Dante, poised between the mountain of purgatory and the city of Florence, displays the incipit Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita in a detail of Domenico di Michelino's painting, Florence, 1465.
Dante Alighieri, attributed to Giotto, in the chapel of the Bargello palace in Florence. This oldest picture of Dante was painted just prior to his exile and has since been heavily restored.
(Vita Nuova is regarded as Dante's most profound creation....)
Vita Nuova is regarded as Dante's most profound creation. The thirty-one poems in this, the first of his major writings, are linked by a lyrical prose narrative celebrating and debating the subject of love. Composed upon Dante's meeting with Beatrice and the "Lord of Love," it is a love story set to the task of confirming the "new life" this meeting inspired. With a critical introduction and explanatory notes, this is a new translation of a supreme work which has been read variously as biography, religious allegory, and a meditation on poetry itself.
(The Divine Comedy is an Italian long narrative poem by Da...)
The Divine Comedy is an Italian long narrative poem by Dante Alighieri that describes Dante's travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise or Heaven, while allegorically the poem represents the soul's journey towards God.
(De Monarchia is a Latin treatise on secular and religious...)
De Monarchia is a Latin treatise on secular and religious power by Dante Alighieri, who wrote it between 1312 and 1313. With this text, the poet intervened in one of the most controversial subjects of his period: the relationship between secular authority and religious authority.
Dante Alighieri was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker, famous for his epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia (The Divine Comedy). Dante is also the author of La Vita Nuova and De Monarchia.
Background
Dante Alighieri was born in 1265 in Florence, the son of Bellincione d'Alighiero. His family descended from "the noble seed" of the Roman founders of Florence and was noble also by virtue of honors bestowed on it later. His great-grandfather Cacciaguida had been knighted by Emperor Conrad III and died about 1147 while fighting in the Second Crusade. As was usual for the minor nobility, Dante's family was Guelph, in opposition to the Ghibelline party of the feudal nobility which strove to dominate the communes under the protection of the emperor.
Education
Although his family was reduced to modest circumstances, Dante was able to live as a gentleman and to pursue his studies. It is probable that he attended the Franciscan school of Sta Croce and the Dominican school of S. Maria Novella in Florence, where he gained the knowledge of Thomistic doctrine and of the mysticism that was to become the foundation of his philosophical culture. It is known from his own testimony that in order to perfect his literary style he also studied with Brunetto Latini, the Florentine poet and master of rhetoric. Perhaps encouraged by Brunetto in his pursuit of learning, Dante traveled to Bologna, where he probably attended the well-known schools of rhetoric.
Career
Dante began early in life to compose poetry, an art, which he taught himself as a young man. Through his love to lyrics he became known to other poets of Florence, and most important to him was his friendship with Guido Cavalcanti, which resulted from an exchange of sonnets.
During his youth, Dante had known a young and noble Florentine woman whose grace and beauty so impressed him that in his poetry she became the idealized Beatrice, the "bringer of blessings," who seemed "a creature come from heaven to earth, A miracle manifest in reality". She is believed to have been Bice, the daughter of Folco Portinari, and later the wife of Simone dei Bardi. Dante had seen her for the first time when both were in their ninth year; he had named her in a ballad among the 60 fairest women of Florence. But it was only later that Beatrice became the guide of his thoughts and emotions "toward that ideal perfection which is the goal of every noble mind," and the praise of her virtue and grace became the subject of his poetry.
When the young Beatrice died on June 8, 1290, Dante was overcome with grief but found consolation in thoughts of her glory in heaven. Although another woman succeeded briefly in winning Dante's love through her compassion, the memory of Beatrice soon aroused in him feelings of remorse and renewed his fidelity to her. He was prompted to gather from among all his poems those which had been written in her honor or had some bearing on his love for her. This plan resulted in the small volume of poetry and prose, the Vita nuova (New Life), in which he copied from his "book of memory" only those past experiences belonging to his "new life" - a life made new through Beatrice. It follows Dante's own youthful life through three movements or stages in love, in which Beatrice's religious and spiritual significance becomes increasingly clear. At the same time it traces his poetic development from an early phase reminiscent of the Cavalcantian manner to a foreshadowing of The Divine Comedy. In the last prose chapter, which tells of a "miraculous vision," the poet speaks of the major work that he intends to write and the important role Beatrice will have in it.
The Vita nuova, written between 1292 and 1294, is one of the first important examples of Italian literary prose. Its 31 poems, most of them sonnets symmetrically grouped around three canzoni, are only a small selection of Dante's lyric production. He wrote many other lyrics inspired by Beatrice which are not included in the Vita nuova; in addition there are verses written to other women and poems composed at different times in his life, representing a variety of forms and stylistic experiences.
Dante also had fought with the Florentine cavalry at the battle of Campaldino in 1289. In 1295 he inscribed himself in the guild of physicians and pharmacists (membership in a guild being a precondition for holding public office in Florence). In October 1301 Dante was sent in a delegation from the commune to Pope Boniface VIII. During his absence the Black Guelphs gained control of Florence and Dante was sentenced to exile in absentia in 1302. Despite various attempts to regain admission to Florence - at first in an alliance of other exiles whose company he soon abandoned and later through his writing - he was never to enter his native city again.
