ZYGMUNT G. BARANSKI: "The 'Marvellous' and the 'Comic': Toward a Reading of Inferno XVI." | ![]() |
Abstract: Inferno XVI betrays a richly metaliterary character hitherto unacknowledged in the tradition of the lectura Dantis. It plays a key role in the structure of the Comedy, for it is the first canto which so insistently demands to be read, not as an autonomous unit, but as part of a broader ideological and formal framework. With Inf. XVI, Dante was intentionally forging a link between the Comedy and the multifaceted and "marvelous" nature of Geryon, and through this link, to the literary tradition as a whole. However, in order to stress the originality and range of his own poem, the Poet needed a "marvelous" being whose traditional lineaments were so vague that he could redraw them almost entirely. He did this by amplifying Geryon in such a way that, through his unique summative qualities, he would also suggest the unique nature of Dante's own text.
Abstract from the American Dante Bibliography 1990 |