Starring Dante

Albert Russell Ascoli

doi:10.3390/rel10050319

Abstract

This essay offers an example of a guiding thread in my own research on and teaching of Dante’s Commedia. Specifically, I will follow a strand that leads us from Dante’s encounter with the “bella scola” of classical poets in Inferno Canto 4, through a key scene in the Purgatorio where Dante and his guide Virgil meet the late classical poet Statius, to the remarkable six-canto suite in the Heaven of the Stars, sign of Gemini, in which Dante-poet has Dante-character undergo a series doctrinal tests on the theological virtues. His successful response to the challenges posed by the apostles Peter, James, and Paul doubly authorizes him as poet and as Christian teacher of the highest order. These unique experiences as Dante is successively introduced to and made part of a rising series of elite groups, highlights his double role as humble student and prospective teacher of others. Among the various aims of this essay is to give a sample of a way in which teachers of the Commedia may address the perennial pedagogical problem of how to account for the extraordinary spectacle of a first-person epic that at once expresses deep piety with profound “charitas” (spiritual love) and appears as the absolute height of a self-aggrandizement seemingly inconsistent with Christian humility. Another is to suggest one possible strategy for teaching the Comedy as a whole, and especially the final canticle, the Paradiso, which even Dante himself notoriously thinks is “not for everyone”.

Highlights

It would hardly be an exaggeration to say—at a time when in many parts of the country and in so many institutions, the teaching of the humanities, and of literature in particular, and even more in particular the historical past, has suffered terribly—that the enduring power of certain authors—Dante, Shakespeare, Cervantes—to capture the imagination of students and the general public alike seems ever more precious, even as it becomes more precarious. This is especially true for a work such as the Commedia, built on Dante’s profound religious faith and his commitment to teaching it, which has appealed to a great many readers from the broadest possible spectrum of cultural backgrounds and world views—Catholic and Protestant—Christian and non-Christian alike—from Florence to Birmingham to Tokyo
The number of pedagogical resources for the teaching of Dante has expanded exponentially over the last decades as dantisti (Dante scholars) have made increasing use of the technological possibilities afforded by the internet, at the same time as the number of hard-copy translations of the works, of biographies, and of volumes devoted explicitly to pedagogy have multiplied
The Dante Society of America website provides an extensive if not complete list of links to many of the most useful sites currently available https://www.dantesociety.org/education-and-outreach, as well as access to the bilingual bibliographical resource know as the Bibliografia Internazionale Dantesca/International Dante Bibliography [to use the English-language version of the latter site, click on the EN icon in the upper-right]

Summary

Introduction

6; translation mine), appears exactly two times in the Divine Comedy, once attributed to Virgil, whom Dante-pilgrim calls “lo mio maestro e ‘l mio autore” (Inf. 1.85: my master [or teacher] and my author) in the first canto of Inferno, and once to God, whom he refers to as the “verace autore”

Results

Conclusion