The

Dante Giovanni

Studies Gentile

of

GIOVANNI GULLACE

Gentile's studies on Dante represent an important contribution to the interpretation of the poet. Yet they do not seem to occupy the place they deserve in the history of Dan te criticism. While Croce's controversial book, La poesia di Dante (1921), aroused vehement debates and polemics, Gentile's studies did not attract much notice; they are still almost completely unknown outside Italy. The main reason for this neglect lies probably in the fact that their publication was spread over a considerable period of time (from 1904 to 1939)1 and thus did not allow them to produce a real impact; another reason may be that during this time Gentile's critical attitude underwent certain changes, which concealed the essential unity of his approach. Croce's La poesia di Dante is a work of theoretical maturity, expressing in clear and articulate terms new and revolutionary views, which were bound to stir up the stagnant waters of Dante criticism. Gentile's studies, on the contrary, represent stages of his intellectual growth; they reflect the development of his philosophical and esthetic tendencies. However, they cannot be altogether disregarded, for they offer an interpretation of Dante significantly broad in scope and extremely rich in historical and ideological perspectives. Furthermore, they may well serve as a valid antidote to Croce's views, which have not always been convincing or acceptable. Dante criticism has a long history; all critical methods and orientations - the philological, historical, biographical, esthetic, stylistic, structuralistic, etc.- have been applied to the interpretation and evaluation of the poet. His philosophy, theology, science, the allegorical and anagogical sense of his work have been extensively studied. All centuries and literary J55

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fashions had their particular approach to the poet and each interpreted and judged him according to the aspirations and tastes of the times. But in this medley of ideas and judgments which have accumulated in six centuries of Dante Studies, it is still possible to discern the major stages of Dante criticism. After the studies produced through the seventeenth century, the main purpose of which had been to extricate the hidden sense of Dante's work, to elucidate the philosophical, theological, political, and moral meaning, to solve historical, biographical, and philological problems, the man who seems to have revolutionized Dante criticism was Giambattista Vico.2 His esthetic ideas mark a new orientation, moving the critical problem from erudite research and philosophical and theological exegesis to a purely esthetic interpretation. The influence of Vico's esthetics, however, did not obliterate the previous approaches; these continued on a lower scale, while the attention of the major critics was turned to the esthetic aspect of Dante's work. Vico conceived of poetry not only as different from but even antithetical to philosophy and science. And he emphatically expressed his preference for poetry, the product of the imagination of the poet rather than the display of theological or philosophical learning. Poetry is the expression of feeling in its primitive form, the powerful expression of "barbarity," of the vivid imagination which is characteristic of the infancy of humanity. Just as Homer is the expression of ancient barbarity, so is Dante the expression of a more modern barbarity that of the Middle Ages. According to Vico, if Dante had known less Latin and scholastic philosophy he would have been a greater poet, for poetry springs from imagination and passion and not from reflection on doctrinal matters. The dualism between doctrine and poetry dominated Dante criticism in the nineteenth century. De Sanctis retained the distinction between poetry and philosophy which he inherited from both Vico and Hegel. He remained, however, closer to Vico's idea of the antithetical nature of poetry and philosophy, rejecting the Hegelian conception according to which poetry, being an inferior stage of knowledge, is overcome by philosophy, which is the summit of human learning. De Sanctis, with his conception of poetry as form, did not succeed in resolving the dualism into a poetic unity encompassing the whole spirit. Croce's criticism proceeds from Vico and De Sanctis and develops around the idea of distinction between poetry and philosophy, echoed by Karl Vossler at the beginning of the twentieth century. Croce's position in relation to Dante can be thus summarized: there is in Dante the philosopher, theologian, and moralist; and there is the poet. Doctrine and poetry are not only unrelated, but one excludes the other. In the

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Divine Comedythe doctrine constitutes the structureof the poem, the "theological-politicalnovel," on which poetry flourishes episodically. We are interestedonly in poetry, doctrine being the dead part of the poem- the non-poetry. Croce seesin Dante the poet and not the teacher of theological truths. For him the primary aim of the poet is to depict worldly passions,suffering,and joy. It seems to him that Dante's main himinterestis to immersehimself in this world ratherthan to transport self seriously to the Other World. He deliberatelyoverlooks Dante's Christianfervor, the poet's faith, from which his poetry springs. Croce's criticsobserved,however, that without Dante's Christianfaith, without without the sinceredesirefor redemphis deeply religiouspreoccupation, tion, the poetry of the Divine Comedywould have been impossible. Thus, Dante's doctrine is not an accumulationof theological learning, - life- which is the subof mystical science, but a concrete experience stanceof his poetry. To speakof doctrineis for Dante to speakof living, not dead, things; it is to touch on mattersuppermostin his mind, that is, the salvationof his own soul. Not to recognize Dante's faith means simply to miss the nexus between doctrine and poetry. Croce seems to view Dante as a worldly man who describesthe other world without believing in it. In this case, Dante would speak of theology with no emotion, with no personalinterest, being moved only by the sight of human passions. Gentile, on the contrary, insists on the unity of Dante's personality. The philosopher,the theologian, the moralist,the politicianare one with Dante the poet; they form the totality of Dante'smind and experiences the whole Dante. Although in his first essays Gentile was not able to free himself completely of the distinction between philosophy and poetry which from Vico on had dominated the critics'minds,his tendency toward unity is alreadyadumbratedand it emerges more and more in his thought. clearlyas he progresses Gentile'sinterestin Dante was primarilymotivated by a strong desire to understandhis greatnessand his importance in Italian culture. His first essayon Dante, in fact, was entitled "Dante nella storiadel pensiero italiano."8 The essay attests to the dominant critical tendenciesof the time: on the one hand, the historical approach inherited from the nineteenthcentury; on the other, the emerging estheticapproachadvocated by Croce. Gentile had studied under the eminent scholar AlessandroD'Ancona at the University of Pisa and had not completely forgotten the latter's teachings concerning the value of historical and biographicalresearchin the interpretationof writers and their works.4 But he could not disregard the creative spirit which transformsand 157

