Divine Dialectic: Dante's Incarnational Poetry (Toronto Italian Studies)

By Guy P. Raffa

In this book, Guy Raffa offers a fresh reading of Dante's major literary works - the Divine Comedy and the Vita nuova - that combines central tenets of incarnational theology and dialectical thought to illuminate the poet's renowned ability to 'have it both ways' on issues that conventionally elicit an 'either/or' response. Viewing Dante as a poet of revision, not conversion, Raffa challenges a dominant paradigm in Dante criticism and takes full account of the poet's unconventional approach to such conventional dichotomies as eros and spirituality, fame and humility, action and contemplation, and obedience and transgression. Divine Dialectic ultimately argues that Dante crosses textual and theological boundaries in his medieval epic to promote the paradoxical union of contradiction and resolution as a way of reading his poem and, by extension, the world itself.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0802048560
• ISBN13: 9780802048561
• Release Date: December 2000
• Publisher: University of Toronto Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.27 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.4" x 9.3"
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher