Dante in the British Library: Hell, Purgatory and Heaven

This is an online-only event hosted on the British Library platform. Bookers are sent a viewing link shortly before the event and are able to watch at any time for 48 hours after the start time.

Two lectures on Dante.

Alessandro Scafi – Mapping Paradise in the Middle Ages: Dante and the Garden of Eden

Christian scholars and map-makers of the late Middle Ages were dedicated to the search for the Garden of Eden, as described in Genesis. Could paradise be found on a map? Dante’s knowledge of geographical lore was deep, rich and varied, and his Divine Comedy echoes contemporary debates about the location and the mapping of paradise.

Alessandro Scafi lectures on Medieval and Renaissance Cultural history at the Warburg Institute, School of Advanced Study, University of London. He is the author of Mapping Paradise: A History of Heaven on Earth (London: British Library; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006; Italian transl. Milan: Bruno Mondadori, 2007) and Maps of Paradise (London: British Library; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013).

Elisabeth Trischler – Architecture and the Afterlife: How the Urban Spaces of Medieval Florence inspired Dante's Divine Comedy

The city of Florence underwent a significant building boom in the 13th and 14th centuries, and this expansion offers a way to explore Dante’s world. This lecture uses illustrations of the Divine Comedy from the British Library’s collection to show how Dante’s masterpiece was shaped by Florence’s urban spaces.

Elisabeth Trischler is a PhD candidate in the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds exploring the intersection of art history and literature. Her current project examines how architecture and urban expansion influenced Dante’s Comedy. She is the Associate Director for the Leeds Centre for Dante Studies and a co-founder of the In via Dante Network.

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