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shapes, through its inner processes, the world of the poet into a work of art. The historical method of D'Ancona is here combined with esthetic ideas coming from Hegel and Croce. Gentile is indebted to Hegel for the latter's conception of art as an activity which does not reach the systematic form of thought but remains as a sensible symbol of that thought; he is indebted to Croce for the distinction between philosophy and poetry and for the lyrical character of poetry. Gentile, however, from his very first essay voices the exigency of giving to art a more comprehensive meaning, encompassing the whole life of the spirit.5 The result is a sort of intellectual biography with occasional insights into the creative processes of the artist. Facts are ascertained, historical circumstances evaluated, cultural elements and particular modes of thinking analyzed, in order to understand the origin and the formation of Dante's work and to grasp his poetic spirit. Dante is, in Gentile's views, the expression of the cultural tradition which converges in him and gives birth to the "divine poem": "The double movement AristotelianThomistic and the Franciscan leads to Dante" (Studi su Dante, p. 3). The poetry of the Divine Comedy cannot be felt and appreciated without a clear understanding of the cultural forces (historical, philosophical, political, etc.) which formed the mind of the poet. Thus, Gentile's intent is to determine and elucidate the historical and ideological or doctrinal elements which contribute to the formation of Dante's personality and the creation of his works. Exegetical work on the cultural sources of Dante becomes for Gentile something of primary importance. Without this work, a purely esthetic interpretation would be impossible. Gentile explains Dante as a "moment" of western philosophical thought. With Dante the first period of western thought comes to a close: "Dopo Dante s'inizia una direzione nuova del pensiero che metter capo all'assoluta negazione d'ogni trascendenza: s'inizia la filosofia moderna" (p. 43). Dante, in Gentile's interpretation, is a "razionalista alla maniera di S. Tommaso," but he ends in the "misticismo di S. Bonaventura" (p. 42). Thomistic rationalism and Franciscan mysticism are the forces which operate in the construction of the Divine Comedy. Without St. Thomas, the immediate predecessor of Dante, the poem would have been impossible. But the ratiocinative spirit of Thomistic theology, though illuminated by faith, cannot bring Dante to God. He needs the mystical ascension which does not come from reason but from love. The disappearance of Beatrice and the appearance of St. Bernard link Dante, indirectly, to Franciscan mysticism. But, in his political conception, Dante goes beyond St. Thomas and scholasticism: "Dal rispetto ideale, la Monarchicirappresenta un passo

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notevolissimo oltre la Commedia. In politica Dante si affranca da ogni sovrannaturalismo; e dentro alla forma medievale del suo trattato lecito scorgere uno spirito nuovo, che lo spirito dell'umanismo, dell'uomo studiato e spiegato nella natura umana e con la natura umana. La Monarchici il primo atto di ribellione alla trascendenza scolastica" (p. 50). The earthly paradise of the Monarchia is a product of reason, of a Virgil who does not need Beatrice: "L'indipendenza dell'imperatore, o in altri termini l'assolutezza dello Stato, la stessa indipendenza della ragione verso la rivelazione, l'assolutezza della ragione. Di certo, Dante in questo punto si lascia indietro d'un gran tratto la filosofia scolastica" (p. 51). On the whole, Gentile's essay is exegetical in nature. The author explains the theological meaning of the poem, the nexus between reason and faith, philosophy and theology. The anagogie structure of the poem is traced and its symbols interpreted. Gentile's accurate research allows him to evaluate the sources and to point out discrepancies. The study of the poem's antecedents and Dante's spiritual journey is often permeated by nationalistic feelings. Dante was the poet of the Italy still to be; he was the expression of the moral forces which were to serve as examples to the Italian people. Gentile's interpretation is in part anchored to the tradition of the men of the Risorgimento who saw in Dante, among other things, the first prophet of Italian unity. Dante was a great poet because he was a great man, poetry and moral life being inseparable in a true genius. While St. Thomas had written in Latin, addressing himself to the learned men of Europe, Dante wrote primarily in Italian, addressing himself to the inhabitants of the peninsula. His love for the vernacular in which he chose to express himself is the mark of his Italian spirit. By writing in Italian he gave to learning an Italian soul. "Con Dante," says Gentile, "comincia ad affermarsi idealmente l'Italia; col suo Poema, la filosofia italiana" (p. 19). But the language is not the only factor making the poem an Italian work; there are in it the profound signs of the Italian character which led every epoch to point to Dante as the spiritual father of the Italian nation: "Dante rimarr, per secoli, il maestro della libert all'Italia, schiava politicamente e moralmente per colpa di quei papi, che Dante ha saettati coi fulmini dello sdegno, che solo la sua coscienza poteva provare" (p. 20). All of Dante's philosophy, seen from a purely historical point of view, "ha un nesso con la particolare istoria d'Italia, e un significato nazionale" (p- 21). But if Gentile's method is mainly historical, aimed at interpreting the meaning of Dante in relation to medieval culture and, in general, 159

