Dante. A Life in Works

Abstract

In the introduction to his latest work on Dante, Robert Hollander observes quite rightly that Dante is, for most readers a "one-book author."Indeed one need only consider the amount of commentary and criticism directed at the Commedia, especially in comparison with the marked paucit}-of study dedicated to Dante's "minor" works, to confirm the accuracy of Hollander's observation.This neglect of Dante's other works, however, suggests Hollander, loses sight of one of the most significant characteristics of Dante's writing -its autobiographical aspect-and results in a reading of theCommediathat falls short of what its author intended.As Hollander points out, Dante by no means considered these other works to be minor.Rather, he says, each of them is marked by consider- able excitement and begins withan "unblushing announcement of its impor- tance."Starting then from the assumption that Dante set, if not equal, then at least, great store in all of his works, Hollander approaches each of them as Dante himself might have intended, as evidence and products of a continuing evolution in his political philosophy and his development as a writer.Dante.A Life in Works, therefore, constitutes Hollander's "attempt to delineate the intellecmal biography of the greatest narrative poet of the modern era."His attempt has suc- ceeded.Dante's journey not only through the other world but also here in this world.In his attempt to find and follow the thread that is Dante's life, Robert Hollander has finally touched that part of Dante that most astonished the other shades -and eluded so manv critics-his existence as a mortal of flesh and blood.Mar^-Alexandra Watt

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