1. Life of one poet from Florence
DANTE ALIGHIERI

2. • Why Dante? (Introduction)
• How did Dante begin
his philosophic life?
• Dante and his time
• Dante and poetical movement
• Dante as a founder of
modern Italian language
• Dante as a poet
• Divine Comedy of Dante
• Memory of Dante in Florence
OUTLINE

3. Dante Alighieri is Italy's most beloved and most
famous poet, thought of as the founder of modern
Italian language and literature.
In Italy he is known as il Sommo Poeta ("the
Supreme Poet") or just il
Poeta. He, Petrarch and Boccaccio are also known
as "the three fountains" or "the three crowns".
Dante is also called "the Father of the Italian
language".
WHY DANTE?

4. He is undoubtedly the
greatest literary expression of
the Medieval culture or
Middle Ages; moreover is
considered to be the greatest
poet ever lived. His work and
his life are high examples of
coherence, magnanimity and
greatness.
That's why Dante.

5. • Dante's engagement with philosophy cannot be
studied apart from his vocation as a writer -- as a
poet whose theme, from first to last is the
significance of his love for Beatrice, but also as
an intellectual strongly committed to raising the
level of public discourse.
• In about 1285 he married Gemma di Manetto
Donati, who gave him three children (or maybe
four, we don’t know exactly).
HOW DID DANTE BEGIN
HIS PHILOSOPHIC LIFE?

6. However, Dante had
already fallen in love with another
girl, Beatrice Portinari that is
mentioned same in "Divine
Comedy", (known also as Bice).
Years after Dante's marriage to
Gemma he met Beatrice again. He
had become interested in writing
poems.
Dante’s stories of
unrequited love are famous, as is
that young Beatrice, the girl he
falls in love with at the age of
nine. She died at the age of 24,
when Dante, in a state of
depression, then threw himself
into studying Italian philosophy
and eventually became heavily
involved in his city's politics,
though unfavorably.

7. The historical period Dante
lived in was the late Middle
Ages, especially the XIV
century. This century will see,
just after Dante, the agony
and death of the traditional
Medieval culture, that is the
one formed mainly by the
influence of the Church, the
Roman classical tradition and
the German populations.
DANTE AND HIS TIME

8. • In Italy, there was no
political union, but the
country was divided into
many different town
councils.
• The political parties were
two: the Guelfi and the
Ghibellini.
• At the beginning of the XIV
century, the Guelfi led most
of the councils in Italy.
• In Florence, the Guelfo
party split in two parts: the
whites (in favor of the
Emperor) and the blacks (
in favor of the Pope).
• Dante was a white guelfo.

9. • In this period (especially
between 1280 and 1310) a new
poetical movement was born:
the Stilnovo (the name, invented
by Dante (see Purgatorio, XXIV,
ll. 55–57) is the Italian for "new
style").
• It was really a new way to intend
and to write poetry. It was
widely diffused only in Tuscany,
especially in Florence.
• The most important Stilnovo
poet was Dante himself.
• This movement used the
poetical art only to speak about
love, to celebrate it..
DANTE AND POETICAL
MOVEMENT

10. Another important cultural debate was the one
about language to be used in literary works. It
consisted in choosing either Latin or an Italian
dialect to write the works. The Italian dialects
were various, since Italy was neither culturally nor
politically united. Dante proposed his solution to
this technical problem in the De vulgari
eloquentia.
DANTE AS A FOUNDER OF
MODERN ITALIAN LANGUAGE

11. Born around 1265 in
Florence, Dante often used
autobiographical references
in his works and so actual
streets and citizens of
medieval Florence often
feature in his greatest
works, such as The Divine
Comedy and La Vita
Nuova.
DANTE AS A POET

12. Dante Alighieri is universally known as the author of the Divine Comedy,
a poem written in terza rima in the vernacular language of his time,
divided into Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. For its grandeur of
construction, its power and variety of form, and its immense richness of
expression, the Divine Comedy is acknowledged as one of the supreme
masterpieces of world literature.
DIVINE COMEDY OF
DANTE

13. DIVINE COMEDY OF
DANTE

14. • Dante died in
Ravenna in 1320 and
is still buried there.
• Regretful, the
Florentines made an
unsuccessful attempt
in 1829 to return him
to Florence by
building a tomb for
him in the church
Santa Croce, which
remains empty.
MEMORY OF DANTE IN
FLORENCE

15. • Sasso di Dante, Piazza Duomo
The Sasso di Dante, or Dante's
stone was a favourite spot of
Dante's. Although the stone is no
longer there, there is a plaque on
the wall, that claims to be the spot
where Dante apparently sat and
wrote poems, while watching the
walls of the Duomo rise up in front
of him.
• The church of Santa Margherita
de' Cerchi.This is the very church
where the nine-year-old Dante first
saw and fell in love with Beatrice.
He was so taken by her from this
one meeting that she became his
life long muse and true love.

16. •Biography of Dante Alighieri
http://www.readprint.com/author-2/Dante-
Alighieri-books#anchor_biography
•Dante in Florence
http://www.walkaboutflorence.com/articles/dante
-florence
•Dante Alighieri
http://www.greatdante.net/life.html
REFERENCES