An English traveller in Italy at the beginning of the eighteenth century picked up in Florence the following curious story about Dante:—
“This great man, we are told, had a most unhappy itch of pilfering; not for lucre (for it was generally of mere trifles), but it was what he could not help; so that the friends whose houses he frequented, would put in his way rags of cloth, bits of glass, and the like, to save things of more value (for he could not go away without something); and of such as these, at his death, a whole room full was found filled.”17
Another anecdote is given by Isaac D’Israeli in his Curiosities of Literature:—
“A story is recorded of Cecco d’ Ascoli and of Dante, on the subject of natural and acquired genius. Cecco maintained that nature was more potent than art, while Dante asserted the contrary. To prove his principle, the great Italian bard referred to his cat, which, by repeated practice, he had taught to hold a candle in its paw, while he supped or read. Cecco desired to witness the experiment, and came not unprepared for the purpose; when Dante’s cat was performing its part, Cecco, lifting up the lid of a pot which he had filled with mice, the creature of art instantly showed the weakness of a talent merely acquired, and dropping the candle flew on the mice with all its instinctive propensity. Dante was himself disconcerted, and it was adjudged that the advocate for the occult principle of native faculties had gained his cause.”18
Many of these stories are obviously much older than the time of Dante, and have been told of various famous persons at different periods. Their association, however, with Dante’s name is sufficient proof of the estimation in which he was held within a few years after his death, and of the way in which his fame as a poet impressed the popular imagination in Italy.
* * *
1 In bk. ii. of the Res Memorandae.
2 Or, as we should say, “birds of a feather flock together”.
3 Quoted by Papanti in Dante secondo la tradizione e i novellatori, p. 94.
4 In the margin Gower has put “Nota exemplum cujusdam poete de Ytalia, qui Dantes vocabatur”. The above passage was omitted by Gower from the latest recension of his poem.
5 Quoted by Papanti, op. cit., pp. 90-1.
6 Purgatorio, iv. 106-27.
7 Anonimo Fiorentino.
8 See above, p. 42.
9 Novella, cxiv.
10 Equivalent to our “Gee up !”
11 Novella cxv.
12 See pp. 193-202 of the Oxford Dante.
13 Quoted by Papanti, op. cit. pp. 47-9.
14 Facezie di Poggio fiorentino, No. 1xvi.
15 Book iv. No. 17 (see Paget Toynbee, Dante in English Literature, vol. i. p. 84
16 Quoted by Papanti, op. cit. p. 157.
17 Edward Wright, Some Observations made in Travelling through France, Italy, etc. in the Years MDCCXX, MDCCXXI, and MDCCXXII (London, 1730), ed. 1764, p. 395 (see Dante in English Literature, vol i. pp. 216-17).
18 Ed. 1866, vol. ii. (Anecdotes of the Fairfax Family), p. 464 (see Dante in English Literature, vol. i. p. 508, and Papanti, op. cit. p. 197).
PART V
DANTE’S WORKS
CHAPTER I
Italian Works—Lyrical Poems—The Vita Nuova—The Convivio.
DANTE’S earliest known composition is the sonnet beginning
“A ciascun’ alma presa e gentil core,”1
which, as he tells us in the Vita Nuova, he wrote after seeing the marvellous vision which followed on the episode of his being publicly saluted by Beatrice for the first time in the streets of Florence, when they were both in their eighteenth year (i.e. in the year 1283). This sonnet, he further tells us, he sent to many famous poets of the day, from whom he received sonnets in reply. Among those to whom he sent were his first friend, Guido Cavalcanti, Cino da Pistoja, and Dante da Majano, whose replies have been preserved.2
Canzoniere.—This sonnet and thirty other poems (twenty-four sonnets, five canzoni, and one ballata) are grouped together in a symmetrical arrangement in the Vita Nuova (or New Life), the prose text of which is a vehicle for the introduction and interpretation of the poems. Others of Dante’s lyrical poems are introduced in his Convivio (or Banquet), which contains three canzoni, and in his Latin work on the vulgar tongue (De Vulgari Eloquentia), which contains quotations from nine poems, canzoni and sestine. In addition to these there is a collection of between ninety and a hundred lyrical poems attributed to Dante, some of which are almost certainly not his.3 Such of the poems of the Canzoniere as do not belong to the Vita Nuova and Convivio appear to have been composed at various times as independent pieces, though attempts have been made to distinguish one or more definite groups. Both Villani and Boccaccio make mention of Dante’s lyrical poems. The former says:4“When he was in exile he wrote about twenty very excellent canzoni, both moral and on the subject of love”. Boccaccio says:5 “He composed numerous lengthy canzoni, and sonnets, and sundry ballate, both amorous and moral, besides those which are included in the Vita Nuova”.6 The earliest printed collection of Dante’s lyrical poems is that included in Sonetti e Canzoni di diversi antichi Autori Toscani in dieci libri raccolte (Florence, 1527), the first four books of which contain forty-five sonnets, nineteen canzoni, eleven ballate, and one sestina, attributed to Dante. A few, however, of the canzoni and madrigali (as they are described) had been printed at Venice in 1518, and reprinted at Milan in the same year, in a collection entitled Canzoni di Dante. Madrigali del detto. Madrigali di M . Cino et di M. Girardo Novello. Fifteen canzoni of Dante are printed at the end of the editio princeps of the Vita Nuova (Florence, 1576).
