Dante Bibliography for 1974." In Dante Studies, XC, 181-211. [1974]
With brief analyses.
Possiedi, Paolo. "Con quella spada ond'elli ancise Dido." In MLN, LXXXIX, 13-34. [1974]
Touches on the semantic ambiguity, positive and negative, of the
epithet "petra" in Dante's rime petrose, cites
the two exempla of victorious and vanquished lovers which
emerge from the lyric tradition of courtly love, and contends
that, since Dante is not to be counted among the vanquished, his
petrosa poems stand as an exceptional part of his lyric
poetry. At the same time, the rime petrose represent a
remarkable achievement which contributed significantly to the
subsequent tradition of noble "philostratic" poetry,
with Petrarch its loftiest exponent. For these poems represent
the first direct transposition of the noblest, most refined elements
of Provencal poetry into non-local, lofty idiom; they are
the first amorous canzoni in which the protagonist presents
himself, not divided into soul, heart, spirits, etc., in a situation
of conflict, but a organically whole person; and as the most interesting
innovation for later poets is Dante's introduction, rare in troubadour
poetry and unique in his own, of a name drawn directly from the
classical world, specifically in Così nel mio parlar
("con quella spada ond'elli ancise Dido"). According
to the author, this use of the Virgilian "emblem" in
the most sensual of the petrosa poems has particular artistic
importance later (cf. its wide application in Petrarch's Canzoniere).
The author shows, further, the multiple aptness of the Dido-sword-Love
allusion, both direct and indirect, parallel and inverse-
But in a most profound way Dante has with the Dido allusion built
a "moral dimension" into this petrosa poem. Dido's
sin went beyond lust: by her infidelity to the ashes of Sicheus,
she rebelled against Jove who imposes his divine order upon the
world. In like manner, the theme of amorous passion in the four
rime petrose is felt as a corruption or "disharmony"
between the lover and the world. The fundamental disharmony is
re-inforced symbolically on the formal level by the harsh
rhymes, the antithetical "descriptio temporis," and
the battle of love itself. The poems, moreover, say more about
the lover than the beloved. Past attempts at allegorical interpretation
of these poems based on the view of a perverse or corrupt lady
(=e.g., the corrupt Church) were mistaken, because the poetic
Petra stands on the side of chastity and virtue against the advances
of the poet-lover as an exemplum of corrupt love.
Possiedi, Paolo. "Petrarca petroso." In Forum Italicum, VIII, 523-545. [1974]
Examines instances of the petrosa theme in various poems of the Canzoniere, particularly the central stanza of Lasso me, ch'i' non so in qual parte pieghi (Canz., LXX), where Petrarch quotes the opening verse of Dante's Così nel mio parlar. Although the poet of Laura was not one to recall his maestri, the author notes this extraordinary exception and other instances where Petrarch does pay tribute very indirectly to Dante.
Preminger, Alex, O. B. Hardison, Jr., and Kevin Kerrane, editors. Classical and Medieval Literary Criticism: Translations and Interpretations. New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Company. xiii, 527 p. 25 cm. [1974]
Contains Dante's De vulgari eloquentia (see above, under
Translations), preceded by an introduction (pp. 405-412)
in which Dante's ideas in the treatise are considered of enduring
value, so as to rank it with the great classical and modern critical
essays.
Richards, I[vor] A[rmstrong]. Beyond. New York and London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. xv, 201 p. 22 cm. [1974]
Contains a chapter on the Divine Comedy (pp. 106-158) and
occasional reference to Dante passim. An excerpted version
of this chapter was pre-printed as "Thoughts on Dante,"
in Michigan Quarterly Review, XII (1973), 205-214.
(See Dante Studies, XCII, 194-195)
Richthofen, Erich von. "Traces of Servius in Dante." In Dante Studies, XCII, 117-128. [1974]
Examines a number of similes, allusions, and concepts from ancient
mythology synthesized by Dante with a Scriptural or exegetic concept,
particularly as channeled through Macrobius, and more especially
Servius in his commentary on Virgil's works. The awareness of
these traces of Servius, along with Macrobius and Probus, helps
to assess Dante's poetic achievement and/or enrich his meaning
in an increasing number of passages in the Commedia. Dante's
figure of the griffon and its context come in for extended discussion
and comment by Professor von Richthofen.
Salvatore, Filippo. "Un ignoto difensore di Dante nel Seicento: Vincenzo Gramigna." In Dante Studies, XCII, 153-166. [1974]
Presents an historical-critical assessment of Vincenzo Gramigna
(c. 1580-1627), who particularly in his Della variatione
della volgar lingua and Paragone tra il valore degli antichi
e dei moderni represents an exceptional position by appreciating
and defending Dante against the general hostility of the time
towards him. Although Gramigna did not create a critical school
of subsequent influence, his example has considerable historical
interest.
Sewell, Elizabeth. "Beatrice to Dante: By Another Hand." In Mosaic, VIII, No. 3 (Spring), 172. [1974]
Thirty-three line poem in free verse invoking Dante who is
needed for translating Beatrice and love in the changed times.
