DANTE BY EDMUND G. GARDNER, M.A. [Illustration] NEW YORK E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 681 FIFTH AVENUE Copyright, 1923 By E. P. Dutton & Company _All Rights Reserved_ PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA TO PHILIP H. WICKSTEED A SMALL TRIBUTE OF DEEP AFFECTION AND HIGH ESTEEM AUTHOR’S NOTE I would ask the reader to take the present volume, not as a new book on Dante, but merely as a revision of the Primer which was first published in 1900. It has been as far as possible brought up to date, the chief modifications being naturally in the sections devoted to the poet’s life and _Opere minori_, and in the bibliographical appendix; but the work remains substantially the same. Were I now to write a new Dante Primer, after the interval of nearly a quarter of a century, I should be disposed to attach considerably less importance to the allegorical meaning of the _Divina Commedia_, and to emphasise, more than I have here done, the aspect of Dante as the symbol and national hero of Italy. E. G. G. LONDON, _July, 1923_. N.B.--The “Sexcentenary Dante” (the _testo critico_ published under the auspices of the _Società Dantesca Italiana_) adopts a slightly different numbering of the chapters, or paragraphs, of the _Vita Nuova_ and the second treatise of the _Convivio_ from that presented by the “Oxford Dante” and the “Temple Classics.” I have kept to the latter (which is indicated in brackets in the _testo critico_). Similarly, I have followed the numbering of the _Epistolae_ in Dr. Toynbee’s edition and the “Oxford Dante” (also given in brackets in the _testo critico_). In the section on the lyrical poetry, _Rime_ refers to the _testo critico_ as edited by Professor Barbi, _O_. to the new Oxford edition revised by Dr. Toynbee. In the closing passage of the Letter to a Florentine friend, I have followed the reading retained by Dr. Toynbee. I have frequently availed myself of Dr. Wicksteed’s translation of the Letters and _Monarchia_, of Mr. A. G. F. Howell’s version of the _De Vulgari Eloquentia_, and occasionally of Carlyle’s rendering of the _Inferno_. Every student of Dante must inevitably owe much to others; but, in this new edition of my Primer, I would express my indebtedness in particular to the writings of Dr. Paget Toynbee, Dr. Philip H. Wicksteed, the late Ernesto Giacomo Parodi, and Prof. Michele Barbi.