Abstracts

Introduction

• Franziska Meier, Putting the Convivio into Perspective. Introductory Remarks

Previous Texts

• Enrico Fenzi, Roman de la Rose
Sino ad oggi i rapporti tra l’opera di Dante e il Roman de la rose sono stati considerati attraverso lo specchio in parte deformante del Fiore, com’è nel famoso ‘nodo’ continiano: Rose – Fiore – Commedia, che tanta influenza ha avuto sugli studi successivi. Ora la paternità dantesca del Fiore è messa in crisi, e sembra invece avanzare la candidatura del maestro di Dante, Brunetto Latini: così, è diventato più facile mettere per un momento il Fiore tra parentesi, e considerare per contro quale possa essere stata la presenza del poema francese all’interno delle opere sicuramente di Dante, dalle Rime alla Commedia. Questo è quanto cerco di fare nel mio intervento, muovendo dalla fase allegorica di Dante quale si esprime nelle prime due canzoni commentate nel Convivio e passando per il realismo della Commedia, per l’incontro con Matelda nel Paradiso terrestre, e infine per la ‘candida rosa’ al sommo del Paradiso, che da tempo qualcuno ha visto come una sorta di sublimato capovolgimento della rose del Roman.


• Paola Nasti, Dante and the Mendicant Schools: the revival of Boethius

This paper will consider the Convivio in the context of the commentary tradition of the Consolation of Philosophy. Particular attention will be paid to the renewed interest for Boethius’ philosophical poetry amongst those mendicant theologians and friars who engaged in comprehensive studies of secular literature and poetry. Amongst other thing this paper will consider the common interests and perspectives of Nicholas Trevet’s commentary to The Consolation and Dante’s Convivio.


• Jörg Bank, Gastmähler in der Bibel, Gastmahl bei Dante

Language and Poetry

• Maria Luisa Ardizzone, The Politics of Poetics: Intelligence and Rhetoric in Dante's Convivio II.
The paper attempts to shape Dante's ideas of poetry and poetics considering them both as part of the sciences of civil conversation and therefore as part of politics. The political nature of the Convivio - an aspect of the doctrinal treatise that has been never discussed - will be investigated reading the text in prose in relation to that in verse and through an analysis of Dante's encyclopedia of learning.
The link between contemplation and action introduced since the first lines of Voi che'intendendo il terzo ciel movete as well as that between the science of rhetoric and the celestial motors of the third heaven (Convivio II) are assumed as propedeutic to the writing of the vernacular treatise and its political contents.


• Albert R. Ascoli, ‘Ponete mente almen come sono bella’: Poetry and Prose, Goodness and Beauty, in Convivio

It is a critical truism to say of the Convivio, as has also been said of Dante’s first prose-poetry hybrid, the Vita Nova, that prose constitutes the real novelty of the work, and gives it its significance. It would be more exact, however, to assert that it is the use of vernacular prose to comment on vernacular poetry that comes forth as the most truly innovative feature of both texts. Whichever formulation is chosen, however, one clear result in the scholarship has been a pronounced tendency to follow Dante himself in leaving the dynamics of the relationship between prose and poetry unexamined, and in particular to focus critical attention on the prose to the exclusion of the poetry. In this paper, however, I will reconsider that relationship through the traditional opposition between the moral-spiritual bontade of content and the sensual pleasures of beautiful form, which, I will argue, undergoes a series of complex and at times contradictory evolutions in both the prose and the poetry of Convivio, beginning with Dante’s initial justification for composing the treatise (readers perceive only the “womanly” bellezza of the poetry, not its masterful, virile, bontade). That justification is, however, a post facto rehearsal of the poet’s instruction to and ventriloquizing personification of his poem in the famous congedo to the first canzone analyzed, “Voi ch’intendendo,” which is then further and suggestively glossed in the prose of book 2, chapter 11. Although in principle the bontade expounded by the prose is superior and opposed to the effectively mute bellezza of the poetry—even as the prose is is ostensibly in servitude to the master discourse on which it comments—in the end, I will suggest, it is precisely the formal “bellezza” of the poetic “arte musaica” that Dante understands as constructing the vernacular as a regulated language in which “conceputa sentenza” can be articulated with an authority like that of Latin; which thus makes possible the revelation of philosophical bontade in the prose; and which ultimately tends toward a reconciliation of bellezza and bontade in a poetic discourse that has acquired the full explanatory powers of philosophical prose, first in the revisionist canzone of book 4 (“Le dolci rime d’amor ch’io solia”) and, eventually, in the Commedia itself.