Shapiro, Marianne. "The Fictionalization of Bertran de Born (Inf. XXVIII)." In Dante Studies, XCII, 107-116. [1974]
Contends that, although echoing Bertran's works early in the canto,
Dante condemns the Provencal poet to a double contrapasso,
by severing him not only from his head but also from his works
as poet of war and strife. For when Bertran is made to speak directly
at the end of the canto, it is only in uncharacteristic tones
of lamentation ("O vos omnes" formula of Lamentations
1:12), thus making for a fictionalized Bertran quite different
from the historical Bertran. At the same time, Dante the poet
here appears himself as the missing Italian poet of arms (cf.
De vulg. eloq., II, ii, 5), while simultaneously redeeming
himself with respect to his own poetic aspirations by turning
away from the rhetoric of schism exemplified and punished in the
canto.
Shapiro, Marianne. "An Old French Source for Ugolino?" In Dante Studies, XCII, 129-147. [1974]
Analyzes the chanson de geste of Amis et Amiles
and finds a whole series of concepts and images suggesting Dante's
assimilation of that work in Inferno XXXIII. Beginning
with the chanson's central action, which is the sacrifice
of Amiles' sons in a situation similarly involving treachery or
betrayal with suggestive Christological overtones, the parallels
with the Ugolino episode are so cogent as to lend support even
to the "interpretazione tecnofagica" of Ugolino's ambiguous
closing line, "Poscia, più che 'l dolor, pot 'l digiuno"
(v. 75).
Sheehan, David. "The Control of Feeling: A Rhetorical Analysis of Inferno XIII." In Italica, LI, 193-206. [1974]
Examines Inferno XIII structurally and rhetorically according
to definition, comparison, and contrast, combined with the classical
notatio and energeia, and, specifically in Pier
delle Vigne's three-part speech, according to the rhetorical modes
of pathos, ethos, and logos. With an eye to the
larger exigencies of the poem and with appropriate variations
of syntax and rhythm for each part, the poet has structured Piero's
speech to the Pilgrim, first, to arouse feeling by means of the
persuasion of pathos, second, to try and exonerate himself
by ethos (though the ploy ironically only confirms his
culpability), and, third, to define objectively by logos
the condition and punishment of the suicide souls in this circle
of Hell. With this rhetorical procedure the poet effectively controls
the feeling of sadness aroused in the Pilgrim and in the reader
as well.
Sturm, Sara. "Structure and Meaning in Inferno XXVI." In Dante Studies, XCII, 93-106. [1974]
Analyzes the Ulysses canto as a whole and finds that the story
of the hero's final voyage, far from standing alone, is effectively
anticipated by and organically related to the other components
of the canto--the opening invective against Florence, the poet's
comment on his reaction, the two similes introducing the souls
wrapped in flames, and the wayfarers' approach to these sinners.
The sequential arrangement of these components and their analogical
inter-relationships enhance the unity and focus of the canto,
whose subject is really the pilgrim Dante, not Ulysses. For the
Pilgrim dramatically exemplifies a conflict of perspective, intellectually
and emotionally rendered particularly effective by the heroic
nature of the sinner encountered (reflected even in the uplifted
style employed by Dante here). The prior components both prepare
reader and Pilgrim for the universal perspective of divine justice
and condition our reaction to Ulysses' account of his final voyage,
which ends "come Altrui piacque." The author also relates
the images of fire, water, and flight to the overall unity and
coherence of the whole canto. Finally, she stresses that the canto's
focus is less on Ulysses than on the tensions created in the Pilgrim
as he perceives disparities between the immediate or temporal
and the eternal perspectives.
Thompson, David. Dante's Epic Journeys. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press. xii, 83 p. 21.5 cm. [1974]
Elaborates more fully on the idea, expressed in an earlier essay
on "Figure and Allegory in the Commedia" (Dante
Studies, XC [1972]), that Dante's way of writing is based
on the literary tradition rather than theological allegory of
Biblical exegesis. Thus the author demonstrates that the Commedia
is creatively modeled on the epic, specifically on ancient and
medieval allegorizations of the Odyssey and Aeneid,
in which the physical journeys were viewed Platonically as figuring
the soul's progress toward perfection. In the latter part of the
book, Thompson relates Dante-protagonist to Ulysses, but
transformed as an anti-Aeneas representing Dante's own spiritual
development, which in contrast to the outcome of Ulysses' experience
in Inferno XXVI has a happy outcome in Christian terms.
The book is cast as follows: Introduction; Part 1: Three
Allegorical Journeys--I. Dante's Twofold Itinerary, II. Odysseus
among the Allegorists, III. Aeneas's Spiritual Itinerary, IV.
Letter and Allegory; Part 2: Ulysses, Aeneas, Dante--V.
Ulysses and the Critics VI. Ulysses in the Commedia, VII.
Ulysses and Aeneas, VIII. Ulysses and Dante, IX. Aeneas and Dante.
