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Detheologizing Dante: For a "New Formalism" in Dante Studies

1989; Cambridge University Press; Volume: 10; Issue: 1-2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.33137/q.i..v10i1-2.10423

2293-7382

Teodolinda Barolini,

Medieval Literature and History

In his capital and underutilized "Dante profeta," published in 1941, Bruno Nardi threw down a criticai gauntlet, and challenged us to look at the Commedia not through a glass darkly, but face to face.He begins where all such discussions must begin, with the Com- media^s most overtly prophetic moments, its political prophecies; situating them within the context of Joachimism and Franciscan spiritualism, he moves to a discussion of medieval attitudes to- ward prophecy, dreams, and divination.Calling to our attention Albert the Great's belief that some people "sognano il vero, e, a dif- ferenza di altri, hanno visioni veraci, talché non di rado pronunziano perfino chiarissime profezie" (368), Nardi claims that Dante consid- ered his own experience one such visione verace,^with the result that those who view the poem as a literary fiction misread it: "chi considera la visione dantesca e il rapimento del poeta al cielo come finzioni letterarie, travisa il senso" (392).Moreover, Nardi persists in asking the inelegant questions that are the logical consequence of his position, not only "Si deve dunque credere colle donniccio- le di Verona, che Dante scendesse davvero all'Inferno, e davvero salisse all'Empireo?"(392), but even "Ma fu veramente un profeta, Dante?" (405).Given that his answer to the first query is a qualified yes ("Non precisamente questo; bensì che Dante credette gli fos- sero mostrati in visione l'Inferno, il Purgatorio, il Paradiso terrestre, come veramente sono nella realtà" [392]), Nardi's next step is to take on Croce, for whom to admit such a hallucination on Dante's part is to suggest-impossibly-that the lucid poet was a madman.