Science

• Andreas Speer, kommt noch - Die Ordnung der Wissenschaften: „Sapienza“ und „scienza divina“
• Theodore J. Cachey, Dal Convivio alla Commedia: questioni cosmologiche

In his commentary on Paradiso 27 Robert Hollander expresses disappointment on behalf of those readers “hoping to have confirmation that somehow the specifications made in Convivio about the intellectual activities sponsored by the various heavens... might seem reflected in these same heavens.” In fact, he notes: “the Primum Mobile, according to Convivio (II. Xiv.14-18), is supposed to resemble moral philosophy –not angelology.” Hollander concludes with the observation that “it certainly seems plain that Dante abandoned this schematic design of the earlier work in the Comedy, for whatever reason.” But what might that reason have been? In this paper I examine the main cosmological sections of the Convivio (Bk II, iii-v; and xiii-xv). Dante’s investigations of the heavens are central to his epistemology and therefore represent a privileged lens through which to assess both the relationship he posits in the Convivio between philosophy and theology, and his subsequent intellectual and poetic development in the transition from the vernacular treatise to the Commedia.

Readers

• Silvia Fabrizio-Costa, Il Convivio de Dante (1940) d'André Pézard : nascita d'un grande italianista francese
Parlare dell'edizione di quest'opera critica d'A. Pézard significa presentare la tradizione di studi in cui la si può inserire e tentare di ricostruire il momento culturale in cui fu pubblicata . E permette di riparlare d'A.Pézard , il cui ruolo nella ricezione di Dante in Francia merita d'essere ricordato come il suo ruolo non banale di scrittore , poco conosciuto.


• Enrica Zanin
• Dennis Looney, Petrarca als heimlicher Leser
• Luca Azetta, «Di questo parla l’autore in una chiosa d’una sua canzone». Il Convivio attraverso gli occhi dei suoi primi lettori
Alla morte di Dante il Convivio, opera incompiuta dei primi anni dell’esilio, non era ancora noto ai contemporanei. Il trattato infatti fu divulgato solo qualche anno più tardi, probabilmente dai figli del poeta, Iacopo o Pietro Alighieri, all’interno di una cerchia ristretta di ammiratori fiorentini. La relazione si propone di indagare le diverse modalità con cui il Convivio fu letto e recepito dai suoi primi lettori. Se tutti infatti concordano nel ricondurre l’opera, per quanto incompiuta, al genere letterario del commento, differente fu la modalità di approccio, tesa a valorizzare ora il rapporto con la biografia propria o del poeta, ora l’evoluzione o la coerenza del pensiero di Dante quale compare in opere differenti; in altri casi invece al Convivio si guardò ora come a un utile repertorio di citazioni, ora come a un modello di stile.


• Thomas Ricklin, ‚Potrebbe dire alcuno ...’: l’opponens di Dante nel Convivio, tentativo d’identikit.

Lungo il Convivio Dante s’immagina a più riprese un opponente che lo costringa a riformulare un’affermazione appena espressa. Ovviamente quest’opponente è un elemento notevole del «perfetto dominio dell’arte del loicare» (Bruno Nardi) dantesco. Ciò nonostante si pone la questione se questo calunniatore (IV, xii, 11) appare soltanto per l’occasione o se dispone di una precisa identità filosofica. In altre parole, è possibile fornire un identikit dell’avversario o si tratta semplicemente di una personificazione tutt’altro che coerente dello scolastico sed contra?

