Commentary Purg XXIV 55-63

Bonagiunta's response may be paraphrased as follows: 'Now I understand the nature of the knot that held back the Notary [Giacomo da Lentini], Guittone [d'Arezzo], and me from the sweet new style that at this very moment I am hearing! Now I clearly understand how your pens [plural] followed strictly after the words of the "dictator," something that ours did not; and in that lies the entire difference between your [Dante's] "new style" and ours." He falls silent, as though, it seems, satisfied with his utterance.

What exactly does Dante mean by the phrase 'sweet new style'? This is surely one of the key questions presented in the poem, and not one of the easiest. Further, who else wrote in that 'style'? And what is the significance of the fact that Bonagiunta says that he hears it now (in listening to Dante here in purgatory? in current Tuscan poems composed on earth? [but how would he hear these?])? What follows is a series of hypotheses that sketch out this writer's views of the major aspects of a difficult question.

(1) The passage, probably written ca. 1311-12, marks the first time that the beguiling phrase 'dolce stil novo' had ever been used in the vernacular that we call 'Italian.' That it was meant to refer to or to identify an actual 'school' of poets that existed before the date of its inscription in Dante's text may not be assumed (see Bigi [Bigi.1955.1] and Favati [Fava.1975.1]), although it frequently is.

(2) On the other hand, the author's (or Bonagiunta's) plural 'vostre' should be seen as including not only himself, but also Cino da Pistoia (the one fellow poet who Dante believed had understood the theological significance of his Beatrice), if perhaps no one else (see Hollander [Holl.1992.2] and Brugnolo [Brug.1993.2]). For reasons to believe that Cino himself, as evidenced in his poem of tribute, 'Su per la costa,' written after Dante's death, believed that Dante's plurality of penne included him, see Rossi (Ross.1998.1), pp. 49-50.

(3) The significance of the poetic stance struck in the phrase should be understood in theological terms. Dante is not presenting himself as a usual love poet, but as one who serves as God's scribe in recording the result of God's love for him through the agency of Beatrice. Benvenuto, so insensitive (and even hostile) to Dante's claims for a theological basis for his writing, has a wonderfully angry gloss to this passage (DDP Benvenuto.Purg.XXIV.52-54): '"inspires me": you should not understand: with the love of divine grace, as certain people falsely interpret (italics added), but indeed with lascivious love.' It is interesting that Benvenuto feels he must oppose those who are reading the poem theologically in his own day. We do not have any record of such an understanding of these lines; it is heartening to know that it existed. John of Serravalle (DDP Serravalle.Purg.XXIV.58) follows his master in thinking Amor here is but the 'god' presiding over the world's oldest indoor sport. Dante and others had previously written in a 'sweet' style; but only he, now, in his Comedy, writes in this 'sweet new style' that creates a theologized poetry that is like almost no one else's (see Mazzotta [Mazz.1979.1], pp. 197-210; Baranski [Bara.2001.2], pp. 392-94).

(4) The word 'style' here has a broader connotation than it usually does in discourse about poetry, indicating not only a way of writing, but a subject for writing, as was apparent when his new style of praise in Vita nuova was presented as requiring new 'matter' (see Holl.1999.1, pp. 271-72; Aversano [Aver.2000.1], p. 131: the poem is 'sweet artistically because it is new poetically.') The 'new style' not only sounds different, it is different (but see the differing view of Leonardi [Leon.2001.1], p. 334). The very phrasing of the element that sets, in Bonagiunta's understanding (vv. 58-59), this 'style' apart from all others -- copying out exactly what was spoken by the 'dictator' -- points not at all to style, but rather to content.

(5) We should probably also understand that the phrase 'dolce stil novo' refers to some of Dante's earlier poetry (only the canzone 'Donne ch'avete intelletto d'amore' for certain), some of Cino's poems (at least and perhaps only the canzone upon the death of Beatrice, 'Avegna ched el m'aggia più per tempo'), and to Dante's Comedy, thus presenting the author's claims for a theological grounding of his poem's inspiration as being joined to certain of his earlier poems that he felt either had, or could be construed as having, the same character. This is the crux of a continuing disagreement with those who argue that the Comedy is a poem that goes beyond the stil novo (e.g., Pertile [Pert.1993.1]), rather than being a continuation of it. While privileging a theological reading (if not firmly), Ginsberg (Gins.1999.1), p. 88, like Pertile, is of the opinion that the Comedy's style 'is a new style, which differs from the stil novo.' In short, while Dante and others (Guido Cavalcanti perhaps the most capable among them) had previously written in a 'sweet' style, Dante alone developed, on the model of Guinizzelli's lyrics, poems of praise of a theologized lady, Beatrice (see C.Purg.XXVI.112). For discussion of a specifically Christian reformulation of traditional images of the god of Love in the fourth stanza of 'Donne ch'avete,' the poem that Dante authorizes us to think of as the first poem of the 'sweet new style,' see Moleta (Mole.1992.1). For a review of the entire question of Dante's relations with Guido Cavalcanti and of the debate over their nature, see Fenzi (Fenz.1999.1), pp. 9-70; Malato (Mala.1997.1); Pasquini (Pasq.2001.1), pp. 48-68; Tanturli (Tant.1993.1), Pasero (Pase.1998.1), and Sarteschi (Sart.2000.1).