Vita Nuova, by Kenneth McKenzie, in which the various theories are carefully examined.1 In 1904 Mr. Edmund G. Gardner edited Rossetti's Early Italian Poets for the Temple Classics; he wrote many admirable notes for the book, but somewhat neglected the Vita Nuova. Towards the end of 1906 a prose version of the Vita Nuova by Mr. Okey was added to the same series (in a volume that also prose rendering of the Canzoniere by Mr. Wicksteed). These two scholars are jointly responsible for the notes to the Vita Nuova which give proof of much original thought and diligent research. contains a It will be seen that during the last fifteen years the study of the Vita Nuova has attained considerable proportions in English-speaking lands-more so, indeed, than would appear from the foregoing list, as no notice has been taken of new editions. The versions of Norton, of Martin and Rossetti, especially the latter, have been re-issued several times. The present edition 1 We are indebted to this article for our knowledge of Gabriele Rossetti's division of the Vita Nuova (see above, p. xxii). It is printed in the Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, vol. xviii, No. 3 (Baltimore, July 1903), PP. 341-355. 2 Two other reprints of this volume appeared in the same year, but without any editorial work. 3 Dr. Paget Toynbee pointed out in the Athenaum of is distinguished from other reprints of Rossetti's New Life by the presence of the Italian text, which will enable students to realise the beauties of the translation even when it departs from its original. The Vita Nuova, the natural introduction to the Commedia, is usually read after it. If, however, this little volume falls into the hands of any one not already familiar with the greater work, it is the earnest hope of the present editor that it may lead to the serious study of that stupendous poem, the literary masterpiece of the Middle Ages. OXFORD, December 1907. H. O. Jan. 12, 1907, that a text and English version of the Vita Nuova appeared at Florence in 1906, bearing on the titlepage the words trascritta e illustrata da A. Razzolini; and that the rendering used is that of Rossetti, though his name appears nowhere in the book. Somewhat less flagrant is the case of the volume Notes on the Vita Nuova and Minor Poems of Dante, together with the New Life and many of the poems, by the author of "Remarks on the Sonnets of Shakespeare, etc." (New York, 1866); for here Rossetti's name does at least figure once in the text as the translator of the Vita Nuova. IN LA VITA NUOVA N quella parte del libro della mia memoria, dinanzi alla quale poco si potrebbe leggere, si trova una rubrica, la quale dice: “Incipit Vita Nova." Sotto la quale rubrica io trovo scritte molte cose e le parole, le quali è mio intendimento d'assemprare in questo libello; e se non tutte, almeno la loro sentenzia. Nove fiate già, appresso al mio nascimento, era tornato lo cielo della luce quasi ad un medesimo punto, quanto alla sua propria girazione, quando alli miei occhi apparve prima la gloriosa donna della mia mente, la quale fu chiamata da molti Beatrice, i quali non sapeano chè si chiamare. Ella era già in questa vita stata tanto, che nel suo tempo lo cielo stellato era |