„Hybridity“

• Zygmunt Baranski, “Oh com’è grande la mia impresa”: Notes on defining Dante’s Convivio
It is a commonplace of Dante scholarship to present the Convivio as a philosophical treatise. Without wishing to call into doubt the work’s interest in matters of philosophy or its evident rationalist stamp, the fact remains that, at no point, does Dante explicitly define the Convivio in philosophical terms or in light of one of the contemporary philosophical genres. Instead, he explicitly terms it a “commentary”, and a literary commentary at that, and describes it through the suggestive image of the “generale convivio”, the intellectual substance of which is fragmentarily and arbitrarily composed of what falls to the ground from “quella mensa dove lo pane de li angeli si manuca”. Indeed, given the Convivio’s intellectual eclecticism and structural weakness, not to mention the uncertain nature of a significant number of its passages, the idea that it is the product of crumbs provides a telling and far from inaccurate insight into its textual status. The Convivio, like so much of Dante’s oeuvre, is a hybrid; and the present contribution aims to ‘define’ the work in light of its hybridity, namely, its relationship to a broad range of medieval genres from the artes poetriae to autobiographical writing, from satire to the literature of exile, from philosophical commentary and tractates to the lyric, from the volgarizzamenti to religious, primarily Scriptural, forms, and from the encyclopaedic compilationes to literary exegesis (and more besides). By endeavouring to offer a more precise definition of the Convivio’s textual identity than has normally been attempted, it is hoped to be able also to cast new light on its aims, whether these are considered in terms of Dante himself or of its supposed audience of those who have been removed “da l’abito di scienza”. As befits a work of synthesis, the Convivio is a work of ambitious and calculated mediation.


• Andrea Mazzucchi, Connotazioni ideologiche delle strategie formali del Convivio
• Barbara Ventarola, Performative Catachreses – Dantes Convivio as an agent of historical change
Because of its hybrid and ambivalent character, Dante’s Convivio (ca 1306) strongly challenges the scientists. The self-commentary on three of Dante’s canzoni, written at the outset of the trecento, merges several text types, structural forms, theoretical fragments as well as concepts of the sign and of knowledge in a very particular way that cannot be reduced to a singular overarching order. Instead, the text simultaneously establishes and criss-crosses orders and this confusing superposition of opposing tendencies can be seen as its main characteristic. The discourse analysis of the German Romance Studies provides a theoretical model that partly explains this ambivalence by tying it back to its historical and epistemological context. From this perspective, the Convivio appears as one of the last representatives of a scholastic-analogistic world-order which is about to crack. The transition from the Middle Ages to the Early Modern Period is seen as a development process of an increasing decay of order, where Dante – claiming ontological truth also for poetic fiction – represents already a first “phase of emancipation” (Küpper) from the analogistic discourse: On the one hand, he allegedly tries to tie back his love poetry to the medieval analogism and the Christian concept of truth. But on the other hand, this attempt is bound to fail, because the aporia of scholasticism become more and more blatant.
Indeed, a closer analysis of the text reveals that this – undoubtedly ingenious – explanation leaves essential questions unanswered. The criss-crossing of the established orders is too systematic to completely fit into the overarching process figure of a (more or less) failing attempt to maintain the status quo. For this reason, the aim of my paper is twofold: In the first part, I will demonstrate where and how the theoretical framework of discourse analysis is to be modified in order to combine historical systematization and the differentiated consideration of individual phenomena of the Late Middle Ages. On this basis, I will then concentrate on the Convivio. An exemplary interpretation of the text will contextualize it in a new way. I will prove that Dante has conceived his text very deliberately as a polydiscoursive, multi-dimensional and dynamic network which aims at opening new discoursive realms. The ‘catachretic’ superposition of different orders can be deciphered as part of a textual strategy and thinking experiment, by which Dante already uses the beginning decay of the medieval-analogistic ordo as a fundament for sketching out a new, diversified concept of order.


