Introductory Papers on Dante
London: Methuen, 1954. First edition. Octavo, original blue cloth, gilt spine, navy top edge, original dust jacket. Slightly toned spine with closed tear, small chip to upper front panel of unclipped dust jacket. A near-fine copy. Item #1841
"WHEN ALL IS SAID AND DONE, DANTE IS NOT PRIMARILY A THEOLOGIAN, POLITICIAN, OR PHILOSOPHER; HE IS A POET"
First edition of Dorothy L. Sayers' collected lectures on Dante, demonstrating a devotion to the Supreme Poet which consumed the last years of her life. An excellent copy.
Inspired by Charles Williams, Sayers was gripped by "an iron determination to translate the Commedia into English terza-rima—a daunting task, given the scarcity of English rhymes—with an extensive theological and literary commentary." These lectures consist of an Introduction, Dante's Imagery: I. Symbolic and II. Pictorial, The Meaning of Heaven and Hell, The Meaning of Purgatory, The City of Dis, The Fourfold Interpretations of the Comedy, The Paradoxes of the Comedy. Dedicated by Sayers "To the Organisers and Students of The Summer Schools arranged by the Society for Italian Studies, who so kindly encouraged me to talk to them about Dante."
A second volume, Further Papers on Dante (1957), appeared shortly, followed by a posthumous edition of her translation of The Divine Comedy in 1962. Sayers never completed her translation but "her Hell and Purgatory, and her unfinished Paradise (completed by her god-daughter, the scholar and translator Barbara Reynolds) remain widely read more than half a century after publication" (Zaleski and Zaleski). With a short Preface by Barbara Reynolds (Cambridge/June 1953) which concludes, "Like Dante, Miss Sayers does not pull her punches." Zaleski and Zaleski, The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings.
Price: $150.00