Abstract
The chapter ‘Pagan Dawn of a Christian Vision’ is the first of the thirty-four ‘vertical readings’ in the three edited volumes (2015, 2016, 2017). The chapter demonstrates the hermeneutic fruitfulness of the ‘vertical perspective’, underlining Dante’s striking and strange emphasis on pagans and on natural ethics and philosophy at the beginning of each canticle about a different realm of the Christian afterlife: Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. The chapter provides original arguments for the theological and political motivations underlining this peculiar emphasis, arguments which emerged because of approaching these cantos through the innovative paradigm of ‘vertical reading’.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Vertical Readings in Dante's Comedy, ed. by George Corbett and Heather Webb (Cambridge: Open Book Publishers, 2015) |
Editors | George Corbett, Heather Webb |
Place of Publication | Cambridge |
Publisher | Open Book Publishers |
Pages | 13-23 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Volume | 1 |
ISBN (Electronic) | 978-1-78374-174-8, 978-1-78374-175-5, 978-1-78374-176-2 |
ISBN (Print) | 978-1-78374-172-4, 978-1-78374-173-1 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2015 |
Keywords
- Corbett
- Pagan
- Christian
- Vertical Reading