For an appraisal of this work, see the review-article by
M. M. Chiarenza in the present volume.
Thompson, David. "A Note on Fraudulent Counsel." In Dante Studies, XCII, 149-152. [1974]
Agreeing with Anna Hatcher that the specific sin punished in the
Eighth Bolgia is an open question and noting the possible solution
by James G. Truscott of "advice to use false promise,"
Professor Thompson here submits evidence that Ulysses did not
steal the Palladium but that Dante may have construed his having
counseled Antenor in his fraudulent activities, hence the verse:
"E del Palladio pena vi si porta" (Inf. XXVI,
63). He further suggests that it may be fruitful to consider Ulysses
and Guido along with the following group of sinners, the schismatics,
and that Guido is used here as one of Dante's self-corrections
from an earlier favorable opinion of him (Convivio IV,
xxviii, 8).
Wilhelm, James J. Dante and Pound: The Epic of Judgement. Orono, Maine: University of Maine Press. xii, 187 p. 23.5 cm. [1974]
Examines the profound and complex Dantean influence on Pound's
life and works, especially on The Cantos for which the
Commedia eventually served as a paradigm. The treatment is arranged
in ten chapters: 1. The Rhythms of Two Lives; 2. Lyric Youth:
Precision and Personae; 3. The Quest for Aim; 4. Cavalcanti as
Mentor; 5. Cavalcanti as Mask; 6. The Middle Phase: Monarchy and
Money; 7. Two Views of Hell: The Infernal and the Ephemeral; 8.
Pound's Two Purgatories: The Fictive and the Real; 9. Two Heavens
of Light and Love: The Visions of Old Age; 10. On Judging the
Judges. Other features include a preface, Some Dante Allusions
Not Mentioned in the Text, Notes, Select Bibliography, Index of
Names and Ideas, Index of Allusions to Dante's Comedy,
and Index of Allusions to Pound's Cantos. Three chapters
were pre-printed in earlier forms: chapter 5 as "Guido
Cavalcanti as a Mask for Ezra Pound," in PMLA, LXXXIX
(March 1974), 332-340 (see below); chapter 8 as "Pound's
Middle Cantos as an Analogue to Dante's Purgatorio: Purgatories
Fictive and Real," in Italian Quarterly, XVI, No.
64 (Spring 1973), 49-66 (see Dante Studies, XCII,
198); and chapter 9 as "Two Heavens of Light and Love: Paradise
to Dante and to Pound," in Paideuma, II (1973), 175-191
(see below, under Addenda).
Wilhelm, James J. "Guido Cavalcanti as a Mask for Ezra Pound-" In PMLA, LXXXIX, 332-340. [1974]
While dwelling primarily on Pound's reading and adaptation of
Donna mi prega, the article contains reference to Dante,
particularly Pound's perception of Dante's relationship to Cavalcanti
and the different roles these two Italian poets play in his Cantos.
Wilkins, Ernest Hatch. A History of Italian Literature. Revised by Thomas G. Bergin. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. xii, 570 p. 24 cm. [1974]
Contains three chapters on Dante (pp. 41-72)--Dante in Florence,
Dante in Exile, and the Divina Commedia--and a chapter
on Contemporaries of Dante (pp. 73-79). This revision of
the original edition of 1954 (see 73rd Report, 62) includes
a new chapter on literary developments since World War II, a map
of Italy, a chronological chart, and updated bibliographies.
Wlassics, Tibor. "Nota sull'anacoluto di Dante." In Italica, LI, 399-408. [1974]
Examines instances of grammatical anomaly, specifically anacoluthon,
in the Commedia, noting its use by the poet for deliberate
stylistic effect, for example, to convey a moment of gradual perception
on the part of the Pilgrim.
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, and XCII, 199.) Reviewed by:
Robert J. Di Pietro, in Modern Language Journal, LVIII, 81.
Riccardo Scrivano, in Rassegna della letteratura italiana,
LXXVIII, 162.
Dante's Inferno. Translated, with notes and commentary by Mark Musa. Bloomington and London: Indiana University Press, 1971. (See Dante Studies, xc, 175 and 189, XCI, 180 and 193, and XCII, 199.) Reviewed by:
Davy A. Carozza, in Forum Italicum, VII, No. 4 (Dec. 1973)--VIII, No. 1 (March 1974), 163-167;
Anthony L. Pellegrini, in Modern Language Journal, LVIII,
137.
Bergin, Thomas G. Invito alla Divina Commedia. Bari: Adriatica Editrice, 1971. (Biblioteca di filologia romanza, 20.) (See Dante Studies, xc, 176.) Reviewed by:
Joan M. Ferrante, in Italica, LI, 366-368.
Boyde, Patrick. Dante's Style in His Lyric Poetry. Cambridge: At the University Press, 1971. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 180 and 194.) Reviewed by:
Giuseppe Mazzotta, in Romanic Review, LXV, 71-72.
Anthony L. Pellegrini, in Speculum, XLIX, 94-98.
Rinaldina Russell, in Italica, LI, 368-370.
