The approach to the great and complex edifice of the Divine Comedy is, for third-year secondary-school classes, a key moment: on this first encounter it often depends whether the work and the figure of Dante Alighieri will become, for these very young readers, a living and beloved point of reference, or yet another workload to be endured with more or less resignation and got rid of as soon as possible, retaining at most the unpleasant memory of a senseless toil. All the greater, therefore, is the responsibility of the teacher, called upon to justify the efforts required of the class in order to become familiar with an entire poetic universe whose coordinates are for the most part utterly foreign to the language, the experiences and the knowledge of today's girls and boys. The criterion adopted by those who must guide them along this cammino aspro e silvestro is very often the apparently simplest and most direct one: to invite them to see themselves reflected in the emotional and sentimental life of the characters, choosing (since not even the ministerial guidelines any longer require a complete reading of the poem) those most marked in this respect; yet, while it is true that Farinata's inflexible pride, Ulysses' undaunted curiosity and the bestial ferocity of Count Ugolino still manage today to take hold of adolescent readers, there is a high risk of reducing these characters to their simplest features, turning them into stereotypes and squandering the fascinating complexity that is the fruit not only of Dante's skill in rendering their many and often contradictory components, but also of the rich and vast cultural heritage that is gathered up in them and, as it were, renewed. Dante's Ugolino, for example, is, as is well known, both the author and the protagonist of a tale that never fails to involve even the least culturally equipped readers; this, however, does not alter the fact that the character also arises from the reuse of more ancient themes and of archetypal situations, in tracing which the poetic greatness of this figure (and, of course, by reflection, of its author) is further enhanced.^[i] Nor is it so unfeasible, once the class has become at least minimally familiar with the most accessible component of the text, namely that of the fabula, to try to give them at least a glimpse of the historical and cultural depth that lies behind the apparent linearity of the tale. A knowledge of Greek and Roman epic, however limited and dating back to the first year of secondary school, makes it possible, for instance, to convey the transformations undergone by certain figures of myth such as Charon or Odysseus, and constitutes a minimal yet effective example of a concept that is fundamental but very difficult to transmit if we confine ourselves to its theoretical formulation: that of retroactive reading, that is, of the creation of the traditio in the present-to-past direction, a concept by means of which one of the principles that legitimise the study of literature from a historical point of view can be made accessible even to a class of apprentice readers.^[ii] The example offered by the present work, however, does not follow this didactic path, indispensable but already well known, but rather the opposite and perhaps less frequented one; that is, examining the characters of the Divine Comedy not as the terminus and fulfilment of a journey toward the reading public, but as its starting point. For if, in the vast universe of Dantean figures, we meet names that are the inheritance of the various traditions (classical, scriptural, philosophical), used and reworked in an astonishing coexistence of fidelity and invention, other figures, often destined for great fortune among readers, entered the collective memory for the first time thanks to the initiative of Dante himself, who, by fixing them in his tercets, secured for them the status of characters that they had previously lacked. In this particular case I have thought of submitting to the classes' work of analysis and reflection the protagonists of an episode belonging to what today we would call the crime pages; we shall not, however, follow their transformation into literary figures, on which studies are all too abundant, but rather the reworking that, on the track of Dante's lines, was carried out by the first generations of commentators and glossators of the Divine Comedy: those from whom begins that veritable "other selva" (in its meaning, dear to philologists, of a congeries) which, continuing over the centuries, has accompanied the poem down to our own day. The aim of this didactic path and of its chronological limitation is twofold. In the first place it will serve to show, with direct examples, a peculiar feature of literature in the pre-Gutenberg age, namely the conception of the text as an entity not wholly defined but still malleable, a situation that permits interesting comparisons with the present-day peculiarities of electronic writing;^[iii] in the second place it will help the apprentice reader to discover the decisive role that the different and successive interpretive stratifications play in the reception of the text, a fact one does not realise unless one has a historically aware view of the ways and times in which the canon came to be constituted: and it is also for this reason that it seems to me appropriate to limit the examination to the glosses of the fourteenth century alone, a period broad enough to allow evident and recognisable interpretive developments, yet so brief that it can be taken in at a single glance. The material I have used to prepare this work is limited to the essentials, though ample in content, and immediately available.^[iv]