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to the history of ideas, and at showing his greatness and his significance for the Italian nation, an attempt is also made to study the poet and the relation between his philosophy and his poetry. Here Gentile is clearly indebted to Vico, Hegel, and Croce, for whom philosophy and poetry are two dissimilar activities of the mind. Gentile views Dante as a teacher of truth and not as a pure poet. Dante's goal is to teach. With his profound knowledge of ancient and medieval learning, he aims at a role higher than that of the poet of human passions: his work must be one of high learning. Poetry is for him the dress, the ornament of truth: its substance must be philosophy. Poetry is an instrument for absolute knowledge. But why did Dante not write a Summa Theologicainstead of a poem? Because Dante had a poetic soul and he could not divest himself of the powerful urge to write according to the inspiration of his heart. He was a poet as well as a philosopher who had long meditated on the problem of the universe, and his poem is a work of doctrine as well as poetry: opera filosofica oltre che poetica, allo stesso titolo di La Divina Commedia tutti i poemi filosofici antichi della Greciae di Roma. Giacchin essail concetto generaledell'universonon un presuppostodella visione poetica nell'anima del poeta, ma l'essenza stessa della trama generale dell'opera. In Dante la filosofia non il particolaree l'accessorio;ma il generale,l'insieme,il principale. La poesia piuttosto nei particolari. E questa la differenzatra lui e i puri poeti; ciascuno dei quali ha di solito una filosofia, ma come antecedente dell'opera sua, latente, ispiratriceinconsapevole. Il critico potr scoprircela; ma il poeta l'ha obliata. Dante, invece, non dimentica mai il suo concetto, che adombra s del velo dell'allegoria,ma senza nasconderlon a s n al suo lettore; e a questo concetto ha fisso sempre lo sguardo; che, se a tratti la passionelo vince, e vive con le creaturevive della sua fantasiala vita irriflessa del mondo, su cui il filosofo medita, il fine generale del poema subito lo scote e richiama a quel concetto, e lo incalza a proseguire la ideale costruzione sopramondana,che conduce l'uomo dalla oscuraselva terrena,in cui si ritrova nel mezzo del cammin della vita, alla grandeluce del pensiero di Dio (p. 3). The Divine Comedy has the form of a vision, but it is a meditation in which the poet unfolds and clarifies the sense of life. One cannot say that philosophy hinders poetry, for the first and the last word of the poem are the point of departure (man's conscience entangled in the world of passions) and the point of arrival (the light of God) of a process the philosophical process of the spirit whose progression, though marked by reflective steps, cannot entirely suppress passions. In the world of eternal justice and truth Dante is unable to free himself of the memory of terrestrial things. Gentile seems here to be striving to overcome a sort of unconscious
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Hegelianism according to which poetry is an inferior and imperfect phase of knowledge as compared to philosophy. Dante, Gentile maintains, " poeta per non poter essere interamente quel che si era proposto di essere: maestro di verit" (p. 5). When necessary, he sacrifices even his art to truth: "La dottrina ascosa sotto il velame dei versi strani , per lui, l'essenziale dell'opera sua; e quando bisogna rompere il velame, ei non esita un istante a metter nei versi la sua scienza prosaica" (p. 5). Dante is a greater poet than philosopher in the Divine Comedy, but he meant to be a greater philosopher than poet. Philosophy and science, in fact, became his great ambition after the death of Beatrice, for whom he had written his love poems. This is shown in the Convivio: from pure poetry Dante turns to science and philosophy. Love poetry appears to him to be unbecoming to his age, knowledge, and fame. "Dante non sdegner certo la poesia: ma la sua sar la poesia grave di ammaestramento e di verit, la poesia di Virgilio. Insomma - secondo la mente di Dante - egli potr ancora servirsi della poesia, ma per insegnare il vero; la poesia potr essere la veste; ma la sostanza dovr essere la filosofia" (p. 10). The Divine Comedy was meant to be, primarily, a philosophical system, but Dante could not divest himself completely of the human and the temporal. He could not always reach the world of pure truth toward which he strove. Often his effort to overcome the world of human passions proved to be vain and he dwelt in the domain of poetry. Gentile tries to present Dante as a complete personality in which at times the poet prevails, at other times, the philosopher. The philosopher predominates when the subjectivity of the writer overcomes itself and acquires rational life, self-consciousness; the poet, when subjectivity remains below that high rationality which constitutes philosophy. Although Gentile retains Croce's distinction between poetry and philosophy, he seems to undermine precisely what Croce considers to be the greatest glory of Dante - his poetry. Dante, in Gentile's view, is a poet when he is unable to be a philosopher, a teacher of truth, as he intended to be. Although at the time of the composition of this first essay on Dante Gentile's philosophical and esthetic thought has not yet taken any particular shape, the general tendency of his mind begins to emerge and it can be seen more clearly a few years later when he returns to Dante on the occasion of the publication of Karl Vossler's Die GottlicheKomodie (Vol. i, 1907; Vol. n, 1908-1910). The fundamental nature of Gentile's thought reflects a need to unify all distinctions into the oneness of the spirit. In reviewing Vossler's work (Vol. I in 1908 and 1909; Vol. n in 1912) he insists more emphatically on the inseparability of philosophy
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and poetry and on the necessity of viewing Dante not as a theologian, a philosopher, a moralist, and a poet separately, but as a complete personality in which all these distinct aspects are fused in the unity of the whole man. For the real is only in the synthesis and not in the parts, which are abstract elements of it. The general direction in which Gentile's criticism develops is that of a unified vision of Dante's world. Therefore, through the various essays on the poet, one may follow Gentile's tendency toward a unified interpretation in which the particular acquires reality only in the synthesis. On the other hand, Gentile does not break away from the historical and biographical approach entirely; he utilizes all the fruitful suggestions derived from exegetical works, incorporating them into his own method. Nor does he reject altogether ideas coming from Croce's esthetics. However, after his first essays, his critical orientation moves gradually toward an interpretation in which all distinctions disappear in the unity of the spirit (in accordance with his philosophy). Gentile praises Vossler for his brilliant presentation of the religious and philosophical genesis of the Divine Comedy and for his relentless effort to grasp Dante's spirit and personality through the religious symbols and the philosophical knowledge of earliest antiquity. But he strongly disapproves of the German critic's marked distinction between rationality and religiosity, philosophy and mysticism, which break the speculative unity of Dante's spirit. Since in Vossler's interpretation the duality of the philosopher and the mystic is brought to unity by the poet, Gentile considers this solution purely external and therefore unacceptable, for it is achieved through a tertium quid (poetry) instead of being intrinsic in the dialectical process. In the concreteness of Dante's spirit everything is unified; religion is philosophy and philosophy is art, an art which fuses in the fire of imagination the vision of the universe, nature, and man- man with all of his vital passions, from sensual love to divine love, and with all forms of knowledge, from the description of things sensible to the speculation of transcendental reality. Vossler, in tracing the prehistory of the Divine Comedy, the religious and philosophical antecedents from which the poem springs, treated religion and philosophy as two historical entities in the spirit of Dante entities unified by art. For Gentile, on the contrary, science and faith, philosophy and religion are only abstractions in their separation; they are not historical realities. The only reality is the synthesis of these abstract elements, which is immanent in them. Dante's Divine Comedy is, indeed, the result of the religious and philosophical movement preceding it, and in order to trace its genesis and its growth one must start with the poem, where
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all the contraditions find harmony, and from there reconstruct Dante's spirit a reconstruction a posteriori. No one could understand Dante without studying the cultural antecedents of his work. But Gentile, while stressing the importance of such studies for the comprehension of the poem as a whole, objects to Vossler's separate treatment of the religious and the philosophical geneses. In reviewing Vossler's second volume of Die GottlicheKomodie,Gentile clarifies his position further. The first volume had dealt with the intellectual prehistory of the Divine Comedy; the second dealt specifically with the esthetic spirit which shaped the vast matter of the poem. Vossler's esthetic approach, Gentile maintains, while resuming the tradition established by De Sanctis, repeats the very same mistakes of the great Italian critic, for it assigns a higher esthetic value to the parts of the poem which display a greater freedom of imagination and regards the doctrinal elements as disrupting the flow of Dante's creative spirit. The whole technical mechanism of the stage on which the poet places his creatures, all the scientific parts, thus become the lifeless elements of the Divine Comedy. If this were to be the principle for the interpretation and evaluation of poetry, argues Gentile, a good part of the poem would be obliterated. How can one draw a precise line between the real creatures of Dante's imagination, living their own life, and the shadows of theological and philosophical concepts? . . .Non possibile dire dove finisca la fede, la teologia, la scienza, il senso figurato, l'opera dell'intelletto, e dove cominci la vita, la passione, l'impeto vivo della personalit,il concreto della realt: per la semplicissima ragione che tutto ci nella fantasiadi Dante fuso in una sola vita; e anche qui la luce gioia e vita in quanto rompe le tenebre, e la vita vita in quanto trionfa della morte: e i due termini hanno la loro realtnella loro inscuidibileunit (p. 119). Gentile takes issue even with De Sanctis' view according to which the Infernohas a minimum of philosophy and consequently a maximum of poetry, and the Paradisohas a minimum of poetry and a maximum of philosophy. De Sanctis wrote: Gli come un andaredall'individuo alla specie e dalla specie al genere. Pi ci avanziamo, e pi l'individuo si scarna e si generalizza. Questa certo perfezione cristiana, morale; ma non perfezione artistica.. . Innanzialla porta del Purgatorio scompareil diavolo e muore la carne, e con la carne gran parte di poesia se ne va (p. 115). In the Paradisoone witnesses the ultimate dissolution of form; imagination becomes a feeble light which soon dies. De Sanctis, in Gentile's opinion, missed the high poetry that Dante infused in the intellectual elements of the work. Life or the flesh does

