Dante Alighieri - biography, facts from life, photographs, background information. Dante Alighieri - Biography - life and creative path

Dante's works

DANTE Alighieri (1265-1321), Italian poet, creator of the Italian literary language. In his youth, he joined the school of “Dolce Style Nuovo”, translated as “New Sweet Style” (sonnets praising Beatrice, autobiographical story “New Life”, 1292-93, edition 1576); philosophical and political treatises (“Feast”, unfinished; “On National Speech”, 1304-07, edition 1529), “Epistle” (1304-16). The pinnacle of Dante’s work is the poem “The Divine Comedy” (1307-21, edition 1472) in 3 parts (“Hell”, “Purgatory”, “Paradise”) and 100 songs, a poetic encyclopedia of the Middle Ages. He had a great influence on the development of European culture.

DANTE Alighieri (May or June 1265, Florence - September 14, 1321, Ravenna), Italian poet, one of the greatest geniuses of world literature.

Biography

Dante's family belonged to the urban nobility of Florence. The poet's grandfather was the first to bear the family name Alighieri (in another vowel, Alagieri). Dante was educated at a municipal school, then, presumably, studied at the University of Bologna (according to even less reliable information, he also attended the University of Paris during the period of exile). He took an active part in the political life of Florence; from June 15 to August 15, 1300 he was a member of the government (he was elected to the position of prior), trying, while fulfilling the position, to prevent the aggravation of the struggle between the parties of the White and Black Guelphs (see Guelphs and Ghibellines). After an armed coup in Florence and the coming to power of the Black Guelphs, on January 27, 1302 he was sentenced to exile and deprived of civil rights; On March 10, he was sentenced to death for failing to pay a fine. The first years of Dante's exile are among the leaders of the White Guelphs, taking part in the armed and diplomatic struggle with the victorious party.

The last episode in his political biography is associated with the Italian campaign of Emperor Henry VII (1310-13), to whose efforts to establish civil peace in Italy he gave ideological support in a number of public messages and in the treatise “Monarchy”.

Dante never returned to Florence; he spent several years in Verona at the court of Can Grande della Scala, and in the last years of his life he enjoyed the hospitality of the ruler of Ravenna, Guido da Polenta. Died of malaria.

Lyrics

The bulk of Dante's lyric poems were created in the 80-90s. 13th century; with the beginning of the new century, small poetic forms gradually disappeared from his work. Dante began by imitating the most influential lyric poet of Italy at that time, Guittone d'Arezzo, but soon changed his poetics and, together with his older friend Guido Cavalcanti, became the founder of a special poetic school, which Dante himself called the school of the “sweet new style” (“Dolce Stilo Nuovo” ) Its main distinguishing feature is the utmost spiritualization of the feeling of love.

Dante, providing biographical and poetic commentary, collected poems dedicated to his beloved Beatrice Portinari into a book called “New Life” (c. 1293-95). The actual biographical outline is extremely sparse: two meetings, the first in childhood, the second in youth, marking the beginning of love, the death of Beatrice’s father, the death of Beatrice herself, the temptation of new love and overcoming it. The biography appears as a series of mental states leading to an ever more complete mastery of the meaning of the feeling that has befallen the hero: as a result, the feeling of love acquires the features and signs of religious worship.

In addition to the “New Life,” about fifty more poems by Dante have reached us: poems in the manner of the “sweet new style” (but not always addressed to Beatrice); a love cycle known as “stone” (after the name of the recipient, Donna Pietra) and characterized by an excess of sensuality; comic poetry (a poetic altercation with Forese Donati and the poem “Flower,” the attribution of which remains doubtful); a group of doctrinal poems (dedicated to the themes of nobility, generosity, justice, etc.).

Treatises

Poems of philosophical content became the subject of commentary in the unfinished treatise “The Feast” (c. 1304-07), which represents one of the first experiments in Italy in creating scientific prose in the popular language and at the same time the rationale for this attempt - a kind of educational program together with the defense of the folk language. In the unfinished Latin treatise “On Popular Eloquence,” written in the same years, an apology for the Italian language is accompanied by the theory and history of literature in it - both of which are absolute innovations. In the Latin treatise "Monarchy" (c. 1312-13), Dante (also for the first time) proclaims the principle of separation of spiritual and temporal power and insists on the complete sovereignty of the latter.

"The Divine Comedy"

Dante began working on the poem “The Divine Comedy” during the years of exile and completed it shortly before his death. Written in terzas, containing 14,233 verses, it is divided into three parts (or cantics) and one hundred cantos (each cantic has thirty-three cantos and another is the introductory one to the entire poem). It was called a comedy by the author, who proceeded from the classification of genres developed by medieval poetics. The definition of “divine” was assigned to her by her descendants.

The poem tells about Dante's journey through the kingdom of the dead: the right to see the afterlife during his lifetime is a special favor that frees him from philosophical and moral errors and entrusts him with a certain high mission. Dante, lost in the “dark forest” (which symbolizes the specific, although not directly named, sin of the author himself, and at the same time the sins of all humanity, experiencing a critical moment in its history), comes to the aid of the Roman poet Virgil (who symbolizes the human mind, unfamiliar with divine revelation) and leads him through the first two afterlife kingdoms - the kingdom of retribution and the kingdom of redemption.

Hell is a funnel-shaped hole ending in the center of the earth; it is divided into nine circles, in each of which execution is carried out on a special category of sinners (only the inhabitants of the first circle - the souls of unbaptized babies and righteous pagans - are spared from torment).

Among the souls that Dante met and entered into conversation with him, there are those familiar to him personally and others known to everyone - characters from ancient history and myths or heroes of our time. In The Divine Comedy they are not turned into direct and flat illustrations of their sins; the evil for which they are condemned is difficult to combine with their human essence, sometimes not devoid of nobility and greatness of spirit (among the most famous episodes of this kind are meetings with Paolo and Francesca in the circle of voluptuaries, with Farinata degli Uberti in the circle of heretics, with Brunetto Latini in circle of rapists, with Ulysses in the circle of deceivers, with Ugolino in the circle of traitors).

Purgatory is a huge mountain in the center of the uninhabited, ocean-occupied southern hemisphere, with ledges it is divided into seven circles, where the souls of the dead atone for the sins of pride, envy, anger, despondency, stinginess and extravagance, gluttony, and voluptuousness.

After each of the circles, one of the seven signs of sin inscribed by the gatekeeper angel is erased from the forehead of Dante (and any of the souls of purgatory) - in this part of the “Comedy” it is felt more acutely than in others that Dante’s path for himself is not only educational , but also redemptive.

At the top of the mountain, in the earthly paradise, Dante meets Beatrice (symbolizing divine revelation) and parts with Virgil; here Dante fully realizes his personal guilt and is completely cleared of it.

Together with Beatrice, he ascends to heaven, in each of the eight heavens surrounding the earth (seven planetary and eighth starry) he becomes acquainted with a certain category of blessed souls and strengthens in faith and knowledge. In the ninth, the sky of the Prime Mover, and in the Empyrean, where Beatrice is replaced by St. Bernard, he is awarded initiation into the secrets of the trinity and the incarnation.

Both plans of the poem finally come together, in one of which the path of man to truth and goodness is presented through the abyss of sin, despair and doubt, in the other - the path of history, which has approached the final frontier and is opening towards a new era. And The Divine Comedy itself, being a kind of synthesis of medieval culture, turns out to be its final work.

The Aldighieri da Fontana family. The name "Aldighieri" was transformed into "Alighieri"; This is how one of the sons of Kachchagvida was named. The son of this Alighieri, Bellincione, Dante's grandfather, expelled from Florence during the struggle between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, returned to his hometown in 1266, after the defeat of Manfred of Sicily at Benevento. Alighieri II, Dante's father, apparently did not take part in the political struggle and remained in Florence.