II

Canto V of the Inferno usually meets with a certain appreciation even among classes that show no particular inclination toward the literature of the Middle Ages: the effectiveness and immediacy of the narrative inventions, the mastery evident in the rhetorical constructions and, finally, the psychological complexity of the relationship between the narrating self of the story and the soul of Francesca da Rimini are relatively easy to grasp; what is more, the central subject of the episode, that of love and of its legitimacy or possible measure, cannot leave an audience of young people indifferent. It will therefore be well to take advantage of the favourable reception the episode will have met with in order to submit to the class, after completing in the previous lessons the reading and the general analysis of the canto, a closer study of the dramatic affair of the "two in-laws". It is important that this too should have been preceded by a detailed reflection on which are the details that Dante's text reveals to a hypothetical model reader:^[v] the name of the protagonist revealed indirectly, the equally indirect way in which she speaks of her origin, the culture to which, again playing off the cushion, her manner of expression bears witness (with literary quotations obvious to the expert ear but perfectly concealed in the continuum of the discourse), and so on. A recapitulation will then be made of all these clues: the character of Francesca's speech as an allusive narration, founded above all on the unsaid, should become evident.

At this point the class will be offered a suitable selection, abridged where necessary, of the entries in the Enciclopedia Dantesca concerning the two protagonists of the drama and Francesca's relatives, namely Guido da Polenta the Elder and his grandson Guido Novello (these last extremely condensed), in which what the historical sources report to us about the affair is set out in detail. In discussing their content, the actual scarcity of precise information ought to emerge; it will be difficult, if the discussion between teacher and learners has been genuine, for what is said in the entry devoted to Paolo Malatesta not to force itself upon their attention:

"The episode [sc. that of Paolo and Francesca] cannot simply be reduced to the amorous triangle, but must be set within a historical and dynastic context that the literary sources do not allow us to reconstruct. The documentation, on the other hand, provides no information concerning the dramatic epilogue, and not even Francesca's identity can be regarded as established."^[vi]

At this point the historical picture ought to be clear: direct accounts we have practically none; Dante Alighieri may have known, if only at a distance, Paolo Malatesta during the latter's brief political office in Florence, learning many years later further details of the affair from Francesca's own descendants, whom he frequented at the time of his exile. All this information will not have been assimilated mechanically from the literature textbook, but produced by a work (very elementary, of course) of analysis, however indirect, of the sources; more than that, it will have been possible to let the class observe the level of uncertainty on which those who investigate the events of the past must sometimes proceed.

At this point one can submit, in sequence, analysing and discussing each text before passing to the next, the glosses that the first and second generations of Dante's commentators appended to this most famous episode; it will be advisable, besides helping with the paraphrase, to supply each time some simple information on the life and circumstances of these commentators (this too can be found in the Enciclopedia Dantesca and must, of course, be adapted to the audience), so as to anchor more firmly in the minds of the pupils a couple of fundamental notions; namely (to put it briefly), first, that the literary text entails, practically from the outset, an interpretive labour, so that the figure of the reader as tabula rasa is a meaningless abstraction;^[vii] second, that the activity of the writer never takes place outside particular and determining cultural and material conditions. An appropriate selection of texts might be the following,^[viii] which can obviously be shortened:

• Graziolo de' Bambaglioli

"Debes scire, lector, quod hee due anime fuerunt Paulus filius domini Malatesta de Malatestis de Arimino, et domina Francischa domini Guidonis de Polenta uxor Çanis Çoti de Malatestis, qui siquidem mutuo in tantum se dilexerunt, quod dictus Çannes occidit dictam dominam Francischam uxorem suam et dictum Paulum fratrem suum cum ipsos invenerit diligentes se ad invicem".

• Jacopo della Lana

"Or questa ystoria si fo che Zoanne Çotto, figlol de misser Malatesta da Rimino, avea una soa muier, ch'avea nome Francesca, e figliola de misser Guido da Polenta di Ravenna, la qual Francesca zasea cun Polo fradello del so marito, ch'era so cugnato: corretta ne fo più volte dal so marito; no se ne castigava; a la fin trovolli insemme suso 'l peccato, prese una spada, e conficolli insieme in tal modo che abraçati ad uno morinno"

• L'Ottimo Commento

"In Rimino i Malatesti, in Ravenna quelli da Polenta […] per la loro grandezza ebbero guerra insieme della quale fecero pace; e per fermezza e legame d'essa, Gianni Sciancato figliuolo di messer Malatesta, uomo dell'abito rustico e del cuore franco, e armigero, e crudele, tolse per moglie Francesca figliuola di messer Guido il vecchio da Polenta, donna bellissima del corpo e gaia ne' sembianti. In costei s'innamorò Paolo figliuolo del detto messer Malatesta, uomo molto bello del corpo e ben costumato, e acconcio più a riposo che a travaglio; e la donna in lui. Finalmente, stando l'uno con l'altro senza nulla suspicione siccome cognati, e leggendo nella camera della donna uno libro della «Tavola Rotonda» […] vinse la forza di questo trattato in loro due, che posto giuso lo libro vennero all'atto della lussuria, al quale diede materia lo confortamento di questo libro sì come Galeotto diede materia a Lancelotto e alla Reina. E questa opera si pubblicò sì che per alcuno famigliare data la posta a Gianni Sciancato, elli lor due insieme […] uccise, siccome nel testo appare"

