Dante’s poem is the fullest and most imaginative ap-
propriation of Christian salvation. Within the confi nes
of the Christian scheme, the Commedia stretches from
the fi rst day to the last night, from the creation to the
crucifi xion and the resurrection. Its greatest distinction
is that it embodies this scheme in signifi cant, distinctive
historical types. In fact, these lively, realistic individuals
rescue the Christian sense of history from certain mono-
chromatism. Dante is an incarnationist, imbued with the
sense that the Christian calendar is always being relived,
relearned, and reengaged. When it vividly realizes reli-
gious passion, Dante’s poem is part of its own age and a
prelude to another age. It stretches from heaven to hell,
which are points or coordinates in Dante’s fundamental
faith that humankind has an innate purpose to return to
God, to redeem itself from nothingness. When it is real-
ized, this innate drive leads to the fullness of the saint,
whose life bespeaks an absolute dedication to a worthy
ideal; but when it is misdirected or defeated by poor
educational models, it leads to frustration and obsessive
attachments, which are the primary evidence of hell. In
this passionate world of manic extremes, such misdirec-
tion must result in the terrible thought that it is better
not to have been born. A long line of modern western
literature, originating in the late Middle Ages in Italy and
realized in the Renaissance, rests on these principles:
the grand scheme of Christian salvation, expressed by
individuals and presented aesthetically in imaginative
fi ction; and religious passion that stretches humankind
between the poles of salvation and damnation. Dante
was the fi rst master of this great cycle of literature.
Dante’s exile was a diffi cult time of wandering from
one place to another. Throughout these years he was
sustained by work on his great poem, which he may have
begun before 1308 and completed just before his death
in 1321. In his fi nal years, Dante was received honorably
in many noble houses in northern Italy, most notably by
Cangrande della Scala in Verona and by Guido Novello
da Polenta, the nephew of the remarkable Francesca, in
Ravenna. Dante died in Ravenna; his burial was attended
by the leading men of letters, and the funeral oration
was delivered by Guido himself.
Dante’s Commedia did not have to wait long for
recognition and honors. By the year 1400, no fewer
than fourteen commentaries devoted to detailed exposi-
tions of its meaning had appeared. Giovanni Boccaccio
wrote a life of Dante and in 1373–1374 delivered the
fi rst public lectures on the Commedia. Dante became
known as the divino poeta, and in a splendid edition of
the Commedia published in 1555 the adjective divina
was applied to the poem itself; thus the simple Com-
media became La divina commedia.
See also Boccaccio, Giovanni; Boniface VIII, Pope;
Brunetto Latini; Cavalcanti, Guido
Further ReadingEditions, Translations, and Commentaries: General
Le opere di Dante: Testo critico della società dantesca italiana,
ed. Michele Barbi et al., 2nd ed. Florence: Società Dantesca
Italiana, 1960.
Le opere di Dante Alighieri, ed. Edward Moore and Paget Toyn-
bee, 5th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1963.
Opere minori, Vol. 2., ed. Pier Vincenzo Mengaldo, Bruno Nardi,
Arsenio Frugoni, Giorgio Brugnoli, Enzo Cecchini, and Fran-
cesco Mazzoni. Milan and Naples: Ricciardi, 1979.
Editions, Translations, and Commentaries:
Commedia
La commedia secondo l’antica vulgata, 4 vols., ed. Giorgio
Petrocchi. Milan: Mondadori, 1966–1967.
La Divina Commedia, 3 vols., ed. Natalino Sapegno. 3rd ed.
Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1985.
La Divina Commedia di Dante Alighieri, ed. C. H. Grandgent.
Boston, Mass.: Heath, 1933. (Rev. ed., Charles S. Singleton.
Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972.)
The Divine Comedy, 6 vols., trans. and commentary Charles
S. Singleton. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1970–1975.
The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, 3 vols., trans. John D.
Sinclair. New York: Oxford University Press, 1958.
Editions, Translations, and Commentaries:
Other Works
The Banquet, trans. Christopher Ryan. Saratoga, Calif.: Anma
Libri, 1989.
Il Convivio, 2nd ed., 2 vols., ed. Giovanni Busnelli and Giuseppe
Vandelli. Florence: Le Monnier, 1968. (With appendixes by
Antonio Enzo Quaglio.)
Convivio, ed. Cesare Vasoli. Dante Alighieri: Opere Minori, 1
(part 2). Milan and Naples: Ricciardi, 1988.
Convivio, 3 vols., ed. Franca Brambilla Ageno. Florence: Casa
Editrice Le Lettere, 1995.
Dante and Giovanni del Virgilio, Including a Critical Edition
of the Text of Dante’s “Eclogae Latinae” and of the Poetic
Remains of Giovanni del Virgilio, ed. Philip H. Wicksteed and
Edmund G. Gardner. Westminster: Constable, 1902.
Dante’s Il Convivio (The Banquet), trans. Richard H. Lansing.
New York: Garland, 1990.
Dante’s Lyric Poetry, 2 vols., ed. and trans. Kenelm Foster and
Patrick Boyde. Oxford: Clarendon, 1967.
Dante’s Monarchia, trans. with commentary Richard Kay. To-
ronto: Pontifi cal Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1998.
Dante’s Treatise De Vulgari Eloquentia, trans. A. G. Ferrers
Howell. Temple Classics. London: Dent, 1890.
Dante’s Vita Nuova, trans. Mark Musa. Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1973.
De vulgari eloquentia, ed. Aristide Marigo. Florence: Le Mon-
nier, 1957.
De vulgari eloquentia, ed. and trans. Steven Botterill. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1996.
The Flore and the Detto d’Amore: A Late 13th-Century Italian
Translation of the Roman de la Rose, trans. Santa Casciani
and Christopher Kleinhenz. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of
Notre Dame Press, 2000.
Literary Criticism of Dante Alighieri, trans. and ed. Robert S.
Haller. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1973.
Monarchia, ed. Pier Giorgio Ricci. Milan: Mondadori, 1965.
Monarchia, trans. and ed. Prue Shaw. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1995.DANTE ALIGHIERI