The Dante Society of America

Mission

Publications

Membership

Members

Events

Prizes

Links

Founded in 1881 by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, and Charles Eliot Norton (the Society's first three presidents) and others, the DSA is the second oldest officially constituted organization in the world (after the Deutsche Dante-Gesellschaft, founded in 1865) dedicated to the furtherance of the study of the works of Dante Alighieri. Its official residence is at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and its managing office is in Arlington.

Currently under the leadership of its seventeenth president, Nancy Vickers (Bryn Mawr College), the Society publishes the annual Dante Studies, sent gratis to all members, a semi-annual Newsletter, and an electronic version of the American Dante Bibliography, also printed each year in Dante Studies. The Society sponsors sessions on Dante at various scholarly gatherings during the academic year, publishes an electronic journal of critical notes (the EBDSA), and invites speakers to address the membership both at the MLA Convention in December and at the annual meeting of the Society each May in Cambridge. Those interested in becoming members should go to the Membership page for information and a membership form.

The Society also sponsors two annual contests. One is open to undergraduate, the other to graduate, students enrolled in North American colleges or universities. Please see the Prizes webpage for details about submission.