• Pietro di Dante

"Ultimo vidit ibi umbram domine Francisce filie domini Guidonis de Polenta olim domini civitatis Ravenne et uxoris Ioannis Gotti de Malatestis de Arimino, de qua philocapto Paulo fratre dicti Ioannis et eius cognato, dicit dicta domina Francisca quod secundum naturam amoris opportuit ipsam illum Paulum amare ut hic dicit textus; ad quod ait Augustinus in libro De catheciçandis rudibus: «Nichil magis provocat ad amandum quam prevenire amando» et ut Autor verificet quod ait Ysidorus in Libro Sententiarum dicens: «Ideo prohibetur christianis legere figmenta poetarum et aliorum scriptorum similium, quia per oblectamenta fabularum nimium mentem excitant ad incentiva libidinum»"

• Pseudo – Boccaccio

" Questi due ispiriti […] l'uno fu Paolo da Rimine fratello di Lanciotto signor di Rimine, reo uomo; l'altro fu quello della Francesca figliuola di messer Guido signor de Ravenna. Questa è la storia di questi due spiriti: dico che capitando a Ravenna un buffone e veggiendo questo giovane tanto bello, disse alla madre di questa fanciulla che aveva ciercato la Corte di quattro signori né mai aveva veduto più bella giovane di questa, né di giovani aveva veduto più bello giovane di Paolo de' Malatesti; e che se queste due bellezze si potessino accozzare insieme a matrimonio, mai non si vide più bella coppia. E ciò sentendo la madre mai non pensò, se non che questo parentado si facesse, e fatto il parentado a parole, e venendo Lancilotto a Ravenna per isposare la Francesca pel fratello e veggiendola sì bella, disse la volea per sua donna: e non essendo chi 'l contradicesse, essendo signore, la tolse e fu sua sposa. Paulo poi sentendo non se ne curò poi per ispazio di tempo. Essendo un dì Paulo con la Francesca in camera e leggendo un libro di Ginevra e di Lancilotto, e de' congiugnimenti che facieano insieme, subito l'una e l'altro di costoro furono percossi d'amore e più volte si congiunsono insieme carnalmente, tanto che uno se n'avide e disselo a Lancilotto. Costui nollo credea, cogniosciendo il fratello savio; di che costui disse: Io te lo farò vedere; e tanto gli pedonò che un dì, essendo eglino insieme congiunti, il fratello Lancilotto, come quegli gli mostrò, gli giunse amendue e amendue a un'otta gli uccise"

III

At this point we should have at our disposal all the elements needed to begin drawing conclusions. The class, once the correct understanding of the texts presented here has been verified, will be invited to assess the quantity of information that each of them contains in relation to the preceding ones and, above all, in relation to the original lines; it will be easy at this point to point out that, starting from the deliberately laconic and elusive discourse of Canto V of the Inferno, the commentators transformed an originally very slender tale into a romance^[ix] that has literally grown upon itself through the successive addition of details: Pietro di Dante himself seems to proceed far more by imitation of his predecessors than on the strength of possible information handed down within the family. In practice this tale, tragic in content but minimalist (if one may use the term anachronistically) as regards the fabula, has acted like a small but powerful magnet that attracts ever larger metal bodies until it is hidden by them. One may at this point discuss with the class the possible reasons for this singular effect, inviting them to look in their own personal experience (which will obviously concern not only literary fiction but also other forms of storytelling, from cinema to comics) for analogous examples of the gradual development of an initial plot; or one may propose as a term of comparison the glossators' insistence on only some of the possible narrative cues offered by the source text, inviting the class to seek out its possible reasons.