Vita Nuova.—Dante’s Vita Nuova or New Life (i.e. according to some, his “young life,” but more probably his “life made new” by his love for Beatrice), the first autobiographical work in modern literature, as it has been described, was written probably between 1292 and 1295, when Dante was under thirty, and some seven or eight years before his exile from Florence. The poems were obviously written before the prose text, which was necessarily composed later than the death of Beatrice in 1290.
The following positive dates are supplied by Dante in the course of the narrative of the Vita Nuova, viz. that he first saw Beatrice in the spring of 1274, when he had nearly completed his ninth year (§ 2, 11. 1-5, 15), and she was at the beginning of her ninth year (§ 2, 11.9-15); that Beatrice saluted him for the first time nine years later, in the spring of 1283 (§ 3, 11. 1-15), when he wrote the sonnet, “A ciascun’ alma presa e gentil core’ (Son. i.), his earliest known composition; that Beatrice died on the evening of 8 June, 12907 (§ 30, 11. 1-13); that on the first anniversary of her death (8 June, 1291) he wrote the sonnet, “Era venuta nella mente mia” (Son. xviii.), in commemoration of her (§ 35, 11. 1-20); that not long after (i.e. probably as appears from Convivio, ii. 2, 11. 1-10, in September, 1291),8 he saw for the first time the “donna gentile” (whom some have identified with Gemma Donati)9 (§ 36, 11. 1-13). To these, if the identity of Beatrice with Beatrice Portinari be accepted, may be added the date of the death of Folco Portinari,10 viz. 31 December, 1289 (§ 22, 11. 1-7).
Boccaccio, who asserts that in later life Dante was ashamed of this work of his youth,11 gives the following account of the Vita Nuova:—
“This glorious poet composed several works in his time, of which I think it fitting to make mention in order, lest any work of his be claimed by another, or the works of others be perchance attributed to him.
“He, first of all, while his tears for the death of Beatrice were yet fresh, when he was nigh upon his twenty-sixth year, collected together in a little volume, to which he gave the title of Vita Nuova, certain small works, such as sonnets and canzoni, composed by him in rime at divers times before, and of marvellous beauty. Above each of these, severally and in order, he wrote the occasions which had moved him to compose them; and below he added the divisions of each poem. And although in his riper years he was much ashamed of having written this little book, yet, if his age be considered, it is very beautiful and delightf
ul, especially to unlearned folk.”12
“The New Life” writes Professor Norton,13 “is the proper introduction to the Divine Comedy. It is the story of the beginning of the love through which, even in Dante’s youth, heavenly things were revealed to him, and which in the bitterest trials of life—in disappointment, poverty, and exile—kept his heart fresh with springs of perpetual solace. It was this love which led him through the hard paths of Philosophy and up the steep ascents of Faith, out of Hell and through Purgatory, to the glories of Paradise and the fulfilment of Hope.
“The narrative of the New Life is quaint, embroidered with conceits, deficient in artistic completeness, but it has the simplicity of youth, the charm of sincerity, the freedom of personal confidence; and so long as there are lovers in the world, and so long as lovers are poets, this first and tenderest love-story of modern literature will be read with appreciation and responsive sympathy.
“It is the earliest of Dante’s writings, and the most autobiographic of them in form and intention. In it we are brought into intimate personal relations with the poet. He trusts himself to us with full and free confidence; but there is no derogation from becoming manliness in his confessions. He draws the picture of a portion of his youth, and displays its secret emotions; but he does so with no morbid self-consciousness and with no affectation. Part of this simplicity is due, undoubtedly, to the character of the times, part to his own youthfulness, part to downright faith in his own genius. It was the fashion for poets to tell of their loves; in following this fashion, he not only gave utterance to genuine feeling, and claimed his rank among the poets, but also fixed a standard by which the ideal expression of love was thereafter to be measured.
