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Search: Colloquium 30 (Spring 2020)

April 15, 2020 @ 1:00 pm - 1:50 pm

Lucia Carrying Dante in his Sleep by William Blake
Watercolor, black ink, graphite, and black chalk on off-white antique laid paper
1824-27
(H: 37.2 × W: 52.2 cm)

Blake’s watercolour illustrations were commissioned in 1824 by John Linnell, friend and patron of his last years. They were executed at a time when Dante’s masterpiece was being made more widely known through translation and critical re-evaluation. Henry Cary’s first complete translation was published in 1814 and Blake owned a copy of it. He also taught himself Italian in order to be able to read the original. In the late 18th century the sublime and terrible passages of the Inferno were illustrated and singled out for praise, however, by the 1820s a new appreciation of the beauties of Purgatory, and especially Paradise, had emerged. Blake’s originality as an illustrator of the Divine Comedy lies in his literary and visionary approach to the text. One of the ways he maintains a continuity of narrative throughout the series is by consistently showing Dante dressed in red (denoting experience) and Virgil in blue (denoting the spirit). Between 1824 and 1827, when he died, Blake completed 102 watercolours which survive in varying stages of completion. He intended to engrave the series – as Flaxman had done with his illustrations in the early 1800s – but managed to partially complete only seven plates. (From the catalog of the National Gallery of Victoria.)

Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University

Reading

Dante, Purgatorio, cantos 1-16

Topic of Discussion

As you read in the introduction to Purgatorio, Archibald MacAllister refers to a “principle of interaction between the classical and the Christian worlds” (278), which a number of you have already observed. For our discussion be prepared to identify this principle in at least three of the cantos from the reading for this colloquium. One of the examples should come from the cantos that describe “Ante-Purgatory” (1-8), and one should come from the cantos after Virgil and Dante have passed through the gate into Purgatory itself. In support of your examples, be sure to have the other relevant texts from the classical and Christian traditions at hand during our meeting.

Rubric for Colloquium

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Connecting to the Colloquium

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Quiz

Quiz 26 (Spring 2020)

Details

Date:: April 15, 2020
Time:: 1:00 pm - 1:50 pm
Event Category:: Colloquia

Venue

: Online