As a final assessment exercise one could even confine oneself to administering exercises that recapitulate the knowledge learned or brought to light in the course of the activity proposed here; but I believe it far more fruitful, from a didactic point of view, to propose instead not to repeat but to use that same knowledge autonomously. For example, one can assign to the pupils some images drawn from the remarkable figurative repertoire that developed from the nineteenth century onward around the theme of Paolo and Francesca^[x] and invite them to analyse these images, observing what, in each case, has been brought into relief and what has been left aside by the artist, asking themselves why the choice was made and to what effect. Or one may remain within a strictly literary sphere by assigning the reading of the notes that Giovanni Boccaccio wrote on the very passage examined here in his unfinished commentary on the Inferno,^[xi] which probably represent the culmination of the process of reworking the plot examined so far, and then have the pupils analyse them, thus autonomously continuing the work of comparison among commentators already carried out; this last exercise may also serve as an introduction to Boccaccio the storyteller, whose reading need not necessarily be confined to a precise and continuous period of the school year but may be distributed over several occasions, as the topics dealt with in speaking of other authors offer the opportunity.^[xii]

Jacopo Manna holds a PhD in Italian Studies from the University of Florence and a PhD in Historical Sciences from the University of Perugia. He teaches Italian, Latin and the History of Art in upper secondary school in the Umbria Region.

NOTES

Notes

^[i] The inevitable reference is of course Gianfranco Contini, Filologia ed esegesi dantesca, in Varianti e altra linguistica. Una raccolta di saggi (1938-1968), Turin, Einaudi, 1970, pp. 407-432

^[ii] Among the various expositions of this fundamental concept, perhaps the most accessible one, with a little help from the teacher, is still the original: Thomas S. Eliot, Tradizione e talento individuale, in Il bosco sacro, Milan, Bompiani, 2003 [1922], pp. 67-80

^[iii] A general framing of the question in Raul Mordenti, L'altra critica – La nuova critica della letteratura fra studi culturali, didattica e informatica, Rome, Meltemi, 2007, esp. ch. IV, pp. 129-166

^[iv] For the commentaries I have drawn on: Guido Biagi, La Divina Commedia nella figurazione artistica e nel secolare commento, Turin, UTET, 1924, 3 vols., also available online (here: https://archive.org/details/DivinaCommediaBiagiInferno/002.jpg ). Information on the commentators and on the characters of Dante's poem can be found in the online edition of the Enciclopedia Dantesca (original edition: Rome, Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1970-1978, 5 vols.) at http://www.treccani.it

^[v] The concept of the model reader (on which see, of course, Umberto ECO, Lector in fabula – La cooperazione interpretativa nei testi narrativi, Milan, Bompiani, 1979, pp. 50-66) is as fundamental as it is difficult to make clear to young people who, often still at the beginning of the three-year upper cycle, are little familiar with the very activity of reading: a didactic experiment of the kind discussed in the present article offers a good opportunity to clarify and consolidate at least the fundamental elements of this theoretical datum

^[vi] Anna Falcioni, entry Malatesta, Paolo in Enciclopedia…, cit., ad vocem

^[vii] This datum, however elementary, can never be taken as obvious and shared: the question is admirably summed up in Mario Lavagetto, Eutanasia della critica, Turin, Einaudi, 2005

^[viii] If the class belongs to a Classical or Scientific liceo, the pupils may be asked to translate directly the easy Latin of the commentaries written in that language; otherwise the teacher will see to it

^[ix] It would be truly stimulating to be able to verify how many of the details added in the glosses resemble topoi of chivalric literature, since this would create, with respect to the episode of the two in-laws as readers of an Arthurian romance, a kind of surprising narrative short circuit: but this evidently lies beyond the scope of the present work

^[x] For example, among the best-known (and, of course, most predictable) works one may single out those by J.A.D. Ingres (1819), A. Scheffer (1835), G. Doré (1861), A. von Feuerbach (1864), A. Cabanel (1870), G. Previati (1887). Interesting pointers on this subject in Maria Antonietta TERZOLI, Ecfrasi, immaginazione, scrittura. Letteratura e arti figurative da Dante a Gadda, Rome, Carocci, 2023

^[xi] Giovanni Boccaccio, Il comento alla Divina Commedia e altri scritti intorno a Dante a c. di Domenico Guerri, Rome-Bari, Laterza, 1918, 2 vols., vol. II, pp. 137-139. The text is available online here: https://archive.org/details/085BoccaccioIlComento02Si043/page/n3/mode/2up?view=theater and here: https://liberliber.it/autori/autori-b/giovanni-boccaccio/il-comento-alla-divina-commedia/

^[xii] For example, when dealing with the Novellino, tale no. LXXIII in the Gualteruzzi edition (Come il soldano, avendo bisogno di moneta, volle cogliere cagione a un giudeo; the text is available online here: https://liberliber.it/autori/autori-n/novellino/ ) can be usefully compared with Decameron I 3