DANTE, LIFE, WORKS AND FORTUNE (FOCUSING ON THE DIVINE COMEDY)

Students have the opportunity to extend and deepen the knowledge and understanding of the works of Dante established during their BA studies, and to develop more advanced engagement with debates in the criticism and philological analysis of Dante’s works.

Knowledge and understanding: to demonstrate acquisition of advanced familiarity with the methods of critical textual analysis and understanding of the literary forms studied on the course. Students will also demonstrate a good ability to interact with relevant scholarship using course bibliography and library resources;
Application: to demonstrate the capacity to apply such knowledge and understanding to Italian literary works, specifically the works of Dante;
Critical thinking: to develop confidence and ability in thinking critically about the area of study, and in developing autonomy in formulating evaluative judgements and defending interpretive hypotheses;
Communicative ability: to be capable of communicating the principal content of the course, with the capacity to communicate concrete information and to identify key debates and their possible elaboration, in ways that should be accessible even to non-specialist audiences;
Learning skills: to demonstrate the ability to engage adequately with scholarship at an advanced level and to display competence in critical textual analysis.

A good familiarity with Italian literary culture of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

The course will concentrate on critical analysis of the works of Dante. Specifically, the course focuses on the Vita nuova, exploring the text’s evolution towards the form – or forms – established as standard in modern critical editions. The course will concentrate on critical analysis of the relationship between prose and poetry within the ‘libello’, making the so-called organic text of the Vita nuova the primary focus of discussion but also paying attention to the fortune of the work’s constituent lyrics both within the book and in their independent transmission.

Dante Alighieri, Vita nuova; le Rime della Vita nuova e altre rime del tempo della Vita nuova, a cura di Donato Pirovano e Marco Grimaldi (Roma, Salerno, 2015: Nuova edizione commentata delle opere di Dante, 1.1)
[For convenience, students may wish to purchase a smaller size modern edition for personal study rather than the Salerno study edition. They are recommended if possible to make use of editions that follow the textual division into 42 chapters (following Barbi) that will be primarily referenced by the course tutor, rather than an edition which follows Gorni’s division into 31 chapters.]

R. Rea, Dante, guida alla ‘Vita nuova’, Carocci, 2021
R. Rea & J. Steinberg (eds), Dante, Carocci, 2020: capitoli 1 (Rime, di Marco Grimaldi) e 2 (Vita nuova, di Donato Pirovano)

Additional bibliography will be indicated during classes.

The following *non compulsory* studies are additionally recommended:
Zygmunt G. Barański & Heather Webb (eds), Dante’s ‘Vita nova’: A Collaborative Reading (University of Notre Dame Press, 2023)
Laura Banella, Rime e libri delle Rime di Dante tra Medioevo e primo Rinascimento (Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 2020)
Paolo Borsa & Anna Maria Cabrini (eds), “Dante e il prosimetro: dalla Vita nova al Convivio”, Quaderni di Gargnano 5 (2022)
Paolo Trovato, Il testo della ‘Vita nuova’ e altra filologia dantesca (Salerno, 2000)

Assessment will be conducted via an oral examination (circa 30 minutes), exploring the themes discussed during the course and including an exercise in analysis of a portion of the texts studied.

oral

From 27 to 30 e lode:
- good or excellent knowledge of the key themes and questions addressed on the course
- demonstration of good or excellent capabilities in analysis and exposition of the texts studied and demonstration of independent critical thinking
- good or excellent command of appropriate critical terminology
From 23 to 26:
- fair or good knowledge of the key themes and questions addressed on the course
- demonstration of fair or good capabilities in analysis and exposition of the texts studied, though perhaps with some weakness in approach and/or content
- fair to good command of appropriate critical terminology, perhaps with some limitations in constructing argument or employing terminology with precision
From 18-22:
- adequate but perhaps superficial or limited knowledge of the key themes and questions addressed on the course
- demonstration of somewhat limited capabilities in analysis and exposition of the texts studied
- limited command of appropriate critical terminology

Tutor-led classes which also require active participation from students in the discussion of the themes and questions addressed. During the second part of the course, students will be encouraged to contribute seminar presentations, either working on individual case studies or presenting collaborative work in groups of two or three student.