• Matthias Roick, Ethik und die Techniken des Selbst

Commentary and Exegesis

• Alaistar Minnis, ‘Per aprire la sentenzia’: Textual subdivision as commentary technique in the Convivio
In his Vita Nuova, Dante adopted and adapted the technique of minute textual subdivision (sometimes termed divisio textus or forma tractatus) which is a distinctive feature of late-medieval commentary on the Latin auctores. In his Convivio he took this method to new depths of precision, in an enterprise of even greater ambition. I will discuss this development in detail, with reference to representative commentary on Latin poetry and philosophical/theological works along with Dino del Garbo's (Latin) commentary on Donna mi prega, Guido Cavalcanti’s canzone d'amore – an exegetical experiment of the first importance, to which Boccaccio ostentatiously deferred in the glosses which he provided to his own Teseida, a commentary which follows in the footsteps of both Dino and Dante. These hermeneutic maneuvers will be considered as part of that major translatio auctoritatis which was promoted by Dante, above all other Italian poets of the period, as he staked a quite self-conscious and finely calculated claim to a measure of cultural prestige for the illustrious vernacular in general and his vernacular canzoni in particular.


• Andreas Kablitz, Exegetische Praxis und Theorie der Exegese in Dantes Convivio

Ethics and Meditation

• Björn Reich, Wahrnehmung, Moral, Meditation - Überlegungen zu Dantes Convivio
• Andrea Robiglio, Bedeutung und Aspekte der Adelsfrage in Dantes Convivio
„Anerkennung“ gilt als ein Gegenstand der modernen Philosophie, der erst mit der Philosophie der deutschen Romantik (bzw. mit Fichte und Hegel) in die philosophische Debatte gelangte. Bereits eine Untersuchung der spätmittelalterlichen Diskussionen über das Thema ”Adel“ jedoch lässt die Präsenz der Anerkennungsfrage sowie verwandter Konzepte wie „Würde“, „gentilezza“, „Ehre“, und „Vertrauen“ klar erkennen. Wie Karl Vossler und Erich Köhler gezeigt haben, spielte die Adelsfrage schon bei Dantes dichterischen Vorgängern, sowohl bei den Troubadours als auch bei den Dichtern der „dolce stil nuovo“, eine große Rolle. Die Frage stand aber auch im Mittelpunkt der scholastischen Philosophie der Zeit Dantes. Der Zusammenhang zwischen der Adelsfrage und dem aristotelischen Konzept der megalopsycheia einerseits sowie den christlichen Themen der Gnade, Demut, Auserwählung und göttlicher Nobilitierung andererseits zeugt von der Bedeutung dieses Problemkomplexes. Der Vortrag versucht in das Denken des Convivio einzuführen und Dantes vielfältige Konzeption von ”Adel“ unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der philosophische Quellen vorzustellen.


• Donatella Perucchio Stocchi, "'Tu l'hai fatto di poco minore che li angeli": Nobility, Imperial Majesty, and the optimus finis in Convivio IV and Monarchia"
La nobiltà dell' intelletto umano discussa nel Convivio diventa nella Monarchia il principio di conoscenza fatto di speculazione e prassi dove l'individuale e il collettivo si intersecano nel perseguimento delle due beatitudini. Il Monarca è colui che la Divina Provvidenza ha preposto a guida del genere umano verso il perseguimento della felicità terrena ma, non meno che nelle Epistole, la Monarchia ce lo presenta come Cristomimete. Vorrei esplorare le implicazioni del fatto che Federico II, la cui autorevolezza in materia di nobiltà nel Convivio viene messa in discussione, fa a sua volta appello al Salmo citato da Dante (Cv IV xix 7, Mon I iv 2) nel Proemio del suo Liber Augustalis per stabilire la "credenziali" Cristomimetiche che anche Dante fa sue.



• Kai Nonnenmacher, ‚Se esso Adamo fu nobile’ - Nor¬mativität in Dantes Convivio