ON

THE VITA NUOVA

OF

DANTE ALIGHIERI.

THE title of the book admits of two interpretations, a literal and an allegorical. It may imply a history of The Early Life of Dante, or a history of The New Life following an allegorical death.

In the mixture of prose and verse the work resembles that of Dante's favourite author, Boetius, De Consolatione Philosophiæ; differing in this, that the prose of Boetius is an exposition of his verse, while the verse of Dante is merely a poetical version of some of the most remarkable passages of his prose.

This singular narrative would appear, from seeming data scattered through it, to be written by Dante at the age of twenty-six. He describes his becoming enamoured of Beatrice when he had just completed his ninth year, and when she had just entered upon hers; he expatiates upon her beauty; relates the strength and constancy of his attachment amidst difficulties and unexplained motives of conceal

ment; he mentions the loss of the lady's favour, by her suspicion of his attachment to another, her denying him her usual salute, and his consequent unhappiness; he relates her death at the age of twenty-five, and the desolate state to which he was reduced. He then speaks of another lady, bearing a resemblance to the deceased, whose looks of pity made an impression on his heart; he acknowledges this in two sonnets addressed to her, then repents this infidelity to his first love, and reproaches himself bitterly; after this, Beatrice presents herself to him in a vision, adorned as when he first beheld her, and from that moment his ancient love is restored and given to her exclusively.

The last poem of the Vita Nuova recites his being transported in thought to the Empyreum, where he beholds his Beatrice in glory that is ineffable and incomprehensible. After having composed this sonnet he says there appeared to him a wondrous vision, in which he beheld things that determined him to say no more of this blessed lady till he should be able to treat of her more worthily, for which end he was studying to the utmost of his power; so that if it should be the pleasure of Him for whom all things live, that his life should be prolonged some years, he hoped to say of that lady what never had been said of any one.

Such is the simple outline of the Vita Nuova; but it is so intermingled with metaphysical abstractions, Platonic mysticisms, and Pythagorean fancies as to the number nine; some things are so strangely introduced, others so strangely omitted, that doubts arise, and we ask ourselves whether Beatrice and this love-passion of Dante be a reality or a fiction. The question was started long ago, and is debated at the present

time by Professor Rossetti of King's College, London, and P. J. Fraticelli, the editor of the recent Florence edition of the works of Dante; the latter maintaining that the Vita Nuova is an ingenuous love story; the former that it is an enigma, every circumstance of which is a mere creation of the fancy.

Boccaccio, the first biographer of Dante, in his Vita di Dante, written in 1351, relates as follows: "Folco Portinari, a distinguished citizen of Florence, gave an entertainment as was customary on the 1st of May, to which the youthful Dante, who had not completed his ninth year, was taken by his parents. Among the large assemblage of young people was Beatrice Portinari, the daughter of Folco, who was about eight years of age. She was graceful, gentle, and exceedingly pleasing; in manners and conversation modest and grave beyond her years: added to this, the features of her face were delicate and admirably formed, and besides her beauty, there was such peculiar loveliness in her appearance, that by many she was reputed a little angel. At this festival, though not seen for the first time, she first had power to enamour the of Dante, and eyes young as he her image was received with such affection in his heart, that as long as he lived it never departed from him. The sorrows which Dante suffered from this passion at a more advanced age he has himself shown in part in his Vita Nuova. His love was virtuous and pure, and he was doomed to feel the heaviest weight of affliction in the loss of his beloved, who died at the end of her twenty-fourth year, and the grief of Dante was such that his friends believed death alone could terminate it. While his tears were still falling for the loss of Beatrice he

was,

composed a little volume, which he entitled Vita Nuova; a compilation of sonnets and canzoni of wonderful beauty, written at various times, and accompanied with an account of the occasion which called forth each of them."

This narrative, which we have greatly abridged, should be decisive, we think, of the question both of the reality of the Beatrice of the Vita Nuova, and of the attachment of Dante. The story of Boccaccio seems confirmed by the first canzone of the Convito, which paints the struggle for superiority between an earthly and a spiritual affection. In the Purgatorio too, where Beatrice first appears to Dante as a spirit of heaven, the allusions to her former corporeal state seem unequivocal. We cannot, therefore, entirely adopt the views of Professor Rossetti and his predecessors*; but are disposed to attribute whatever is strange and mysterious in the poems of the Vita Nuova, and in the prose which strings those pearls together, to the taste for allegory and obscurity prevalent in that age, and still more, to the multitude of ideas then crowding on the poet's mind, which had soared into the Heaven of Heavens,

"Oltre la spera che più larga gira,"

and was filled with the conception of the Divine Vision, over which he had destined his angelic Beatrice to preside, and to shed her beauty as the symbol of Christian philosophy.

* G. M. Filelfo, Vita di Dante, 1450? who pronounces the Beatrice of Dante to be a creation as purely ideal as the Pandora of Grecian mythology. A. M. Biscioni, Prose di Dante, &c., Firenze, 1723, who treats the account of Boccaccio as a fable, and Beatrice as a mere personification of Theology.

ON THE

CONVITO

OF

DANTE ALIGHIERI.

THE title, Il Convito, The Banquet, was probably suggested by the Banquets of Plato and Xenophon, the purpose of Dante being, like theirs, to furnish an intellectual feast at once instructive and agreeable; but his manner of executing this is entirely different, the work being a comment upon three of his canzoni. He professes an intention of commenting upon fourteen, "quattordici canzoni sì di Amore come di virtù materiate*,” which his biographers generally suppose he was prevented from performing only by death†.

* Convito, Trat. 1. c. 1.

+ No fragments of the eleven comments that are wanting have been found; but in the three of the Convito there are allusions to eleven canzoni, which Professor Witte considers to be those that had been fixed upon, and has arranged them in the Lyrische Gedichte von K. L. Kannegiesser' in the order that he presumes was intended. They are respectively Nos. iv., vii., ix., xxv., xvi., xviii., viii., ii., iii., vi., v. of the 'Canzoniere of Dante,' London, 1835.