“This first essay of his poetic powers rests on the foundation upon which his later life was built. The figure of Beatrice, which appears veiled under the symbolism, and indistinct in the bright halo of the allegory of the Divine Comedy, takes its place in life and on the earth through the New Life as definitely as that of Dante himself. She is no allegorized piece of humanity, no impersonation of attributes, but an actual woman,—beautiful, modest, gentle, with companions only less beautiful than herself,—the most delightful personage in the daily picturesque life of Florence. She is seen smiling and weeping, walking with other fair maidens in the street, praying at the church, merry at festivals, mourning at funerals; and her smiles and tears, her gentleness, her reserve, all the sweet qualities of her life, and the peace of her death, are told of with such tenderness, and purity, and passion, as well as with such truth of poetic imagination, that she remains, and will always remain, the loveliest and most womanly woman of the Middle Ages,—at once absolutely real and truly ideal.
“The meaning of the name La Vita Nuova has been the subject of animated discussion. Literally The New Life, it has been questioned whether this phrase meant simply early life, or life made new by the first experience and lasting influence of love. The latter interpretation seems the most appropriate to Dante’s turn of mind and to his condition of feeling at the time when the little book appeared. To him it was the record of that life which the presence of Beatrice had made new.”
The Vita Nuova, which was dedicated to Dante’s earliest friend Guido Cavalcanti (§ 31, 11. 22-3), consists of three distinct elements, viz. the poems, the narrative of the events which gave rise to the poems, and the expositions of the structural divisions of the poems. Two distinctive features of the work are the frequency with which Dante, in accordance with the literary traditions of the day,14introduces the expedient of visions, of which there are no less than seven in the book (§§ 3, 9, 12, 23, 24, 40, 43); and the important part played by the number nine, in connection with the hour, day, month, and year of the various events related concerning Beatrice. Thus Dante first sees Beatrice when they were both in their ninth year (“quasi dal principio del suo nono anno apparve a me, ed io la vidi quasi alla fine del mio nono” § 2, 11. 13-15 ; cf. § 2, 11. 1-8 : “ Nove fiate già,” etc.); he sees her again nine years later (“appunto erano compiuti li nove anni appresso l’ apparimento soprascritto,” § 3, 11. 2-3) ; and receives her first greeting at the ninth hour of the day (“l’ ora, che lo suo dolcissimo salutare mi giunse, era fermamente nona di quel giorno,” § 3, 11. 16-18); his subsequent vision takes place during the first of the last nine hours of the night (“fu la prima ora delle nove ultime ore della notte,” § 3, 11. 63-5). When he was minded to write a poem containing the names of the sixty fairest ladies of Florence, the name of Beatrice would stand nowhere save in the ninth place (“in alcuno altro numero non sofferse il nome della mia donna stare, se non in sul nove, tra’ nomi di queste donne,” § 6, 11. 14-17). The third vision takes place at the ninth hour of the day (“trovai che questa visione m’ era apparita nella nona ora del dì,” § 12, 11. 74-5). The vision in which he has a presentiment of the approaching death of Beatrice, when he is laid low with sickness, occurs on the ninth day of his illness (“nel nono giorno sentendomi dolore quasi intollerabile, giunsemi un pensiero, il quale era della mia donna . . . ,”§ 23, 11. 8-10). In the sonnet, “Io mi sentii svegliar dentro allo core” (Son. xiv.), in which Beatrice is mentioned, her name occurs in the ninth line15 (§ 24, 1. 58). In the date of her death the number nine comes in with special significance, in connection with the day, the month, and the year, which are computed for the purpose according to the Arabian, Syrian, and Roman calendars respectively16 (“secondo l’ usanza d’ Arabia, l’ anima sua nobilissima si partì nella prima ora del nono giorno del mese; e secondo l’ usanza di Siria, ella si partì nel nono mese dell’ anno; . . . e secondo l’ usanza nostra, ella si partì in quello anno della nostra indizione, cioè degli anni Domini, in cui il perfetto numero nove volte era compiuto in quel centinaio nel quale in questo mondo ella fu posta,” § 30, 11. 1-12). Finally, his last vision of Beatrice, when she appeared to him as she was when he first saw her, took place just on the hour of nones (“ si levò un dì, quasi nell’ ora di nona, una forte immaginazione in me,” etc., § 40, 11. 1-3). Dante himself draws particular attention to the fact of this connection of the number nine with Beatrice, and promises to explain the reason of it (§ 29, 11. 29-38), which he subsequently does in detail (§ 30, 11. 13-32), his conclusion being that she was “a nine, that is to say a miracle, whose root is no other than the marvellous Trinity” (“questa donna fu accompagnata dal numero del nove a dare ad intendere, che ella era un nove, cioè un miracolo, la cui radice è solamente la mirabile Trinitade,” § 30, 11. 37-41).
