Gattamorta, Lorenza; (2002) Luzi, Eliot and Dante: Language and experience. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

The aim of my thesis is to determine how far Mario Luzi was influenced by Dante, as mediated by various Italian poets and especially by T.S. Eliot. While the relationship between Montale, Eliot and Dante has for decades been part of Italian critical discourse, that between Luzi, Eliot and Dante has not yet been given the attention it deserves. This research, therefore, seeks to add a postscript to the history of Eliot's international achievements and, more generally, to make a contribution to the question of the relationship between Italian and Anglo-American dantismo. In order to have a clearer understanding of the postwar period, and especially of that Dante whom Mario Luzi at this stage of his poetic output was beginning to consider his 'maestro operativo', this study examines the pre-war years and those immediately following, limiting the field of inquiry to the poetic world closest to Mario Luzi, that of 'the third generation' Florentine poets. After an Introduction describing the method used to trace the relationship between Dante and Hermeticism - and an attempt is made above all to identify which Dante is the object of the discussion - the first three chapters deal with the Platonic stilnovismo and dantismo of Bigongiari, Parronchi and Luzi. Chapter 3 examines the stilnovismo and dantismo of the early Luzi (from La barca to Quaderno gotico), while Chapter 4 studies Dantean 'figures' in Luzi's post-war poetry (from Primizie del deserto to Dal fondo delle campagne). Both chapters attempt to offer a new approach to Luzi's stilnovismo and dantismo by way of an intertextual, intratextual and 'interfigural' analysis. What lacks in this field of research is in fact an exegesis capable of systematically exploring the intentionality, history, and stylistic -rhetorical significance of the allusions and highlighting possible mediations on the part of other Italian and foreign poets. The second part of the thesis concentrate on Luzi's reception of Eliot from the thirties to the sixties within the context of the Italian critical debate of those same years. Key issues discussed include the intertextual relationship between Luzi, Eliot and Dante in the post-war period, theories and practice of impersonality and intersubjectivity in their writing.

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