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not go with the devil, because life is not only the tumult of passions portrayed in the Inferno, but it is also contemplation artistic, philo- which the ideal of the Purgatorio represents; nor is sophical, religious the asceticism or mysticism of the Paradiso an abstract doctrine; it is an essential aspect of human life. Dante's poem, Gentile reiterates, must be viewed in its intrinsic unity. There is no work of art, and there never can be, that is free of intellectual elements. However, these intellectual elements must not be valued as such for their objective truth, but rather for the lyrical inspiration of the artist. The question, then, is whether Dante permeates with his lyricism the theological and philosophical concepts which he advocates as a poet-philosopher in his Divine Comedy, whether these concepts are deeply felt by the poet. One cannot detach the Inferno from the other cantiche, nor can one separate the passional center of Dante's being from the world of his scholastic culture, which is the very essense of his personality. Every dissection of his work is a mutilation^ it destroys the life of the spirit which is unity. Gentile defends Dante's allegory against Vossler, who considers the most successful parts of the Divine Comedy to be those where the poet frees himself of the allegorical style of the Middle Ages. Dante's allegory is for Gentile the very poetic language of Dante, the expression of his spirit. Allegory is an esthetic error, a disruption of the poetic intuition, only when it is mechanically superimposed on the creative process, thus remaining outside its object. This is not the case in the Divine Comedy, where allegory is not an intruder but a precondition of art, a constituent element of the mind of the artist, his very language. Gentile's main objections to Vossler's work were indicative of a marked tendency to fight distinctions in order to achieve the absolute unity of the spirit, which was the major concern of his budding neoidealism: . . . Non possiamo parlare di Omero poeta e di Piatone filosofo senza un concetto del poeta e del filosofo, e cio della poesia e della filosofia: le quali, come funzioni dello spirito, trascendono la storia, che la concretezza stessa della realt spirituale. E soltanto alla poesia e alla filosofia come funzioni trascendentalidello spirito si possono assegnare caratteri distinti, dei quali quello che della poesia in quanto tale non sardella filosofia, e per converso. Nella storiatutte le funzioni concorrono in un'unitconcreta,in cui il poeta, essendo anche filosofo, partecipadel caratteredello spirito che filosofia; e il filosofo, essendo pure poeta, partecipadel caratteredello spirito che la poesia, sempre. E la rigida e salda distinzione delle funzioni astrattecede il luogo alla plasticae mobile distinzionedella storia,che fa essastessala divisione dei grandi spiriti nelle due schiere dei poeti e dei filosofi, secondo che negli uni prevale il momento poetico e negli altriil momento filosofia).*

