Sayers, D: Introductory Papers on Dante

Introducing the Dante Papers Trilogy: Introductory Papers on Dante Further Papers on Dante The Poetry of Search and the Poetry of Statement This introductory volume of essays on Dante by Dr. Dorothy L. Sayers will be eagerly sought by the many thousands of readers who already know her vigorous and vivid translation of the Inferno. As those who have heard Miss Sayer's lectures on Dante can testify, she brings to the interpretation of the Divine Comedy a vitalizing power of analysis and re-creation. Readers of Dante often become discouraged by the mass of factual detail which the older school of historical criticism has made available; mere aestheticism, however, unrelated to the time and space, is nor likely to satisfy them either. They will find in Miss Sayers' essays enough scholarly assistance to put themselves in the position of a contemporary reader; but their attention will chiefly be drawn to the relevance of the Divine Comedy to our present day world and way of life. Miss Sayers' emphasis on the ethical, rather than on the aesthetic, or historical, significance of Dante's work, comes as a welcome and bracing challenge to the confusion regarding values, whether of literature or of life, which characterizes the present age. These three volumes by Dorothy L. Sayers have been unavailable for far too long. Wipf & Stock Publishers has done both Sayers and Dante studies a true service by bringing these lively, perceptive and important works back into print. Not only do these collected essays offer engaging insights into the poetry of Dante (as well as other poets), but they also shed significant light on Sayers' own mature understanding of the Christian faith. Marjorie Lamp Mead Associate Director The Marion E. Wade Center Wheaton College It is now half a century since Dorothy L. Sayers died suddenly, her translation of Dante unfinished and her mind still active. The vigor of these papers on Dante is unequalled and together with her translation of the Commedia made possible a relationship between Dante and the modern reader which was new at the time and is still vividly alive. Barbara Reynolds, author of The Passionate Intellect Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957), born and educated in Oxford, was an accomplished novelist, poet, scholar, and Christian apologist. Along with her translations of Dante, her numerous writings include detective stories, radio plays, and studies of the Middle Ages and Renaissance.