Free Dante Alighieri by Paget Toynbee Page B

acquainted, and the early French “chantefable,”
Aucassin et Nicolete
), was no doubt borrowed from a Provençal model, the prose text being a vehicle for the introduction and interpretation of the poems. The latter, which are thirty-one in number, consisting of twenty-five sonnets (including two which are irregular), five canzoni (two of which are imperfect), and one ballata, are symmetrically arranged in groups around the three principal canzoni, the central poem of all being the canzone, “Donna pietosa e di novella etate” (
Canz.
ii.). 17
    Â Â Â Â  The work falls naturally into two main divisions, viz. the period before the death of Beatrice (1274-1290), and the period after her death (1290-
c
.1295). Taken in more detail it may conveniently be divided into five parts, 18 viz. (§§ 1-17) Dante’s youthful love for Beatrice, and his poems in praise of her physical beauty; (§§ 18-28) his praises of the spiritual beauty of Beatrice; (§§ 29-35) the death of Beatrice and the poems of lamentation ; (§§ 36-39) Dante’s love for the “donna gentile,” and the poems about her; (§§ 40-43) Dante’s return to his love for Beatrice, and reverence for her memory.
    Â Â Â Â  The division into numbered chapters was not made by Dante himself, and does not appear in any of the MSS.,nor even in the printed editions before the middle of the nineteenth century. 19 It is, however, convenient for reference, and is now generally adopted in modern editions. 20
    Â Â Â Â  Analysis of the
Vita Nuova:
—
    Â Â Â Â 
Part
I. §§ 1-17.—§ 1. (“Proemio”) Introductory, explaining the title of the book (“Incipit Vita Nova”), and the author’s purpose.—§ 2. First meeting of Dante with Beatrice (in the spring of 1274), he being nearly nine years old, and she not yet nine.—§ 3. Nine years later (in the spring of 1283), at the ninth hour of the day, Dante for the first time receives a greeting from Beatrice ; his first vision (Love appears to him holding a lady asleep in his arms, and in his hand Dante’s heart in flames, of which he gives the lady to eat, and then disappears, bearing her away with him); he describes the vision in the sonnet: “A ciascun’ alma presa, e gentil core” (
Son
. i.), which he sends to the most famous poets of the day for interpretation ; he receives a reply among others from Guido Cavalcanti.—§ 4. Dante falls ill through the intensity of his passion for Beatrice; questioned as to the object of his passion he refuses to reply.—§ 5. He dissembles his love for Beatrice under pretence of devotion to another lady.—§ 6. He composes a
serventese
containing the names of the sixty fairest ladies in Florence, amongwhich that of Beatrice will stand in no other than the ninth place.—§ 7. The lady of his pretended devotion leaves Florence; he laments her departure in a sonnet: “O voi, che per la via d’ Amor passate” (
Son
. ii).—§ 8. He writes two sonnets on the death of a beautiful damsel, a friend of Beatrice: “Piangete, amanti, poichè piange Amore” (
Son
. iii); “Morte villana, di pietà nemica” (
Son.
iv.).—§ 9. He is obliged to take a journey out of Florence in the direction taken by the lady of his pretended devotion; his second vision (Love appears to him in the guise of a pilgrim of sorrowful aspect, who calls to him and tells him that he brings back his heart from the keeping of the lady who had possessed it awhile, in order that it may be at the service of another lady; whereafter he vanishes) ; which he describes in the sonnet: “ Cavalcando l’ altr’ ier per un cammino” (
Son.
v.).—§ 10. Dante’s devotion to the second lady occasions remark, and causes Beatrice to deny him her salutation.—§ 11. He describes the marvellous effects on himself