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This passage, written in 1911 in reference to Leopardi (who next to Dante was Gentile's favorite author, being, like Dante, a philosopherpoet), clearly foreshadows Gentile's actualistic conception of art which fuses poetry and philosophy in the unity and actuality of the spirit. Although Gentile still keeps a theoretic distinction between the poetic temperament and the philosophical mind, he strives toward a unity in which the components are abstract positions acquiring reality in their synthesis. The article "La Profezia di Dante" (written in 1918), while moving into Dante's political world, follows the same tendency: Gentile never loses sight of the unity of the poet's spirit, a totality of intellectual and practical experiences. The poetry of the Divine Comedy could not be understood without knowing Dante's political ideas and aspirations, his concept of the world political organization, which is so closely related to his theological views. Dante the political exile, the advocate of an independent world monarchy, that is, a power coordinated and not subordinated to the papacy, is one with the poet. Dante's political passion finds eloquent and highly poetic accents in his works. It was quite natural that Gentile would not confine his interest to the pott per se, but would inquire into Dante's political world in order to grasp his whole personality, which was that of a poet-seer. Gentile's presentation of Dante's political ideal, of the poet's hopes in Henry VII to restore freedom and justice in Italy, of his harsh criticism of Florence and the papacy for their hostility to the emperor, leads us to Dante the poet and the prophet: "Profeta del rinnovamento della civilt mediante la riforma della Chiesa," a reformation which edifies human life (Studi su Dante, 170). This is the reason for the universality of Dante and his fame in the world. This fame is not due to "the excellence" of his poetry alone: . . .Voglio dire di quello che per poesia si suole intendere, mettendo insieme e il Goethe, in una stessaschieraDante e il Petrarca,l'Ariosto e lo Shakespeare o qual altro pi insigne creatoredi vivi fantasmisia nei fasti dell'umanagrandezza. Ogni poeta universale,e parla eterno al cuore di tutti. Ma l'universalit di Dante un'universalitsuperiore a quella propria d'ogni poeta; e se mi fosse lecito di definire il mio concetto con una formula filosofica, direi che laddove l'universalitdel poeta concerne la forma dello spirito che si attua nella poesia, quella di Dante investe anche il contenuto (p. 167). His poetry was all that Dante thought and felt, all that he believed in and hoped for: "Dante poeta s, ma in quanto profeta," for he aspires to something higher than "pure" art, to something which, while it is still art, is primarily thought and knowledge (p. 169). In discussing Dante's ideas concerning the relation between Church i65

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and State and the particular role of each in working toward the common goal of humanity, both temporal and eternal, Gentile links Dante to the aspirations of our own time. Dante's ideal was, in Gentile's opinion, our own ideal: "L'idea per cui lottiamo, per cui diamo anche la vita, torcendo lo sguardo dai difetti degli istituti e degli uomini in cui essa s'incarna" (p. 172). This was Dante's prophecy: "Uno Stato intimamente religioso perch libero dalla Chiesa, indipendente, potenza illimitata: e per una Chiesa povera, spirituale, alimentatrice di quella vita etica, che nello Stato trova la sua attualit e la sua tutela" (p. 173). Although Gentile cannot easily dismiss Croce's view that the poem is philosophy in its general structure and poetry in some of its episodes, he strongly objects to Croce's distinctions. According to Croce, the theological-political novel and poetry are two distinct things, and where philosophy prevails poetry vanishes. Gentile maintains, on the contrary, that poetry is philosophy itself colored by a particular feeling, that feeling which constitutes the subjectivity of the writer. Philosophy is the subject matter which the poet uses to build his own world. There is no Dante the poet or Dante the philosopher, but Dante the poet-philosopher, poetry and philosophy constituting the substance of Dante's mind in its actual unity. Dante's poetry is immanent in his philosophy; it is not sheer imagination, but imagination fostered by thinking. It is in fact a philosophical concept, a new vision of the world that gives fire to his poetical creativeness and urges him on in his journey. Gentile's article, "La Filosofia di Dante" (1921), attests more clearly than his earlier writings his "actualistic" interpretation of the poet. Previously he seems to emphasize Dante's thought, the vast doctrine and the universal truths which form the architecture of the poem; in this essay, while discussing the meaning of Dante's philosophical thought again, he stresses the subjective element animating the poet's thought and doctrine, insisting vigorously on the unity of poetry and philosophy. Thought and feeling cannot be separated. The thought of a poet, in fact, can only be reached through the subjective element which allows us to penetrate to the source of that immortal life which is poetry, the poetry in which thought assumed its form. Philosophy constitutes the personality and the center from which all passions irradiate to the vast world of the poem. Gentile points out that there are two methods of interpreting a writer: the classical, dwelling on doctrinal content objectively conceived, and, by antitheses, the romantic, which in the interpretation of a work of art concerns itself with "the subjective element expressive of the personality of the writer." The classical method, by disregarding the subjec-