Caserta, Ernesto G. Croce critico letterario (1882-1921). Napoli: Giannini 1972. 424 p. Contains a section on Croce's interpretation of Dante. Reviewed by:
Giovanni Gullace, in Forum Italicum, VIII, 319-323.
Cope, Jackson I. The Theater and the Dream: From Metaphor to Form in Renaissance Drama. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973. Contains a chapter on "Theater of the Dream: Dante's Commedia, Jonson's Satirist, and Shakespeare's Sage." (See Dante Studies, XCII, 183.) Reviewed by:
Anne Barton, in Modern Language Quarterly, XXXV, 420-423
Dante Studies, LXXXVII (1969). Reviewed by:
Marianne Shapiro, in Romance Philology, XXVIII (Nov.),
265-266
Dante Studies, LXXXVIII (1970). Reviewed by:
Riccardo Scrivano, in Rassegna della letteratura italiana,
LXXVIII, 167-168.
Dante Studies, LXXXIX (1971). Reviewed by:
Riccardo Scrivano, in Rassegna della letteratura italiana,
LXXVIII, 167-168.
Moccia, Domenico. La voce di Dante. Napoli: Laurenziana, 1971. 113 p. Reviewed by:
Ben Lawton, in Italian Quarterly, XVII, No. 68 (Spring),
104-105.
Pépin, Jean. Dante et la tradition de l'allégorie. Montréal: Institut d'Etudes Médiévales, 1970. (See Dante Studies, LXXXIX, 118, XCI, 184, and XCII, 200-201). Reviewed by:
Marianne Shapiro, in Romance Philology, XXVIII (Nov.),
233-236.
Porcelli, Bruno. Studi sulla "Divina Commedia." Bologna: R. Pàtron, 1970. 166 p. (Le miscellanee, 2.) Reviewed by:
John M. Steadman, in Renaissance Quarterly, XXVII. 55-57.
Sarolli, Gian Roberto. Prolegomena alla Divina Commedia. Firenze: Olschki, 1971. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 191-192.) Reviewed by:
Alfred A. Triolo, in Italica, LI, 360-366.
Thompson, David. Dante's Epic Journeys. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1974. (See above, under Studies.) Reviewed by:
Alan F. Nagel, in Modern Language Quarterly, xxxv, 418-420.
The Three Crowns of Florence: Humanist Assessments of Dante, Petrarca and Boccaccio. Edited and translated by David Thompson and Alan F. Nagel. New York: Harper and Row, 1972. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 178.) Reviewed by:
Silvia Ruffo-Fiore, in Forum Italicum, VIII, 591-594.
Viator: Medieval and Renaissance Studies, I (1970). Contains David Thompson, "Dante and Bernard Silvestris," pp. 201-206. (See Dante Studies, xc, 195-196.) Reviewed by:
Henri Hugonnard-Roche, in Bibliothèque d'Humanisme
et Renaissance, XXXVI, 209-210.
Wlassics, Tibor. Interpretazioni di prosodia dantesca. Roma: Sigorelli, 1972. (See Dante Studies, XCII, 202 and 210.) Reviewed by:
D. H. Higgins, in Modern Language Review, LXIX, 427-429;
Luigi Soru, in Cenobio, XXIII (genn.-febbr.), 59.
[Seven Poems.] In Lyrics of the Middle Ages, edited by Hubert Creekmore (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1969), 157-165 pp.
Contains three canzoni, three sonnets, and a sonetto
rinterzato in translations by Rossetti; Shelley, and Howard
Nemerov. Each section, by language, of the anthology is introduced
by a brief historical note. The volume is reprinted from the 1959
edition (New York: Grove Press). (See 79th Report, 55-56).
De vulgari eloquentia, VI. Translated by A. G. Ferrers Howell In Readings in Medieval Rhetoric, edited by Joseph M. Miller, H. Prosser, and Thomas W. Benson (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973), pp. 269-271.
The excerpt, in the well-known translation by Ferrers Howell,
is prefaced by a comment.
Auerbach, Erich. Scenes from the Drama of European Literature: Six Essays. Gloucester, Massachusetts: Peter Smith, 1973. 249 p
Contains two studies of Dantean interest, "Figura" and
"Saint Francis of Assisi in Dante's Commedia."
The volume was originally published by Meridian Books in 1959
(see 78th Report, 26).
Beall, Eugenie R. " 'By Amor Rationalis Led': The Dantesque Element in the Poetry of W. H. Auden." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII (1973, 6338A-6339A.
Doctoral dissertation, Wayne State University, 1972.
Browning, Oscar. Dante, His Life and Writings. London: S. Sonnenschein; New York: Macmillan, 1891. New York: Haskell House, 1972. vii, 104 p. front. 23 cm.
Reprint of the 1891 edition (The Dilettante Library series). According
to the preface, the work was based on the author's genera article
on Dante in the 9th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica.
Burnhan, James. The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom. Freeport, New York: Books for Libraries Press, [1970, c1943]. xiii, 270 p. 23 cm. (Essay Index Reprint Series.)
Contains an opening section (pp. 3-26) on "Dante: Politics
as Wish"--1. The Formal Meaning of De Monarchia; 2.