Dante led the life of an exile, taking refuge first with Bartolommeo della Scala in Verona, and after a time of travel - to Bologna, through northern Italy, possibly also to Paris between 1307 and 1309 - with Can Grande della Scala in Verona (1314). During this time his highest hopes were placed in Emperor Henry VII, who descended into Italy in 1310 to restore justice and order among the cities and to reunite church and state. When Henry VII, whose efforts proved fruitless, died in Siena in 1313, Dante lost every hope of restoring himself to an honorable position in Florence. During these years of wandering Dante's studies were not interrupted. Indeed, he had hoped that in acquiring fame as a poet and philosopher he might also regain the favor of his fellow citizens. His study of Boethius and Cicero in Florence had already widened his philosophical horizons.
After 1290 he had turned to the study of philosophy with such fervor that "in a short time, perhaps 30 months" he had begun "to be so keenly aware of her sweetness that the love of her drove away and destroyed every other thought." Two uncompleted treatises, De vulgari eloquentia (1303-1304) and the Convivio (1304-1307), belong to the early period of exile. At the same time, about 1306, he probably began to compose The Divine Comedy. In De vulgari eloquentia, a theoretical treatise in Latin on the Italian vernacular, Dante intended to treat of all aspects of the spoken language, from the highest poetic expression to the most humble familiar speech.
During his exile Dante also wrote various Latin epistles and letters of political nature to Italian prices and cardinals. Belonging to a late period are two Latin eclogues and the scientific essay Quaestio de aqua et terra (1320). Il fiore, a long sonnet sequence, is of doubtful attribution. In 1315 Dante twice refused pardons offered him by the citizens of Florence under humiliating conditions. He and his children were consequently condemned to death as rebels. He spent his last years in Tuscany, in Verona, and finally in Ravenna. There, under the patronage of Guido da Polenta and joined by his children (possibly also his wife), Dante was greatly esteemed and spent a happy and peaceful period until his death on September 13 or 14, 1321. The original title of Dante's masterpiece, which he completed shortly before his death, was Commedia; the epithet Divina was added by posterity.
(Vita Nuova is regarded as Dante's most profound creation....)
1294
Politics
Dante's literary interests did not isolate him from the events of his times. He became a member of the people's council and served in various other capacities. For 2 months in 1300 he was one of the six priors of Florence, and in 1301 he was a member of the Council of the One Hundred. Dante wrote the Latin treatise "On Monarchy" ("De Monarchia"). This work is a kind of apotheosis of the humanist emperor, next to whom he would like to place an equally perfect papacy. Dante also openly opposed policies of Pope Boniface VIII and considered it a threat to Florentine independence.
Views
Dante Alighieri always looked for the fundamental basis for everything that was going on in and around him, it was this thoughtfulness, the thirst for common principles, certainty, inner integrity, passion of the soul and boundless imagination that defined the qualities of his poetry, style, imagery and abstractness. He brought to his poetry the near photographic recall of an intensely political life and the love of his native language, while also having a vision of heaven, earth, and hell that surpassed all previous efforts at encompassing the vast range of human experience. Dante also distinguished between natural language, locutio prima, that children learn at their mother's breast, and a second artificial language, locutio grammatica, that they learn at school. Latin should be used only in technical works, such as the De Vulgari, while the first nobler, more natural language should be used to create art.
Quotations:
"There is a gentle thought that often springs to life in me, because it speaks of you."
"Where the way is hardest, there go thou; Follow your own path and let people talk."
"I care not where my body may take me as long as my soul is embarked on a meaningful journey."
"Consider your origins: you were not made to live as brutes, but to follow virtue and knowledge."
"In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost."
Connections
Dante does not write of his family or marriage, but before 1283 his father died, and soon afterward, in accordance with his father's previous arrangements, he married the gentlewoman Gemma di Manetto Donati. They had several children, of whom two sons, Jacopo and Pietro, and a daughter, Antonia, are known.
Dante: A Brief History
For over seven centuries, Dante and his masterpiece, The Divine Comedy, have held a special place in Western culture. The poem is at once a vivid journey through hell to heaven, a poignant love story, and a picture of humanity’s relationship to God. It is so richly imaginative that a first reading can be bewildering.
2006
Dante Alighieri: His Life and Works
One of the most frequently cited texts on Dante's life and writings, this invaluable study illuminates the Divine Comedy as well as the great Florentine poet's other works.
1902
Dante: The Story of His Life
Marco Santagata’s Dante: The Story of His Life illuminates one of the world’s supreme poets from many angles – wrier, philosopher, father, courtier, political partisan. Santagata brings together a vast body of Italian scholarship on Dante’s medieval world, untangles a complex web of family and political relationships for English readers, and shows how the composition of the Commedia was influenced by local and regional politics.