Dante was born on May 26, 1265 in Florence. Dante's first mentor was the then famous poet and scientist Brunetto Latini. The place where Dante studied is not known, but he gained extensive knowledge of ancient and medieval literature, the natural sciences, and was familiar with the heretical teachings of that time.

Brief chronology

• - birth of Dante
• - second meeting with Beatrice
• - death of Beatrice
• - creation of the story “New Life” (“La Vita Nuova”)
• / - the first mention of Dante as a public figure
• - Dante's marriage to Gemma Donati
• / - Prior of Florence
• - expelled from Florence
• - - "Feast"
• 1304- - treatise “On Popular Eloquence”
• 1306- - creation of the “Divine Comedy”
• - confirmation of the expulsion of Dante and his sons from Florence
• On the night of September 13 to September 14, 1321 - dies on the way to Ravenna

Essays

• - “The Divine Comedy" - (Italian: Divina Commedia):
• - “Feast” (Italian: Convivio)
• - “On popular eloquence”, treatise (dubia lat. De vulgari eloquentia libri duo )
• "Eclogues" (lat. Egloghe)
• "Epistle" (lat. Epistulae)
• "The Flower" (Italian: Il fiore)), a poem of 232 sonnets based on "The Romance of the Rose" ( Roman de la Rose) fr. 13th-century allegorical novel
• - “Monarchy”, treatise (lat. Monarchia)
• "Detto d'Amore" is a poem also based on "The Romance of the Rose" (fr. Roman de la Rose)
• “The Question of Water and Land”, treatise (dubia lat. Quaestio de aqua et de terra)
• "New Life" (Italian: Vita nuova)
• "Poems" (Italian: Rime (Canzoniere))
  • Poems of the Florentine period:
  • Sonnets
  • Canzone
  • Ballatas and stanzas
  • Poems written in exile:
  • Sonnets
  • Canzone
  • Poems about the stone lady
• Letters

Russian translations

• A. S. Norova, “Excerpt from the 3rd song of the poem Hell” (“Son of the Fatherland”, 1823, No. 30);
• his, “Predictions of D.” (from the XVII song of the poem Paradise;
• “Literary sheets”, 1824, L "IV, 175);
• his, “Count Ugodin” (“News Liter.”, 1825, book XII, June);
• "Hell", trans. from Italian F. Fan-Dim (E. V. Kologrivova; St. Petersburg. 1842-48; prose);
• "Hell", trans. from Italian the size of the original by D. Mina (M., 1856);
• D. Min, “The First Song of Purgatory” (Russian Vest., 1865, 9);
• V. A. Petrova, “The Divine Comedy” (translated with Italian terzas, St. Petersburg, 1871, 3rd ed. 1872; translated only Hell);
• D. Minaev, “The Divine Comedy” (LPts. and St. Petersburg. 1874, 1875, 1876, 1879, translated not from the original, in terzas);
• “Hell”, canto 3, trans. P. Weinberg (“Vestn. Evr.”, 1875, No. 5);
• “Paolo and Francesca” (Hell, wood. A. Orlov, “Vestn. Evr.” 1875, No. 8); “The Divine Comedy” (“Hell”, presentation by S. Zarudny, with explanations and additions, St. Petersburg, 1887);
• "Purgatory", trans. A. Solomon (“Russian Review”, 1892, in blank verse, but in the form of terza);
• Translation and retelling of Vita Nuova in the book by S., “Triumphs of a Woman” (St. Petersburg, 1892).
• Golovanov N. N. “The Divine Comedy” (1899-1902)
• M. L. Lozinsky “The Divine Comedy” (Stalin Prize)
• Ilyushin, Alexander Anatolyevich. (“The Divine Comedy”) (1995).
• Lemport Vladimir Sergeevich “The Divine Comedy.” (1996-1997)

see also

Literature

• Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: In 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional ones). - St. Petersburg. : 1890-1907.
• Barenboim P. D. “Constitutional ideas of Dante”, Legislation and Economics, No. 6, 2005, pp. 64-69