The Real Meaning of De Monarchia; 3. The Typical Method
of Political Thought. The author considers Dante's treatise from
the standpoint of the distinction necessary between the formal,
"idealistic" expressions of politicians and their real
meaning and goal based on "realities." In this view,
Dante's political work was irrelevant and irresponsible, untenable
in its formal meaning, vicious and reactionary, but Dante's treatise
can not simply be dismissed as historically outworn, for the method
continues to be ever the same in the majority of political rhetoric
based merely on the expression of human wish, rather than practical
or scientific politics. This is a reprint of the 1943 edition
(New York: The John Day Company). There was also a British edition,
London: Putnam and Company, 1943, and a later American edition,
Chicago: Regnery Company (A Gateway Edition, 6079), 1963, with
a new preface by the author; also a Swiss edition in German translation:
Die Machiavellisten: Verteider der Freiheit, Mit einer
Einleitung des Herausgebers: Burnham Managerial Revolution (Zurich:
Pan-Verlag, 1949).
Chiarenza, Marguerite Mills. "Myths in Dante's Paradiso and Their Sources in the Latin Tradition." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXI (1971), 6596A.
Doctoral dissertation, Cornell University, 1970.
Freccero John. "Medusa: The Letter and the Spirit." In Yearbook of Italian Studies, II (1972), 1-18.
Contending that Christian allegory is identical with the phenomenology
of confession, the author examines Dante's address to the reader
in Inferno IX, 61-63, insisting that he read allegorically,
and the Medusa episode generally, and shows that the allegory
here is essentially theological and organically coordinated with
the poem's narrative structure. In the rather complex argumentation,
the antithetical action of covering and uncovering of the pilgrim's
eyes is related to the antithesis of Medusa-dottrina,
or God of this world versus the Truth, with support drawn from
Scriptural passages that contrast, for example, the Letter of
the Old Testament (written on tablets of stone) with the Spirit
of the New Testament (Christ, re-velation). The author
goes on to explore the Medusa figure in mythology, stressing that,
powerless against women, she was a female horror to the male imagination,
but in terms of sensual fascination, an excessive pulchritudo
that turned men to Stone. The Medusa is seen as a coordinate
of Matelda on Mount Purgatory, an impediment to recapture of innocence.
In confirmation of this interpretation of Medusa as sensual fascination
and potential entrapment and petrifaction, evidence is cited from
the Roman de la Rose and Dante's own rime petrose. The
Medusa episode in Inferno IX is further linked to the first
petrosa, Io son venuto, by the repetition of a set of identical
rhyme-words. Professor Freccero states that both the voice
of the poet-narrator and the figure of the pilgrim are created
simultaneously by the poem itself, the two becoming one at the
end. But this requires a death and resurrection, in short, conversion.
In terms of poetic expression or language, there is the danger
of immobilizing entrapment by the Letter and the necessity, indicated
by the poet, of seeing the Spirit beyond, or in other words, the
Eros of Medusa must give way to the transcendent Eros of Caritas.
Dante's poem, finally, "is the allegory of theologians
in his own life."
Gugelberger, Georg M. 'The Secularization of 'Love' to a Poetic Metaphor: Cavalcanti, Center of Pound's Medievalism." In Paideuma, II, (1973), 159-173.
Includes a page on Dantean references in the Commedia identifying
amor with poetry in the context of the article which also
notes a fusion of Cavalcanti and Dante in Pound's own transformation
of the amore-concept in the direction of poetry.
Hope, T. E. "Gallicisms in Dante's Divina Commedia: A Stylistic Problem?" In Studies in Medieval Literature and Languages in Memory of Frederick Whitehead, edited by W. Rothwell [et al.] ([Manchester, England:] Manchester University Press; New York: Barnes and Noble, 1973), pp.153-172.
Discriminates among langue d 'oï1 loan-words
in Dante's Italian chronologically, lexically, and stylistically,
with a view to correcting certain repeated misperceptions by scholars
about their use in the Commedia (they are not all found
in the rhyme position; they are not there to meet exigencies of
rhyme) and to characterizing their varied stylistic function in
the poem. For example, besides Gallicisms already long established
in Italian, the poet is seen to use several more recent loan-words
in contemporary use which were still new enough to carry considerable
force, particularly in the important final position of the verse.
The thirteenth century is indeed the period when medieval French
linguistic influence was at its greatest and Dante himself had
undergone the teaching of a Francophile scholar like Brunetto
Latini. Some attributes of Dante's Gallicisms, more concentrated
appropriately in the first cantica for their shock effect,
are novelty, rarity, dramatic intensity or context, key position
in the line. Because of the evocative values of their foreign
origin, they add resources to the poet's imagery and contribute
to his ultimate poetic achievement; they add registers and tonalities
that enhance the range of the volgare illustre and, in
the case of everyday words, provide dampening effects for maintaining
the mediocre stylus of commedia.
