Reading Dante in Renaissance Italy
Florence, Venice and the 'Divine Poet'

Examines Dante's reception in the culture and criticism of Renaissance Italy, with a particular focus on Florence and Venice.

Simon Gilson (Author)

9781107196551, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 15 February 2018

446 pages, 4 b/w illus.
23.5 x 15.8 x 2.6 cm, 0.74 kg

'… this analysis of Dante's fortuna in sixteenth-century Florence and Venice offers both a valuable guide and a stimulus for future research.' Martin Eisner, Renaissance Quarterly

Simon Gilson's new volume provides the first in-depth account of the critical and editorial reception in Renaissance Italy, particularly Florence, Venice and Padua, of the work of Dante Alighieri (1265–1321). Gilson investigates a range of textual frameworks and related contexts that influenced the way in which Dante's work was produced and circulated, from editing and translation to commentaries, criticism and public lectures. In so doing he modifies the received notion that Dante and his work were eclipsed during the Renaissance. Central themes of investigation include the contestation of Dante's authority as a 'classic' writer and the various forms of attack and defence employed by his detractors and partisans. The book pays close attention not only to the Divine Comedy but also to the Convivio and other of Dante's writings, and explores the ways in which the reception of these works was affected by contemporary developments in philology, literary theory, philosophy, theology, science and printing.

Part I. Florentine Legacies and Venetian Initiatives, 1481–1540: 1. Reading and refashioning the Comedy, 1484–1536
2. Dante's verse, the De vulgari eloquentia, and the Convivio: editions and critical estimates, 1490–1532
Part II. Dante and Florentine Academies, 1540–1595: 3. Dante and Florentine academies
4. 'His greatest partisan': Giovan Battista Gelli as public reader of Dante
Part III. Venetian 'Dantes', 1544–96: 5. New print commentaries: the 'espositioni' of Alessandro Vellutello and Bernardino Daniello
6. Dante and the polygraphs.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: poetry & poets [DSC], Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB], Literature: history & criticism [DS], Literature & literary studies [D]