• Guenon R. Esotericism of Dante // Philosophical Sciences. - 1991. - No. 8. - P. 132-170.
• Golenishchev-Kutuzov I. N. Dante's work and world culture / Edited and with an afterword by Academician V. M. Zhirmunsky. - M.: Science, 1971.
• Dante and world literature. M., 1967.
• Dzhivelegov A.K. Dante, 1933. - 176 p. (Life of wonderful people)
• Dobrokhotov A. L. Dante Alighieri. - M.: Mysl, 1990. - 207, p. - (Thinkers of the past) ISBN 5-244-00261-9
• Elina N. G. Dante. M., 1965.
• Zaitsev B.K. Dante and his poem. M., 1922.
• Rabinovich V.L. “The Divine Comedy” and the myth of the philosopher’s stone // Dante’s readings. M., 1985.

Links

• 2011.02.09. 21-25. Russia-K. Academy-4. Academia. Mikhail Andreev. Ascent to Dante. 1 lecture
• 2011.02.10. 21-25. Russia-K. Academy-4. Academia. Mikhail Andreev. Ascent to Dante. Lecture 2
• The Divine Comedy with comments by Lozinsky and illustrations by Gustave Doré in the library mobook.ru

(estimates: 4 , average: 3,75 out of 5)

Name: Dante Alighieri

Date of Birth: 1265

Place of Birth: Florence
Date of death: 1321
A place of death: Ravenna

Biography of Dante Alighieri

Dante Alighieri is a famous literary critic, theologian and poet. He gained worldwide fame thanks to his narrative work “The Divine Comedy”. In it, the author tried to show how perishable and short-lived life is, and tried to help readers stop being afraid of death and torment in hell.

Everything that is known about Dante Alighieri today is known from his works. He was born in Italy in the city of Florence, and until his death he was devoted to his homeland.

Unfortunately, almost nothing is known about his family. Alighieri barely mentioned her in his play The Divine Comedy. His mother's name was Bella and she died very early, and that is all that is known about her. The father tied the knot for the second time and had two more children. Around 1283 the father died. He left his family a simple but very comfortable estate in Florence and a small house outside the city. During the same period, Dante married Gemma Donati.

His friend and mentor Brunetto Latini played a very important role in the life and development of Alighieri as a person. This man had enormous knowledge; he constantly quoted famous philosophers and writers. It was he who instilled in Dante a love of beauty and light.

Dante was a slightly self-confident person. At the age of eighteen, he stated that he taught himself to write poetry and now does it perfectly.

Dante Alighieri often mentioned his talented comrade Guido Cavalcanti in his works. Their friendship was very complicated. Dante even had to leave Florence with him, since Guido found himself in exile. As a result, Cavalcanti contracts malaria and dies in 1300. Dante was saddened by this event, and paid tribute to his friend by including him in his works. Thus, in the poem “New Life” Cavalcanti is mentioned many times.

Also, in this poem, Dante described his brightest and first feelings for a woman - Beatrice. Today, experts believe that this girl was Beatrice Portinari, who died very young, at 25 years old. The love of Dante and Beatrice is comparable to the feelings of Romeo and Jellyette, Tristan and Isolde.

The death of his beloved made Dante take a different look at life, and he began to study philosophy. He read Cicero a lot and thought about life and death. Also, the writer constantly visited a religious school in Florence.

In 1295, Dante became a member of the guild at a time when the struggle between the Pope and the Emperor began. The city was divided into two fronts: the “blacks” led by Corso Donati, and the “whites”, in which Alighieri was a member. It was the “whites” who won the battle and drove out the enemies. Over time, Dante became more and more against the Pope.

