Dante and the Church

Paolo Acquaviva & Jennifer Petrie, editors

The topic of Dante's attitude to the Church has exercised scholars since the 14th century, with the Reformation adding fuel to the question. The essays contained in this volume, however, are concerned with situating Dante in the context of his own time.

They are: Gary Dickson (U. Edinburgh), Dante, Boniface VIII and the Jubilee; George Holmes (U. Oxford), Dante and the Franciscans; Jennifer Petrie (UCD), Dante, Boniface VIII and Jacopone da Todi; Alexander Murray (University College, Oxford), Purgatory and the spatial imagination; Paola Nasti (U. Reading), Images of the Church in Dante's Heaven of the Sun; Matthew Kempshall (Wadham College, Oxford), Ecclesiology and political thought in Dante's Monarchia; Catherine Keen (UCL), (Mis)readings of clerical and civic duty in Inferno XXIII.

The main area of Paolo Acquaviva's research includes Italian linguistics, particularly syntax and sociolinguistics; Jennifer Petrie has devoted her scholarly endeavour to Dante, Petrarch, St Caterina de' Ricci and 16th-century women Petrarchist poets.