Liapunov, Vadim. "Limbo and the Sharashka." In Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: Critical Essays and Documentary Materials, edited by John B. Dunlop, Richard Haugh, and Alexis Klimoff (Belmont, Massachusetts: Nordland Publishing Company, 1973), pp. 231-240.
Examines the parallel between Dante's Limbo in the Divine Comedy
and Solzhenitsyn's novel The First Circle, stressing
the sharashka-Limbo analogy, particularly in chapter
2, "Dante's Conception," must be viewed in terms of
the total system of which each is a part.
Martin, Elizabeth P. "Psychological Landscape in Fourteenth-Century Poetry and Painting." In Dissertation Abstracts International, XXXIII (1973), 6877A.
Doctoral dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 1973.
Deals with the iconography and function of landscape particularly
in Dante's Commedia and the anonymous English Pearl.)
Masciandaro, Franco. "Inferno I-II: il dramma della conversione e il tempo." In Studi danteschi, XLIX (1972), 1-26.
With support from the Convivio as well as passages from
Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, the author offers a temporalistic
analysis of the drama of conversion which the Pilgrim undergoes
at the beginning of the Commedia. The time references in
the opening verse and later are related temporally and spiritually
to the traditional four ages of life and to the cosmic image of
the arc of life as an imperfect imitation of the perfect circular
movement of the heavens. According to the concepts of concordia
discors, temperamentum and ordo quadratus, further
correspondences are drawn with the four qualities of hot, cold,
humid, and dry and their combinations associated with the four
ages; the four-part division of the year and the day; and,
reflecting the spiritual side, the canonical hours for the Church
service. On a parallel with Christ's passion occurring at the
point of physical perfection or the middle of the parabolic arc
of life, where youth yields to maturity, the Pilgrim finds himself,
except that he is in an ambiguous, precarious condition of imperfection,
at the same opportune moment with the option of pursuing perfection
through conversion. In short, the author examines the Pilgrim's
condition in fieri, along with the sequential steps of
his spiritual awakening, conversion, and subsequent orientation
towards the way necessary for salvation. It is precisely in time,
which engenders movement, that awakening, re-direction, and
progress are possible. For even with his God-given autonomy,
man must live his life, involving choice, as a function of time;
he must appropriate time for himself to fashion in his own way.
Finally, the author shows that the concept of temporal sequentiality
is consistent throughout the whole opening scene of the poem,
as the Pilgrim passes from a static living in time to living
time kinetically, time which assumes meaning from an awareness
of eternity, the ultimate goal of conversion After undergoing
conversion and accepting Virgil's Heaven-sent guidance, the
Pilgrim can proceed to act out the temporal process of the journey
that will take him to the eternal.
Meeker, Joseph W. "The Comedy of Survival." In North American Review, CCLVII, No. 2 (Summer 1972), 11-17.
Questions the metaphysical morality of tradition and proposes
that the key to man's survival lies in the mode, not of tragedy,
but of comedy with its pattern of flexible adaptation to circumstances.
Analogically, "biological evolution itself shows all the
flexibility of comic drama, and little of the monolithic passion
peculiar to tragedy" (p- 13). The article concludes
with a discussion of Dante's comedy as a model ecological view
of life. "Dante's vision is genuinely comic, thoroughly ecological,
and the highest expression of both comedy and ecology" (p.
17).
Peterman, Larry. "Dante's Monarchia and Aristotle's Political Thought." In Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History, X (1973), 1-40.
Examines to what degree Dante's Monarchia reflects the
political thought of Aristotle and finds that the way that Dante
borrows from the Ethics and Politics illustrates
both his debts and his ultimate departures from the Greek philosopher.
By positing in advance a speculatively determined goal of earthly
paradise or ideal universal community (humana civilitas),
Dante views Aristotle's political ideas and political hierarchy
from that ideal standpoint. He therefore does not recognize any
tension, for example, between the contemplative life (theoretical
concerns) and the active life (practical concerns) and goes beyond
Aristotle's understanding of virtue(s) and prudence and their
relationship in the practical ordering of the temporal world of
the polis. With his conception of humanity realizing its
full potential in the unity of peace and the identity of good
man and good citizen, Dante goes far beyond his source in the
Politics, where Aristotle characterizes political rulers
by qualities (e.g., moral virtues) independent of intellect. "Aristotle's
distinction between contemplative and political life . . . disappears
in the Monarchia, where ruling virtue is more in line with
the life depicted in the Physics and Metaphysics
than the practical life depicted in the Ethics and Politics"
(p. 23). Dante's concept of humana civilitas, along with
his particular conception of justice, both of Augustinian influence,
is simply not definable in Aristotelian terms of polis
or politeia. Thus, even as Dante endorses the Aristotelian
supremacy of the speculative life, given the influence of Christianity
and the contemporary need for the unity and stability of world
government, he departs from Aristotle's political thought and
the now inadequate moral virtues of pagan tradition.
Routh, Harold Victor. God, Man and Epic Poetry: A Study in Comparative Literature. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press 1969. 2 v.
