Bibliotheca Dantesca: Journal of Dante Studies

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2643-4946
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Discipline
Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque Art and Architecture
Italian Language and Literature
Medieval History
Description
Bibliotheca Dantesca is an international peer-reviewed open-access journal dedicated to Dante studies. The journal represents the result of a productive collaboration between the students of Penn's Italian Studies doctoral program, who were its first promoters, the faculty in the program, the Center for Italian Studies, and the Penn Libraries. The journal's purpose is to produce scholarship that investigates the work of Dante and its reception with a widely interdisciplinary perspective. At Penn, the Italian Studies program and the Center actively collaborate in organizing events devoted to Dante, such as Lecturae Dantis, talks, conferences, concerts, films, and theatrical performances. The Department of Romance Languages, of which the Italian Studies program is a section, regularly offers courses devoted to Dante and his world, in conjunction with the interdisciplinary program in Global Medieval and Renaissance Studies. Bibliotheca Dantesca thus consolidates the strong commitment of Penn and its Italian Studies community to Dante's scholarship in a timely way. Eva Del Soldato and Mauro Calcagno Call for Articles: We welcome submissions for our sixth volume (December 2023). The deadline is June 30, 2023. The journal welcomes contributions that investigate the works of Dante and its reception from a broad interdisciplinary perspective. Bibliotheca Dantesca invites essays related to Dante and Dante's reception through the centuries, from the late Middle Ages to modern times, and from a variety of perspectives, including Mediterranean studies, gender studies, history of emotion, African-American studies, material text, influence on nationalism, "Italianity", digital humanities, environmental studies, to mention a few. Submissions should be in English (preferred) or Italian. The journal publishes ARTICLES (double-blind peer-review, between 6000 and 15000 words) and NOTES (single-blind peer-review, maximum 6000 words). For information and inquiries contact: bibliothecadantesca@sas.upenn.edu All publications are released under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0): http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ See the Guidelines here: https://repository.upenn.edu/bibdant/policies.html
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Now showing 1 - 10 of 117
  • Publication
    “SCORES FOR A PARTICULAR CHEMICAL ORCHESTRA”: THE ‘COMMEDIA’ AND THE MATTER OF SOUND IN OSIP MANDELSTAM’S ‘CONVERSATION ABOUT DANTE’
    (2018-12-10) Gazzoni, Andrea
    This paper discusses the implications of the wide-ranging use of sound in Osip Mandelstam’s 1933 essay “Conversation about Dante,” a landmark in the twentieth-century reception of Dante. With a special focus on the sound mo-tives incorporated in Mandelstam’s description of the Commedia, the Con-versation is analyzed as a study in the receptiveness of the reader, as it is acti-vated by the poetic speech of Dante in a call-and-response relation. At the same time, the paper explores issues of individuation, as reading through sound brings the reader back to his or her historicity and presentness, and of trans-formation, as the mutability of sounds brings about an experience of poetry as an ongoing metamorphosis. In this perspective, the vernacularization of poetry in the Commedia is conceived of by Mandelstam as the rediscovery of the aesthetical and ethical potential of our bodily, local, and contingent existence.
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    Reviews Full
    (2019-12-12) Editor, Bibliotheca Dantesca
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    The Global Popularity of Dante's 'Divina Commedia': Translations, Libraries, Wikipedia
    (2022-12-13) Blakesley, Jacob
    Studies of the translation and reception history of Dante’s Divina Commedia have rarely included the use of either distant reading (aka large-scale literary analysis) or Digital Humanities, much less both. However, using both these methods allows innovative research questions to be pursued and answered with regard to Dante’s fortuna, as I have shown in four previous articles regarding Dante and other writers. This contribution draws on three new datasets that I constructed myself in order to study canons of world literature, using Dante’s Divine Comedy as a case study: a comprehensive catalogue of all the worldwide complete translations of the Commedia (or single canticles such as Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso), published from the 16th century until 2021; readership data pertaining to all the Wikipedia entries dedicated to Dante’s biographical entry and his works; and Commedia holdings, in both Italian and translation, in all national libraries with online searchable catalogues. The aim is to see where Dante’s text is translated and circulates the most, and whether his work is globally popular.
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    From the "Allora" to the "Non Ancora:" Luzi's Essays on Dante
    (2021-12-12) Peterson, Thomas E
    In five critical essays on Dante extending from 1945 to 1999 Mario Luzi presents his view of the Divina Commedia as a living work that requires its readers to enter into its internal creative process in order to comprehend its moral and teleological meanings. At the center of the essays is the figure of Dante, identical to the poem’s protagonist, whose absolute identification with the objects of his thought gives rise to a poetry of prophecy, proclamation and testimony rooted in the experience of exile. Dante sees exile as the universal condition of humanity, which presupposes a spiritual struggle and itinerary on the part of the individual: from the “allora” of sin and perdition to the “non ancora” of penitence and expiation, and hence to the prospect of salvation. In closing, the essay considers the relation between Luzi’s critical Dantism and the impact of Dante on his poetry.
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    Interpreting Dante’s 'Commedia': Competing Approaches
    (2021-12-12) Corbett, George
    This article first addresses the emphasis on the truth of the literal sense of Dante’s Commedia in twentieth-century scholarship, whether the poem is conceived as a mystical vision (Bruno Nardi, 1884-1968), figural fulfillment (Erich Auerbach, 1892-1957), or allegory of the theologians (Charles S. Singleton, 1909-1985; and Robert Hollander, 1933-2021). Secondly, it analyses the interpretative approach of the French Dominican scholars Pierre Mandonnet (1858-1936) and Joachim Berthier (1848-1924), who draw on symbolic theology (and the four senses of Scripture) but, unlike Singleton and Hollander, insist that the literal sense of the poem is a “beautiful lie.” Thirdly, it shows how literalist approaches underpin key twentieth-century discussions of Dante’s theology, contribute to broader secularizing trends in Dante Studies, and represent a rupture with the seven-hundred-year-long commentary tradition on the poem as a whole.
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    MUSIC AND THE ACT OF SONG IN DANTE’S ‘PURGATORIO’ AND ‘PARADISO’
    (2018-12-10) Brownlee, Kevin
    The present paper explores the relation between the vernacular words used to designate the Act of Song, and the inscribed texts of the Sung Music itself, by considering a set of key cases first in Purgatory and then in Paradise. It focuses on important moments of structural and literary transition, at the same time as showing how sung sacred texts relate to each other (and to other kinds of passages) in important functional ways. I examine how song works in five key moments of the protagonist’s journey: the exit from the final terrace of the Purgatorial mountain, and the opening of the vision of the Procession of the Books of the Bible, as well as Carlo Martello’s famous citation of the first ode of the Convivio, which I link to the sacred “Osanna” sung by the souls of the third heaven. Finally, I analyze the (sung) relationship between the angel Gabriel and the Virgin Mary, both in their descent to the eighth heaven and then in their “eternal home” in the Empyrean.