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tivity of the writer, does not go beyond the exposition of an objective content; the romantic method reaches the feeling animating the writer's thought. Every philosopher has his poetry, and every poet his philosophy: there is no poetry without philosophy, nor is there philosophy without poetry. The philosophy of a poet is his poetry. The thought of a poet can never be understood outside the subjective element which transforms it into poetry. The classical method was adopted when art was conceived as content. Now we know that art is form, not abstract form, but the form of a content, an intrinsic unity. Dante, explained by the classical method, is a very humble scholastic. But the real Dante is the one who infuses all of his passion into his scholasticism. Scholastic philosophy is the material used by the imagination of the poet to build his own world, to throw into it his creatures, and into his creatures his own soul. His philosophy cannot be understood outside the subjectivity permeating it. Dante, therefore, cannot be explained by the classical method, which dwells on a world already formed. For Dante the poet the concept of being is only part of a more profound concept: "del concetto, che lo spirito umano non ha fuori di s, gi attuato, il suo mondo; ma deve produrlo egli stesso, faticando, durando nelle battaglie, con cui destinato a vincer tutto" (p. 210). This faith is the fire in which Dante fuses the immense matter he gathered from life and history in order to shape his prophecy. Here again Gentile upholds the esthetic nature of Dante's allegory this time against Croce's controversial book, La poesia di Dante (1921), which radically rejects the allegorical mode. In an article of 1920 Gentile had written in reference to Dante: "L'arte non si pu giustificare se non per l'allegoria: in quanto deve servire non all'espressione del sentimento, che l'individualit dell'artista, ma alla rappresentazione attraente di quella stessa verit che forma il valore della religione e della filosofia."7 And he further added: "E appunto perch l'arte trae il suo valore dal sapere, la poesia allegorica; ed essa che per sua natura la pi libera espressione, anzi celebrazione della libert dello spirito nella sua individualit, si sommerge nell'universalit di un sapere, che all'uomo s'impone, o si comunica, con la legge che egli osserva perch non egli la promulga."8 For Croce, on the contrary, allegory is not a poetic expression; the allegorical language is absolutely alien to poetry, for it has no relation to the esthetic intuition. Allegory is a sort of convention whereby the writer arbitrarily decides that a certain character, word, fact, or object, stands for something to which it is not intrinsically related. This "crytography" is completely unintelligible unless the writer himself provides the key. Croce points out the inanity of critical works aimed i67

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at solving riddles and the tendency of some critics to multiply these riddlesby seeing in the Divine Comedy something other than the poem. a a the is decision of will, and thereforea hindrance act, Allegory practical to poetry. When a writer sets up in advancean allegoricalscheme, one or two things can result: either his intentions disappearin the flow of his imaginative, process,and thus there will be no allegory but the poetic image; or his allegorical intentions remain as a mechanical addition completely extrinsicto the intuitive process,in which case there will be allegory but no poetry. Allegory is either identifiedwith poetry or it is alien to poetry. "Allegoria e poesia," wrote Croce later, "sono come l'acqua e Folio, due atti mentali radicalmentediversi e non unificabili tra loro."9 For Gentile, on the contrary, Dante's allegory is the embodiment of his scholasticphilosophy; it is an imaginative transfigurationof philosophicalreasoning,a form of poetic languageinherentin the whole architecture of the poem. Dante's philosophy, expressedby symbols, is the very substanceof his poetry. Without those symbols, which are part of his language,Dante would not have been able to arriveat his concepts. His entireworld is but his philosophy expressedin allegoricalform. The artist thinks and actualizeshis world through the technical means at his disposal. Allegory is an expressiveword, a symbol, which represents the object more effectively. It is impossible to understandDante's from the allegoricalelements. Thus thought and poetry when separated Gentilejustifiesthe exegeticalwork aimed at clarifyingDante's symbols. Because of his mental habits, the poet could not have presentedthings differently,since allegory was for him a spontaneousway of conceiving and expressing.Allegory, like any other form or figure through which imagination presentsits object, is estheticallylegitimate, provided that (and here Gentile repeatsthe observationmade in referenceto Vossler) it observesthe essential law of form which is for allegory to be the very living form of the subject itself and never to remain outside its object.10 Croce would certainly agree with this; he would, however, reiterate that when allegory is "the very living form of the subject itself" there is no longer allegory but the poetic image. For allegory is comments Croce, something other than poetry: "Legge dell'allegoria," " proprio di 'restarefuori del suo obbietto,' ossia di essereun secondoe perci estraneosenso: 'allegoria,'insomma, e non gi 'una forma come un'altradella fantasia,'perch, se cos fosse, non sarebbenata questione alcunaparticolareintorno ad essa."11 Croce's criticismof Gentile'sconception of allegory is directedat the whole of Gentile's philosophy. Actual idealism posits logical thought 168

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as the only reality, dissolving imagination, will and morality, esthetics, economics and ethics into the form of logical thought. The consequences of this is panlogism, which suppresses all logical distinctions. Panlogism is blind to what makes poetry poetry, and practical activity practical activity: Si osservino, per esempio, i lavori del Gentile sul Leopardio su Dante: nelle Morali del Leopardi egli non s'interessaa ci che interessalo spirito Operette non vi percepisceil travaglio di una poesia ora in abbozzo ora raffredpoetico, data in forme improprie e raziocinative, ma s'industriaa scoprirvi il disegno dell'esposizione didascalica di un concetto filosofico; e, in Dante, vede il filosofo e il profeta e non il poeta, e l'allegorismoche convenzione e intellettualismo. . .toglie in iscambio con una forma poetica di espressione.12 Gentile, on the other hand, levels his major attacks at Croce's distinction between thought and poetry in the Divine Comedy and his complete devaluation of Dante's doctrine, which constitutes the structure of the poem. Unable to deny that there is a philosophy in the Divine Comedy, the critics of the "fragment" (Croce), Gentile argues, assert that it is necessary to distinguish between poetry and philosophy, spontaneous creation and philosophical concepts, and conclude that where the philosopher looms, the poet vanishes. The esthetics of form, he continues, does not consider an abstract form, separated from its content, but a form in which all the content of the work of art is fused. The world that the poet saw cannot be put aside as alien to the development of the process in which esthetic creation consists. The content embodies the personality of the poet, the vibrations of his soul from which the content receives life. The subject matter of art, abstractly conceived, comprises all the experiences accumulated in the human spirit throughout the centuries, including philosophical experiences; but this matter becomes poetry insofar as it is transformed into concrete life in the mind of the poet. Nor can any part of the Divine Comedy be detached as non-poetic in itself. Any matter in itself is outside poetry, being outside the spirit and therefore outside reality. Nor can poetry be anything outside Dante's philosophy, his political and religious thought. His philosophy is a dream, a vision, passion, and it cannot be understood outside the self which dreams and feels. Dante gathered from the schools of his time the matter of his thought, but he impressed upon it the seal of his powerful individuality, thus transforming philosophy into living thought poetry. Dante's personality as interpreted by Gentile is that of the poet-seer. Gentile celebrates in him the prophet, the philosopher, the moralist, the man of action, rather than the poet per se. He seems to see the poet in