Reprint of the 1927 edition (Cambridge, England: At the University
Press). Volume II (Medieval) closes with the epic hero
evolved into the intellectual or spiritual adventurer, with Dante
cited as the most perfect example. The final chapter, (pp. 254-265)
is "A Note on Divina Commedia and a Glance Forward,"
including sections on Dante as both epic poet and epic character;
the Inferno as an epic; and the Purgatorio and Paradiso
as an epic. Further brief Dantean reference, passim, is
indicated in the index.
Wheeler, Thomas. "Dante in the Cinquecento." In Renaissance Papers 1965 (Durham, North Carolina: The Southeastern Renaissance Conference, 1966), pp.35-46.
Surveys attitudes towards Dante in sixteenth-century Italy,
including attacks (not without countervailing defenses) (1) on
his character, particularly by Machiavelli on patriotic grounds,
(2) on his language, particularly by Bembo who favored Petrarch's
refinement, and (3) on his Comedy, particularly by the
Aristotelians who had difficulty categorizing its genre. More
significant is the singular lack of followers of Dante, Pulci
alone being truly indebted to him, while Boiardo, Ariosto, and
Tasso simply incorporated occasional lines, often distorted, and
slight imitations from Dante in their own works. Closest to Dante's
style are some of Michelangelo's late sonnets. Finally, the Commedia's
mere thirty editions during the century were outnumbered by the
Orlando furioso, Gerusalemme liberata, and Petrarch's Canzoniere.
Wilhelm, James J. "Two Heavens of Light and Love: Paradise to Dante and to Pound." In Paideuma, II (1973), 175-191.
Examines the Later Cantos (85 to Fragments) as Pound's paradisal
equivalent of the third cantica of the Comedy, noting
the various Dantean parallels and echoes. While Pound always appreciated
the visionary ethereal qualities of Dante's cosmological Paradise,
his own conception is based on the terrestrial city in a mixture
of hard social orientation and Neoplatonic ideas. The American
poet is seen to link Graeco-Byzantine culture with the Chinese
as "the cornerstone for all that is permanent in human endeavor"
and to consider Dante as the bridge between them.
Wimsatt, William K., Jr., "Two Meanings of Symbolism: A Grammatical Exercise." In Renascence, XXV (Summer 1973)--"Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Issue," 213-226.
Includes references to Dante in the discussion which distinguishes
the two polar meanings of symbol in terms of word-symbol
and thing-symbol (involving verbal mediation in any case)
but seeks to minimize, for the literary critic, their essential
differences on the modern premise of the poem as a construct of
symbolic art. (The article is reprinted from Renascence,
VIII [Autumn 1955], 12-24, 35.)
Wlassics, Tibor. "Ambivalenze dantesche." In Studi e problemi di critica testuale, No. 5 (ottobre 1972), 15-32.
Examining a number of Dantean passages posing grammatical ambiguities,
the author contends that one reading should not be rejected in
favor of another, because both meanings must be considered as
having been conceptualized simultaneously by the poet at the moment
of inspiration. Such "ambivalences" are the stuff of
poetry. Indeed this concept of ambivalence can contribute to the
correct reading, poetic reading, of many controversial passages,
once one accepts that two possible constructions existed together
in Dante's mind, complementing each other and leading to a complex,
multiple result. Thus, the author disagrees with the negative
attitude of critics towards "equivocal elements" in
poetry. "Dante è stato attentissimo a non evitare
le genetiche ambivalenze della poesia, e ne è maestro incontestable."
Wlassics, Tibor. "Antropomorphism dantesco." In Lettere italiane, XXV (1973), 149-161.
Stresses that the world of the Commedia is conceived of
anthropomorphically by Dante, who keeps his glance constantly
turned back on earth even when he lets his imagination soar in
distant heavens, and the poem thus expressively reduces ultra-terrestrial
phenomena to human measure, in order to render the experience
more apprehensible to the reader. Many Dantean similitudes are
seen to originate from this anthropomorphic principle, whereby
the poet feels the need to transfer to a hypothetical anonymous
human figure whatever feelings or reactions he desires to represent,
for example, through the mediation of a generic "man"
by means of formulas like "l'uom," "quei,"
"colui," etc. This is especially useful for communicating
ineffable experience in the Paradiso, where there is particular
need of the anthropomorphic "interpreter." Even when
he reaches the ultimate goal, Dante sees "la nostra effige"
reflected in the Trinity and so again returns from the divine
to the human. Dante's universe is so close to us, the author contends,
precisely because he has created it in his (our) own image, i.e.,
by analogy on the same principle of God's Creation.
Wlassics, Tibor. "Coreografie dantesche." In
Nuova antologia, No. 2067 (marzo 1973), 326-337.
