Metaphor in Dante / David Gibbons.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Gibbons, David, 1969-

Contributor:

University of Oxford. European Humanities Research Centre.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321--Criticism and interpretation.

Dante Alighieri.

Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321.

Criticism and interpretation.

Metaphor in literature.

Physical Description:

xi, 206 pages ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Legenda, European Humanities Research Centre, 2002.

Summary:

In the sixteenth century, when Dante's critical fortunes were at their lowest ebb, his use of metaphor was still considered remarkable enough to describe him as 'poeta metaforicissimo'. David Gibbons's book, which takes its fide from this epithet, seeks to account for the specifically Dantean nature of that genius which Aristotle said was the mark of those who used metaphor well. Probing first the relationship between theory and practice, Gibbons offers a working definition of metaphor based on those available to the poet himself, and looks at Dante's earliest metaphorical efforts in his lyric poetry. The heart of the book is an analysis of metaphor in the Paradiso, by common consent the most metaphorical poetry Dante ever wrote.

Contents:

Part I Metaphor: From Theory to Practice

1 Defining Metaphor: Problems and Issues 9

2 Metaphor in the Early Italian Lyric and Dante's Lyric Poems 21

Part II A Study of Dante's Paradiso

3 Metaphor from the Inferno and Purgatorio to the Paradiso 39

4 The Metaphorical Word 58

5 Dante's Celestial 'Grammar' of Metaphor 81

6 Metaphor and Rhyme: A Reading of Paradiso 28 99

Part III Reading Metaphor in Dante

7 Dante's Metaphors and the Model Reader 119

8 An Exegetical Response: The Trecento Commentators 134

9 A Poetic Response: Petrarch's Rerum vulgarium fragmenta 155.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

ISBN:

1900755637

OCLC:

51683392