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the wholeness of all of his activities- intellective and practical. The poet is the passion and the soul which animate Dante's thought and actions. He is a poet insofar as he is a thinker, his poetry being his prophecy. Gentile's last essay on Dante, "II Canto di Sordello" (1939), represents a radical departure from Hegelian or Crocean formulas. He emphasizes the arbitrariness of seeking the philosopher as distinct from the poet, or philosophy as distinct from poetry, pointing out always the intrinsic unity of the work of art. In reconstructing the episode of Dante's and Virgil's meeting with Sordello, Gentile cannot refrain from levelling his attacks against quei critici, che a furia di analisi smontano l'organismo poetico, e finiscono col trovarsi in mano tanti pezzi eterogeni: parte prosaici, artificiosi e morti, e parte membra vive o che paion tali, ancor capaci di movimento e di resistere con la loro indistruttibilevitalit poetica a ogni violenza di anatomia.18 Gentile here takes issue with Croce's conception of poetry as a lyrical fragment, since for Gentile poetry is not to be found in lines or passages, but in the whole of a work. The meaning and relevance of a line or a passage result from the context to which they belong, and they acquire value in the complex organism of which they are a part. Each word has an accent in which its individuality lies; and this accent cannot be felt outside the rhythm of the whole. It is absurd to try to isolate a word or a phrase from it. There is general agreement that Canto vi of the Purgatorio contains a highly poetic moment. It occurs when Sordello, who stands aside and alone, proud and disdainful, without uttering a word, suddenly springs to his feet at the sound of the name of his birthplace mentioned by Virgil. "O Mantuan, 1 am Sordello, from your own land!" cried out the solitary soul, embracing the Latin poet without even knowing who he was. In this touching scene there is the whole of Sordello, the whole of his personality and his inner world; it is a Sordello who remains unforgettable. The scene prompts Dante's well-known invective against Italy torn by dissension and anarchy. While these two noble souls in purgatory feel united by the love of their city, the Italians cannot live without war against one another even within the walls of the same city. But according to Croce, the invective against Italy is a piece of oratory and not poetry. From the tone of deep and serene humanity, from the pinnacle of poetry, Croce argues, Dante descends to a bitter political diatribe against the perversity of the Italian people and the indifference of their leaders:
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L'invettiva all'Italiaprorompe improvvisa ed una vera disgressione(come il poeta stesso, del resto, la chiama), troppo lunga ed elaborata per adagiarsi spontaneain quella situazione,che solo ne comporterebbele prime tre terzine: Dante declama un intero pezzo oratorio, con partizioni, trapassi,esclamazioni, esortazioni,ironie, sarcasmi,come chi preso bens dal furore della passione, ma non dimentica nulla di quanto gli sta a cuore di dire per l'effetto politico che si propone di conseguire.14 Poetry has here vanished to reappear when Dante, "rendendo vano l'udire di cose politiche, distornandosi dai discorsi di Sordello, s'immerge nella scena che gli si forma attorno."16 Gentile, on the contrary, considers Dante's outburst as reflecting the feeling of the poet, the patriot, the citizen the whole of Dante. Therefore, the so-called oratorical digression is an integral part of the whole, for it throws light, by contrast, on the poetic figure of Sordello as imagined by Dante: I soliti critici armati di coltello anatomico, vi diranno che la "digressione" un pezzo oratorio: un pezzo che l'uomo praticoinserisceper la sua polemica e propaganda politica nell'organismo vivo della sua poesia; e s'intende che avrebbe fatto meglio ad astenersene,perch, si sa, dove entra la pratica, un interesseo movente della vita reale in cui l'uomo opera, la poesia ita. Tutto vero, ma in astratto. In concreto, nulla per se stessoimpoetico e refrattarioal soffio animatoredell'arte. Convien vedere se la praticarestagrezza e massiccia pratica,o se essasi fonde al fuoco della inspirazionepoetica.1* The "digression" is, to Gentile's mind, the expression of the feeling and the judgment of the poet; and it is essential to the whole episode. The contrast between the tender scene the poet had just seen and the bloody conflicts ravaging Italy at the time was too striking to leave him indifferent and silent. His political ideal and the tragic reality of political events are a part of the very drama of his own life. His aversion to the political situation gives the figure of Sordello an extraordinary magnitude. It is not the case, argues Gentile, to speak of oratory, but of a picture in which the artist, in order to throw a vivid light on the figure he intends to bring out, had to give it a somber and frightening background. When we read the digression with the tone required by its true meaning, it does not tolerate any oratorical emphasis, but only the passion which is in the words of the poet, the passion which was in his soul as citizen and artist, engaged both in action and poetic creation. In the passage, Dante's imagination fuses all of his political passions in order to enlighten his social conduct with the ideals of his spirit of refined poet and thinker. Gentile's aim in literary criticism is to explain the works through the study of the author's thought and actions; he seldom judges a literary
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work on purely artistic grounds. He is concerned with the writer as a whole, as a totality of intellectual and practical experiences, and not with specifically artistic qualities. This attitude explains his firm opposition to Croce's imagistic conception of art which tends to disregard all the philosophical awareness underlying the poetic image. Gentile agrees that the life of a man must be distinguished from his works; but for him this distinction is possible only insofar as the antecedents of the man's works are in his life. In the events of his life there is always the very subject which manifests itself fully in his artistic creations. In order to understand his art, one must look at the man, at his moral character, which breaks through in the light of his poetry. This seems to be a return to the romantic conception of criticism, to the major tendencies of the nineteenth century, to the historical and biographical school. But this return to a nineteenth-century artistic ideal is broader in scope, for it is fostered by a deep philosophical exigency striving to encompass the whole man in his unity and totality. Thus it is opposed to the esthetics of fragmentariness prevailing in the twentieth century. In this sense, Gentile's approach not only may prove more adequate for a thorough appreciation of complex artistic personalities and works, but it is definitely more broadly humanistic than Croce's, for it embraces the whole man, not just the artist. It presents in a broader vision, the whole life of a writer, as it finds expression in his works. Experience proves, Gentile says, that in all great poets there is a philosophy, a thought, however unsystematic, which is enlivened by poetry. Dante is one of the most outstanding examples; many others could be mentioned - Lucretius, Virgil, Goethe, and so on. The problem, therefore, is to examine the intrinsic relation between poetry and philosophy, rather than to exclude philosophy from art and to relegate the former to another sphere of the spirit. The distinction between philosophy and poetry is not real but purely logical, for in reality there are no pure poets without concepts, no pure philosophers without feeling. There is no purely economic man who has no moral preoccupations. The poet has a moral personality, a thought, a practical energy. Although it is his poetic genius which prevails in him and creates images, there is no radical difference between esthetic and logical activities, since both are necessary functions of the same unfolding process of spiritual activity. The presence of thought would not break the esthetic spell, since thought is the very condition of the expression of feeling; art as pure feeling in its immediacy is completely unreal. Feeling and thought cannot be considered separately in a work of art, for art is the feeling given to thought. In the artist any lack of feeling stems from the lack of thinking and
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acting, from a completely passive life. Although Gentile emphasizes the lyrical nature of art, that is, the feeling permeating a certain thought, his marked inclination toward a poetry fostered by reflection often leads him to focus attention on the philosophy of a writer and to deal rather generically with specific artistic qualities. He concentrates on the spiritual genesis of the art work, on the personality and character of a writer, rather than distinguishing the poetic from the non-poetic. In his approach to Dante he fuses the teacher, the prophet, the patriot, and the poet in order to form Dante's personality, warning against the distinction between the man and the artist. He points out the philosophical intentions of the Divine Comedy, emphasizing that poetry is not the expression of barbarity, of the infancy of mankind, as asserted by Vico, nor a pre-logical activity, but that it springs from a philosophical conception which involves all the activities of the spirit. The relation poetry-structure should be inverted to structure-poetry, structure being the total intellectual experience which converges in the creation of the poem. Gentile's approach can be defined as a vigorous attempt to undermine a purely imagistic and "fragmentistic" conception of art and to call attention to the cosmic experience underlying the image of the poet. State University of New York Binghamton,New York