Examines the frequent gestures and "movement" built
into the scenes of Dante's Commedia, which give the impression
of "directions" and "distance" and help create
the illusion of a three-dimensional world. Accompanying the words
and at times actually substituting for them, the gestures and
movements are appropriate to the emotions characteristic of each
realm--brusk, unseemly, and violent movements in the Inferno,
predominantly gestures of stupefaction in the Purgatorio,
and finally in the form of almost immaterial gesturing, made up
of smiles of varying intensity, in the Paradiso. The author
notes that the states of mind are effectively expressed with brief,
rapid brush-strokes and that many gestures of Dante-Pilgrim
himself have an allegorical value going beyond the choreographic
He maintains, finally, that characteristic of Dante's gesturing
is its indeterminateness, i.e., it can be interpreted in various
ways, all basically appropriate, since this "polyvalent"
Dantean choreography seems to invite the observer to participate
with his own personal sensitivity. It is this very indeterminateness
that confers on Dante's poem the sense of "becoming"
associated with true poetry.
Wlassics, Tibor. "Le 'postille' di Dante alla Commedia." In Studi danteschi, XLIX (1972), 115-128.
Contends that Dante is the first commentator of his Comedy
and that his postille, besides clarifying the sense of
the text, form part of his narrative technique. This intentionally
prosaic or "pedantic" aspect of the poem is characteristically
Dantean and forms an intimate part of his inspiration. In his
rectifying, explaining, clarifying, Dante does not always limit
himself to indicating sources, but often assumes the attitude
of "reader-critic-judge." In particular, the
annotative-narrative technique enlivens the text so it does
not appear rigid, but bears the signs of ripensamenti by
the poet. The retarding effect inhering in the postille
is not always syntactical, but often implies a mental movement,
a later reflection or "afterthought" which reinforces
an exaggeration or serves to bring a scene into focus gradually.
Some passages cast with such a technique alert us to an intimate
movement in the scene, with the effect that we can follow the
action described in its progressive unfolding.
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, XXXIX, 107-108, XC, 189, XCI, 193, and XCII, 199.) Reviewed by:
J. M. Hatwell, in Italian Studies, XXVIII (1973), 108-112.
Bàrberi Squarotti, G. 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
1973), 55-57.
Carrubba, Robert W. "The Color of Dante's Hair." In Mediaeval Studies, XXXIII (1971), 348-350. (See Dante Studies, XV, 179.) Reviewed by:
G[iorgio] Bru[gnoli], in Studi danteschi, XLIX (1972),
350-352
Collected Essays on Italian Language and Literature Presented to Kathleen Speight. Edited by G. Aquilecchia, S. N. Cristea, and Sheila Ralphs. Manchester [England]: Manchester University Press, 1971. Contains three Dantean essays by Beatrice Corrigan, Alan Freedman, and M.F.M. Meiklejohn. (See Dante Studies, xc, 180, 182, and 185.) Reviewed by:
Peter G. Bietenholz, in Canadian Journal of History, VIII (1973), 169;
Nicolas J. Perella, in Modern Language Journal, LVII (1973),
437-438.
Dante Studies, LXXXV (1967). Reviewed by:
Riccardo Scrivano, in Rassegna della letteratura italiana,
LXXVII (1973), 368.
Dante Studies, LXXXVII (1969). Reviewed by:
Gabriele Muresu, in Rassegna della letteratura italiana, LXXVII
(1973), 368.
Jacks, R.D.S. The Italian Influence in Scottish Literature: Edinburgh: University Press, 1972. Contains references to Dante, passim (See Dante Studies, XCII, 200 and 206-207.) Reviewed by:
Matthew P. McDiarmid, in Comparative Literature Studies,
X (1973), 263-265.
Kay, Richard. "The Sin of Brunetto Latini." In Mediaeval Studies XXXI (1969), 262-286. (See Dante Studies, LXXXVIII, 186.) Reviewed by:
F[ranceso] Maz[zoni], in Studi danteschi, XLIX (1972),
339-340.
Mineo, Niccolò. Dante. Bari: Laterza, 1970. Reviewed by:
B. L. [Ben Lawton], in Italian Quarterly, XVII, No. 66
(Fall-Winter 1973), 62.
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 14, and XCII, 201.) Reviewed by:
Susumu Kawanishi, in Studies in English Literature, L,
No. 1 (Nov. 1973), 111-114. (In Japanese)
Sarolli, Gian Roberto. Prolegomena alla Divina Commedia. Firenze: Olschki, 1971. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 191-192.) Reviewed by:
Mario Marti, in Giornale storico della letteratura italiana, CL, (1973), 416-419.
Tateo, Francesco. Questioni di poetica dantesca. Bari: Adriatica Editrice, 1972. 221 p. (Biblioteca di critica e letteratura.) Reviewed by:
C. W. [Consuelo Wager], in Italian Quarterly, XVII, No.
66 (Fall-Winter 1973), 61-62.
Vallone Aldo. Dante. Milano: Francesco Vallardi, 1971. (See Dante Studies, XCI, 184, XCII, 167-179 and 202.) Reviewed by:
Joseph Chierici, in Italica, L (1973), 589-590.
Wlassics Tibor. "Le anomalie fonologiche del rimario di Dante." In Battaglia letteraria, XXII (1972), 1-3 and 13-14. Reviewed by:
Bruno Maier, in Rassegna della letteratura italiana, LXXVII
(1973) 628-629,
State University of New York
Binghamton, New York