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“Noi leggiavamo un giorno per diletto”: Reading Dante in South Africa

  • Sonia Fanucchi
  • Anita Virga

Since its conception in 2018, our Dante society has evolved to embrace a unique, South African engagement with the poet and his Commedia. This chapter provides an insight into the society’s origin and the conversations that first inspired our South African Convivio with Dante. Through a detailed description of the thinking behind the contributions of students and colleagues, we highlight the process of reading Dante as a powerful personal experience for us and our students. We argue that Dante provides us with a language through which to make sense of our vulnerable position in post-Apartheid South Africa. This is evident in the ways that student responses to Dante echo the Commedia’s Dante-Virgil dynamic - complex, and sometimes rebellious, yet always intimate and affectionate.

  • Keywords:
  • Dante in South Africa,
  • Dantessa,
  • teaching Dante,
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Sonia Fanucchi

University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa - ORCID: 0000-0001-7653-2650

Anita Virga

University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa - ORCID: 0000-0002-7600-4919

  1. Watson, Stephen. 2010. The Music on the Ice: On Writers, Writings and other things. Cape Town: Penguin Books.
PDF
  • Publication Year: 2021
  • Pages: 13-24
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2021 Author(s)

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  • Publication Year: 2021
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2021 Author(s)

Chapter Information

Chapter Title

“Noi leggiavamo un giorno per diletto”: Reading Dante in South Africa

Authors

Sonia Fanucchi, Anita Virga

Language

English

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-458-8.03

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2021

Copyright Information

© 2021 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

A South African Convivio with Dante

Book Subtitle

Born Frees’ Interpretations of the Commedia

Editors

Sonia Fanucchi, Anita Virga

Peer Reviewed

Number of Pages

212

Publication Year

2021

Copyright Information

© 2021 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-458-8

ISBN Print

978-88-5518-457-1

eISBN (pdf)

978-88-5518-458-8

Series Title

Studi e saggi

Series ISSN

2704-6478

Series E-ISSN

2704-5919

176

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