Dante's Masterplot and Alternative Narratives in the Commedia (Oxford Modern Languages and Literature Monographs)

"The book studies narrative pluralism in the Commedia by Dante Alighieri with the aim of opening up the poem to alternatives to the dominant narrative embedded in the text, which it terms 'Dante's masterplot'. This is the teleological trajectory that subordinates the past to the revisionist gaze of a new endpoint. The introduction analyses the masterplot's workings and its role in the interpretation of the poem, documenting its overwhelming influence on readings of the Commedia. The body of the book then explores three competing narrative models that resist and counter its hegemony, which are enacted by (i) paradoxes, (ii) alternative endings and parallel lives,; and (iii) the future. Paradoxes neutralizse the teleological hierarchy and thus allow Dante to represent contradictory ideas and experiences; through counterfactuals and parallel episodes, Dante creates an affective space in the text, where narrative necessity and moral normativity are momentarily suspended; lastly, the future constitutes teleology's blind spot and thus exposes the poem's, and its author's, vulnerability to time and circumstance. By focusing on non-linear modes of storytelling or taking teleological linearity to its extreme consequences, the monograph questions interpretations of the Commedia that favour one normative master -truth, and highlights instead the manifold poetic, theological, and ethical tensions which, due to the masterplot's influence, are often overlooked. The book concludes with a proposal that, alongside traditional notions of Dante's plurality of linguistic registers and styles, Dante's narrative pluralism can and should play a key role in readings of the Commedia"-- Provided by publisher Cover Dante’s Masterplot and Alternative Narratives in the Commedia Copyright Dedication Acknowledgements Contents Editions, Translations, and Abbreviations Figure Introduction: Dante’s Masterplot I.1 Keywords of the Masterplot I.2 Masterplots and the Masterplot I.3 The Cases of Vita nova and Commedia I.4 Exemplariness, Credibility, Reproducibility I.5 Reading Hermeneutic Writing I.6 ‘The good’ and ‘the other things’ 1: Paradox in the Poem 1.1 Paradox in the Middle Ages: Scholastic Theology and Mystical Writings 1.2 Oxymoron as ‘compact verbal paradox’ 1.3 Long-range Paradox in the Commedia 1.4 Coexistence of Narrative Models of Teleology and Paradox 1.4.1 Teleological Plot and Paradoxical Content 1.4.2 The ‘Time’ of Antanaclasis 1.4.3 The Ineffability Topos 1.5 The Role of the Reader 2: Alternative Endings and Parallel Lives 2.1 The Affective Space: Paradiso VIII 2.2 The ‘Disnarrated’ and Free Will in the Commedia: a Comparison with Two Twentieth-century Poems and the Convivio 2.3 ‘La tecnica dell’episodio parallelo’: Parallel Lives as Narrative Correlative of Alternative Endings 2.4 Interpreting Alternative Endings and Parallel Lives: Paradiso XIII 2.5 Secret as Narrative Freedom 3: The Future In/Out of the Commedia 3.1 Poeta Writing into the Future 3.2 The Proems of the Poem 3.3 Unfinished Writing 3.4 Vulnerable Narrator, Vulnerable Text 3.5 Future’s Messes in the Inferno 3.6 The Ageing Author 3.7 Between Vulnerability and Performance: Paradiso XXV Epilogue: Dante’s Narrative Pluralism Bibliography Index of Passages Index of Names Index of Concepts Dante's Masterplot and Alternative Narratives in the 'Commedia' questions the familiar narrative arc at play in the writings of Dante Alighieri and opens his masterpiece to three alternative models that resist it. Dante's masterplot is the teleological trajectory by which the poet subordinates the past to the authority of a new experience. The book analyses the masterplot's workings in Dante's text and its role in the interpretation of the poem, and it documents its overwhelming success in influencing readings of the Commedia over the centuries. The volume then explores three competing narrative models that resist and counter its monopoly which are enacted by paradoxes, alternative endings and parallel lives, and the future. By focusing on these non-linear modes of storytelling and testing the limits of linear narration, the book questions critical paradigms in the scholarship of the Commedia that favour a single normative master truth, exposes their problematic authoritarian implications, and highlights the manifold poetic, theological, and ethical tensions that are often neglected due to the masterplot's influence. The new picture of a vulnerable author and open-ended text that emerges from this study thus doubles as a metacritical reflection on the state of the field. The book's impassioned argument is that, alongside established notions of his trademark plurality of linguistic registers and styles, Dante's narrative pluralism can, and should, come to play a key role in contemporary and future readings of the Commedia . Alongside traditional notions of Dante's trademark plurality of linguistic registers and styles, this book argues that his narrative pluralism can and should play a key role in contemporary and future readings of the Commedia.