The form of the composition of the Vita Nuova, partly in prose, partly in verse (as in the famous De Consolatione Philosophiae of Boëthius, with which Dante was intimately acquainted, and the early French “chantefable,” Aucassin et Nicolete), was no doubt borrowed from a Provençal model, the prose text being a vehicle for the introduction and interpretation of the poems. The latter, which are thirty-one in number, consisting of twenty-five sonnets (including two which are irregular), five canzoni (two of which are imperfect), and one ballata, are symmetrically arranged in groups around the three principal canzoni, the central poem of all being the canzone, “Donna pietosa e di novella etate” (Canz. ii.).17
The work falls naturally into two main divisions, viz. the period before the death of Beatrice (1274-1290), and the period after her death (1290-c.1295). Taken in more detail it may conveniently be divided into five parts,18 viz. (§§ 1-17) Dante’s youthful love for Beatrice, and his poems in praise of her physical beauty; (§§ 18-28) his praises of the spiritual beauty of Beatrice; (§§ 29-35) the death of Beatrice and the poems of lamentation ; (§§ 36-39) Dante’s love for the “donna gentile,” and the poems about her; (§§ 40-43) Dante’s return to his love for Beatrice, and reverence for her memory.
The division into numbered chapters was not made by Dante himself, and does not appear in any of the MSS., nor even in the printed editions before the middle of the nineteenth century.19 It is, however, convenient for reference, and is now generally adopted in modern editions.20
; Analysis of the Vita Nuova:—
Part I. §§ 1-17.—§ 1. (“Proemio”) Introductory, explaining the title of the book (“Incipit Vita Nova”), and the author’s purpose.—§ 2. First meeting of Dante with Beatrice (in the spring of 1274), he being nearly nine years old, and she not yet nine.—§ 3. Nine years later (in the spring of 1283), at the ninth hour of the day, Dante for the first time receives a greeting from Beatrice ; his first vision (Love appears to him holding a lady asleep in his arms, and in his hand Dante’s heart in flames, of which he gives the lady to eat, and then disappears, bearing her away with him); he describes the vision in the sonnet: “A ciascun’ alma presa, e gentil core” (Son. i.), which he sends to the most famous poets of the day for interpretation ; he receives a reply among others from Guido Cavalcanti.—§ 4. Dante falls ill through the intensity of his passion for Beatrice; questioned as to the object of his passion he refuses to reply.—§ 5. He dissembles his love for Beatrice under pretence of devotion to another lady.—§ 6. He composes a serventese containing the names of the sixty fairest ladies in Florence, among which that of Beatrice will stand in no other than the ninth place.—§ 7. The lady of his pretended devotion leaves Florence; he laments her departure in a sonnet: “O voi, che per la via d’ Amor passate” (Son. ii).—§ 8. He writes two sonnets on the death of a beautiful damsel, a friend of Beatrice: “Piangete, amanti, poichè piange Amore” (Son. iii); “Morte villana, di pietà nemica” (Son. iv.).—§ 9. He is obliged to take a journey out of Florence in the direction taken by the lady of his pretended devotion; his second vision (Love appears to him in the guise of a pilgrim of sorrowful aspect, who calls to him and tells him that he brings back his heart from the keeping of the lady who had possessed it awhile, in order that it may be at the service of another lady; whereafter he vanishes) ; which he describes in the sonnet: “ Cavalcando l’ altr’ ier per un cammino” (Son. v.).—§ 10. Dante’s devotion to the second lady occasions remark, and causes Beatrice to deny him her salutation.—§ 11. He describes the marvellous effects on himself of the salutation of Beatrice.—§ 12. Dante’s distress at Beatrice’s denial to him of her salutation; his third vision, which takes place at the ninth hour of the day (Love appears to him in his sleep, sitting at his bedside, and weeping piteously; Dante questions him as to why Beatrice had denied him her salutation ; Love explains and bids him write a poem which shall make manifest to Beatrice his faithful and unaltered devotion to her; he then disappears and Dante awakes); he composes the ballata: “Ballata io vo’ che tu ritrovi Amore” (Ball. i.).—§ 13. Dante is assailed by doubts as to whether the lordship of Love is a good thing or the reverse; he describes his doubts in the sonnet: “Tutti li miei pensier parlan d’ Amore” (Son. vi.).—§ 14. He is conducted by a friend to a marriage-feast where he finds himself in the presence of Beatrice; he is so over-come by emotion that his confusion is remarked, and the ladies, including Beatrice herself, whisper and mock at him, whereupon his friend, perceiving his distress, leads him away; on his return home he addresses to Beatrice the sonnet: “Coll’ altre donne mia vista gabbate” (Son. vii.).—§ 15. He is torn between his longing to be in the presence of Beatrice, and his dread of appearing contemptible in her eyes; he addresses to her the sonnet: “ Ciò che m’ incontra, nella mente mora” (Son. viii).—§ 16. He speaks of the pitiable condition to which he is reduced by the thought of his love; and describes how, though he longs for the sight of Beatrice, he is utterly overcome in her presence; he addresses to her the sonnet: “Spesse fiate vengonmi alla mente” (Son. ix.).—§ 17. Having disburdened his heart in the three preceding sonnets, Dante determines to speak of a new matter.
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