Dante's Prayerful Pilgrimage: Typologies of Prayer in the Comedy

Erscheinungsjahr 2019
ISBN: 978-90-04-40524-0
Verlag: Brill

Buch, Englisch, Band 22, 266 Seiten, Format (B × H): 157 mm x 236 mm, Gewicht: 522 g

Reihe: Medieval and Renaissance Authors and Texts

In Dante’s Prayerful Pilgrimage Alessandro Vettori provides a comprehensive analysis of prayer in Dante’s Commedia. The underlying thesis considers prayer a metaphorical pilgrimage toward a sacred location and connects it with the pilgrim’s ascent to the vision of the Trinity. Prayer is movement in Purgatorio and also in Paradiso, while eternal stasis is the penalty of blasphemous souls in Inferno. In the fictional rendition of the poem, the pilgrim’s itinerary becomes a specular reflection of Dante’s own exilic experience. Prayer’s human-divine interaction affords the poet the necessary escape from the overwhelming sense of failure in politics and love. Whether it is petitional, liturgical, thankful, praiseful, or contemplative, prayer expresses the supplicant’s wish to transform reality and attain a superior spiritual status.

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Autoren/Hrsg.

Vettori, Alessandro

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Romanische Literaturen Italienische Literatur
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Einzelne Autoren: Monographien & Biographien
• Geisteswissenschaften Religionswissenschaft Religionswissenschaft Allgemein Gebet & liturgisches Material
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literarische Stoffe, Motive und Themen

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Pilgrimage and Exile

1 Blasphemy in Inferno

2 The Psalms: Poetic Prayer of Ascent

3 Prayer as Art in Movement

4 Intercessions, Prayerful Locations, and the Theatrics of Prayer

5 Dancing Souls in Paradiso

Conclusion: Prayer as Desire to Be Elsewhere

Appendix

Works Cited

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Alessandro Vettori, (Ph.D., Yale,1995) is Professor of Italian and Comparative Literature at Rutgers University (New Jersey, USA). He is a specialist of medieval Franciscan writers (Poets of Divine Love, 2004) and of the rewriting of scripture (Giuseppe Berto, La passione della scrittura, 2013)