The “blacks” once entered the city and caused a real pogrom. Dante was repeatedly summoned to the city council, but he never appeared there. Therefore, he and several other “whites” were sentenced to death in absentia. He had to run away. As a result, he became disillusioned with politics and returned to writing.

It was during Ena, when Dante was away from his hometown, he began working on a work that brought him worldwide fame and success - the Divine Comedy.

Alighieri tried in his work to help those who are afraid of death. At that time, this was very relevant, because the souls of the people of that time were torn by the horrors of torment in hell.

Dante did not force people not to think about death, and did not claim that hell does not exist. He sincerely believed in both heaven and hell. He believed that only bright, kind feelings and courage would help him get out of hellish torment without harm.

In The Divine Comedy, Dante tells how he tried to write poetry in order to constantly reproduce in his memory the image of his beloved Beatrice through the lines. As a result, he began to understand that Beatrice did not die at all, did not disappear, because she was not subject to death, but on the contrary, she was capable of saving Dante herself. The girl shows the living Dante all the horrors of hell.

As Dante wrote, hell is not a specific place, but a state of the soul that at a certain moment can appear in a person and settle there for a long time precisely when a sin is committed.

In 1308, Henry became king of Germany. Dante again plunged headlong into politics. From 1316 to 1317 he lives in Ravenna. In 1321 he went to make peace with the Republic of St. Mark. On the way home, Dante contracted malaria and died in September 1321.

Bibliography of Dante Alighieri

Poems and treatises

• 1292 – New life
• 1304-1306 — About popular eloquence
• 1304-1307 - Feast
• 1310-1313 — Monarchy
• 1916 — Messages
• 1306-1321 —
• This is Love
• The question of water and land
• Eclogues
• Flower

Poems of the Florentine period:

• Sonnets
• Canzone
• Ballads and stanzas

Poems written in exile:

• Sonnets
• Canzone
• Poems about the stone lady

Dante Alighieri is an Italian poet and writer, theologian, and political activist. His contribution to the development of not only Italian, but also world literature is invaluable. He is the author of The Divine Comedy and the creator of the nine circles of hell, heaven and purgatory.

Childhood and youth

Dante Alighieri was born in Florence. His full name is Durante degli Alighieri. The exact date of birth of the poet is unknown; presumably, he was born between May 21 and June 1, 1265.

According to family tradition, his ancestors were from the Roman family of Elisei. They took part in the founding of Florence. His great-great-grandfather Kacciaguida was a knight under Conrad III, went with him on the Crusades and died in battle with the Muslims.

His great-great-grandmother was Aldighieri da Fontana, a woman from a wealthy family. She named her son Alighieri. Later this name turned into a well-known surname.

Dante's grandfather was expelled from Florence during the confrontation between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines. He returned to his homeland only in 1266. His father Alighieri II was far from politics, so he remained in Florence all the time.

Dante was an educated man, he had knowledge of the natural sciences and medieval literature. He also studied the heretical teachings of that era. Where he received this knowledge is unknown. But his first mentor was the then popular scientist and poet Brunetto Latini.

Literature

It is not known for certain when Dante became interested in writing, but the creation of the work “New Life” dates back to 1292. It did not include all the poems written by that time. The book alternated poetry and fragments of prose. This is a kind of confession written by Dante after the death of Beatrice. Also in “New Life” many poems were dedicated to his friend Guido Cavalcanti, by the way, also a poet. Later scholars called this book the first autobiography in the history of literature.

Like his grandfather, Dante became interested in politics at a young age. At the end of the 13th century, Florence was involved in a conflict between the Emperor and the Pope. Alighieri took the side of opponents of papal power. At first, luck “smiled” on the poet, and soon his party managed to rise above the enemy. In 1300 he was elected to the post of prior.

