🦋 How Dante appropriated Islamic theological writings for his own ends
I'm thinking of an old post by Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution, which asserts that key to understanding Pamuk's The New Life is understanding Dante and how Dante used themes from Islamic writings in *his* La Vita Nuova. I've started reading Dante as I begin to think about rereading Pamuk. The translator's (Barbara Reynolds') introduction was not of much help in regards to figuring out Islamic sources for the work... I'm figuring one reference is to Majnun and Layla, with Dante casting himself as Majnun, approaching divinity by losing his wits over Beatrice. (The allegory doesn't really work for me, it seems kind of silly... Also Dante has twisted it around by portraying Love as a rational voice that tries to counter his mania. I guess he's attributing the mania to something like infatuation?)
 No, not infatuation, definitely Love -- see e.g.
And when I perceived her, all my senses were overpowered by the great lordship that Love obtained, finding himself so near unto that most gracious being, until nothing but the spirits of sight remained to me. But Love is also portrayed as talking him down...
posted evening of Wednesday, March 7th, 2018
➳ More posts about The New Life
➳ More posts about Orhan Pamuk
➳ More posts about Readings
➳ More posts about Sufi Epics
A source document: La escatologia musulmana en la Divina comedia by Asin Palacios, Miguel (1919)
posted morning of March 18th, 2018 by Jeremy Osner
Palacios' work was translated by Harold Sutherland; a pdf of "Islam and the Divine Comedy" is available from rtraba.
posted morning of May 6th, 2018 by Jeremy Osner
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