NOTES
1. Gentile's Dante studies are now collected in a volume, Studi su Dante (Opere complete, Vol. xm; Firenze: Sansoni, 1965). 2. See Benedetto Croce, La poesia di Dante, 10a ed. (Bari: Laterza, 1961), Appendix: "Intorno alla storia della critica Dantesca," pp. 175-210. 3. The work, written in 1902, was the chapter of a book (chap. 4), Lafilosofia, published in 1904 by Vallardi (Milan) and republished under the title of Storia dellafilosofia italiana fino a Lorenzo Valla in 1962 (Firenze: Sansoni), as Vol. xi of Opere completedi Giovanni Gentile. 4. The first published work of Gentile is in fact an erudite monograph on a Renaissance writer, Le commediedi Anton FrancescoGrazzini detto il Lasca (1896), prepared under the direction of D'Ancona and following the method of historical and philological research of the master. 5. This exigency was felt by Croce himself several years later (1917), when he theorized, under the influence of Gentile, that art breaks the limits of the individual (in his first formulation of esthetics, art was viewed as intuition of the individual) and encompasses the whole life of the spirit in its universality (see his essay "D carattere di totalit dell'espressione artistica" in Nuovi Saggi [Bari: Laterza, 1920]. Unfortunately, after the essay on Ariosto, which was inspired by the newly acquired theoretical principle, Croce, in his activity as a literary critic, fell back to his old positions which he had theoretically outgrown.

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Dante Studies, xc, 1972 6. Manzoni e Leopardi,2a ed. (Firenze: Sansoni, 1960), pp. 47-48. 7. Il pensiero italiano del Rinascimento,3a ed. (Firenze: Sansoni, 1940), p. 23. The chapter from which the passage is taken was published in 1920. 8. Ibid., p. 24. 9. Conversazioni critiche,Vol. v (Bari: Laterza, 1951), p. 104. See also La poesia di Dante, ed. cit., pp. 14-17; Nuovi saggi (Bari: Laterza, 1958), pp. 332-338. 10. See Frammentidi estetica e letteratura(Lanciano: Carabba, 1921), pp. 244-245; Dante e Manzoni (Firenze: Sansoni, 1923), pp. 79-80; Studi su Dante, pp. 83-84; // pensiero italiano del Rinascimento, pp. 23-24. 11. Conversazioni critiche,Voi. v, p. 8 (footnote). 12. Conversazioni critiche, Voi. iv, p. 300. 13. Studi su Dante, p. 224. 14. La poesia di Dante, 10a ed. (Bari: Laterza, 1961), p. 111. 15. Ibid., p. 112. 16. Studi su Dante, p. 231.

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