However, a year later the political situation changed dramatically - power passed into the hands of the Pope’s supporters. He was expelled from Florence on a fictitious bribery case. He was also accused of anti-state activities. Dante was fined 5,000 florins, his property was seized, and later a death sentence was imposed. At this time he was outside of Florence, so, having learned about this, he decided not to return to the city. So he began to live in exile.

For the rest of his life, Dante wandered around cities and countries, finding shelter in Verona, Bologna, Ravenna, and even lived in Paris. All subsequent works after “New Life” were written in exile.

In 1304, he began writing the philosophical books “The Feast” and “On Popular Eloquence.” Unfortunately, both works remained unfinished. This is due to the fact that Dante began work on his main work, The Divine Comedy.

It is noteworthy that the poet initially called his work simply “Comedy.” The word “divine” was added to the title by Giovanni Boccaccio, Alighieri’s first biographer.

It took him 15 years to write this work. Dante personified himself with the main lyrical hero. The poem is based on his journey through the afterlife, which he embarks on after the death of his beloved Beatrice.

The work consists of three parts. The first is “Hell,” consisting of nine circles, where sinners are ranked according to the severity of their fall. Dante placed political and personal enemies here. Also in “Hell” the poet left those who, as he believed, lived unchristianly and immorally.

He described “Purgatory” with seven circles that correspond to the seven deadly sins. “Paradise” is performed in nine circles, which are named after the main planets of the solar system.

This work is still shrouded in legends. For example, Boccaccio claimed that after his death, Dante's children could not find the last 13 songs of Paradise. And they discovered them only after the father himself came to his son Jacopo in a dream and told him where they were hidden.

Personal life

Dante's main muse was Beatrice Portinari. He first saw her when he was only 9 years old. Of course, at such a young age he did not realize his feelings. He met the girl only nine years later, when she had already married another man. Only then did he realize how much he loved her. Beatrice was the poet's only love for the rest of his life.

He was such a shy and self-conscious young man that during the entire time he only spoke to his lover twice. And the girl didn’t even suspect his feelings for her. On the contrary, Dante seemed arrogant to her for not talking to her.

In 1290, Beatrice died. She was only 24 years old. The exact cause of her death is unknown. According to one version, she died during childbirth, according to another, she became a victim of a plague epidemic. For Dante this was a blow. Until the end of his days, he loved only her and cherished her image.

A couple of years later he married Gemma Donati. She was the daughter of the leader of the Florentine party, Donati, with whom the Alighieri family was at enmity. Of course, it was a marriage of convenience, and most likely political. True, the couple later had three children - sons Pietro and Jacopo and daughter Antonia.

Despite this, when Dante began to create the Comedy, he thought only about Beatrice, and it was written in glorification of this girl.

Death

The last years of his life, Dante lived in Ravenna under the patronage of Guido da Polenta, he was his ambassador. One day he went to Venice to conclude a peace treaty with the Republic of St. Mark. On the way back, the poet fell ill. Dante died on the night of September 13-14, 1321. The cause of his death was malaria.

Dante Alighieri was buried in the Church of San Francesco in Ravenna, on the territory of the monastery. In 1329, the cardinal demanded that the monks commit the poet's body to public burning. How the monks were able to “extricate themselves” from this situation is unknown, but no one touched the poet’s remains.

For the 600th anniversary of the birth of Dante Alighieri, it was decided to restore the church. In 1865, builders discovered a wooden box in the wall with an inscription carved on it: “Dante’s bones were placed here by Antonio Santi in 1677.” This discovery became an international sensation. No one knew who this Antonio was, but some suggested that he might well be a relative of the artist.

Dante's remains were transferred to the poet's mausoleum in Ravenna, where they remain to this day.

Bibliography

• 1292 – “New Life”
• 1300 – “Monarchy”
• 1305 – “On popular eloquence”
• 1307 – “Feast”
• 1320 – “Eclogues”
• 1321 – “The Divine Comedy”