Dante Alighieri – Poet, Philosopher, Politician

Dante Alighieri towers at the beginning of Italian, even European literature. He anticipated central ideas of the Renaissance and of ecclesiastical reforms. He is best known for his great poem, the Divine Comedy. His person and his character remain, however, shrouded in mystery. We have not a single line written by his own hand, we have only few and highly sporadic historical documents. Most of what we know about his life goes back to what Dante wrote about himself. These hints are unsystematic and strongly tinged by Dante’s own attempt to portrait himself as an innocent victim. While fully appreciating Dante’s singular poetic genius, this biography casts a critical light on his political aspirations and reconsiders his philosophical works, particularly those on political and natural philosophy.

This book combines historical research, a keen eye for semantic subtleties, and investigative analysis to evaluate Dante’s works and to introduce the reader to his mental world. It establishes a revised chronology of Dante’s life and argues that today’s text of the Divine Comedy was revised and finalized after Dante’s death by his sons Pietro and Iacopo. It sheds a fresh light on some of Dante’s most enigmatic poems and on his concept of Amor and donna. Dante’s political ambitions are reconsidered, particularly how he turned from a protagonist of an autonomous city republic into a fervent supporter of emperor Henry VII and a defender of absolutist universal monarchy. Beatrice’s indictment of Dante in Earthly Paradise serves to analyze how Dante looked back on his life between 1290 and 1300.

The consistency of the narrative and the stringent argumentation make this a reliable biography of the greatest poet in Italian literature.

The author combines a lifelong study of Dante with a broad experience in history, diplomacy, creative writing and intelligence analysis.