Addivinola, Gabriella (2013) The Apophatic tradition in Alan of Lille and Dante : logic, theology and poetry from the twelfth to the fourteenth centuries. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.

Research output not available from this repository.

Request-a-Copy directly from author or use local Library Get it For Me service.

Request Changes to record.

Abstract

This thesis explores, through a focused examination of the works of Alan of
Lille and Dante Alighieri, the apophatic tradition or via negativa, with particular
regard to the issues raised by naming God with human language. Thematic and
stylistic reappropriations of Alan are highlighted, the aim is not, however, to
establish textual dependency as such, but to explore the historical development of
the via negativa, the problems it raises in medieval logic and theology, and the
different approaches to the transcendence of the divine reality in the production,
both prose and verse, of Alan and Dante. Since divine ineffability crosses a number
of disciplinary domains – rhetoric, semantic, logic, metaphysics and theology – the
thesis is attentive to all these topics and their interactions. Attention to these fields
and to their development over time, both in the period before and after the entry of
Aristotelian works at the end of the twelfth century, is employed in order to
evaluate more closely the respective treatments of Alan and Dante.
Chapter One reconstructs the interactions of Stoic, Augustinian and Aristotelian
(by Boethian mediation) sources together with the Neoplatonism of Proclus and
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite (especially as transmitted by Eriugena) in order
to provide a conceptual background for medieval discussion on the heuristic value
of signs. In this chapter, attention is paid in particular to the contribution of the
Pseudo-Dionysian tradition to medieval thought. Chapter Two provides an in-depth
study to the medieval reception of the conceptual background delineated in Chapter
One, particularly in relation to the issue of the transformations which human
language undergoes when used in the theological field. This chapter assesses the
impact of the new translations on the reconfiguration of the relationship between
metaphysics and theology and related linguistic questions, illustrating shifts in the
way that divine predication is handled and the richness and importance of the
medieval understanding of the concept of analogy of being (analogia entis).
Chapter Three deploys the historical context set out in the previous two chapters in order to compare Alan of Lille’s and Dante’s treatment of apophatic themes, by
showing the different conceptual backgrounds for their reinterpretations of the
theory of translatio and of the concept of analogia entis. The analysis thus departs
from the extant scholarly concerns with Alan and Dante (namely, the use of
figurative and allegorical devices) in order to provide a firmer historical and
conceptual basis from which to understand their poetical choices in the De Planctu
naturae and the Anticlaudianus and in the Comedy.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BR Christianity P Language and Literature > PQ Romance literatures
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH):	Theology in literature, Negative theology, Alanus, de Insulis, -1202 -- Criticism and interpretation, Dante Alighieri, 1265-1321 -- Criticism and interpretation
Official Date:	September 2013
Dates:	Date Event September 2013 Submitted
Institution:	University of Warwick
Theses Department:	Department of Italian
Thesis Type:	PhD
Publication Status:	Unpublished
Supervisor(s)/Advisor:	Gilson, Simon A.
Extent:	ix, 240 leaves.
Language:	eng

Request changes or add full text files to a record

Repository staff actions (login required)

View Item