Canto XXXIII. Il 'disìo' del ritorno tra lamento e consolazione

This paper tries to approach one of the exegetically-hardest Cantos of Dante's Commedia through the hermeneutic perspectives already envisaged by Charles Singleton (the importance of the moral exegesis of the Edenic allegory), Peter Dronke (the dialectics between "macro-cosmic" and "micro-cosmic" worlds in the interpretation of the "occulta" hidden in the Edenic cantos of Purgatory), and Gennaro Sasso (the immanence of Dante-as-poet's political autobiography beside Dante-as-character's moral significance), in order to focus on some previously neglected or not in-depth examined passages of the Canto. In this light, the strong tie between Dante and Adam is once again stressed, by retrieving specific inter-textual matches (par. 1); Beatrice's "ammaestramento" to Dante is explained in a moral way with the support of a Tomistic treaty (parr. 2 and 3); Beatrice's "superciliousness" is particularly connected with the as-far-unexplored sense of the crucial mention of Pyramus and Thisbe's story (par. 4); the "enigma forte" is deciphered on the basis of the very convincing arguments proposed by Filippo Bognini in his papers (par. 5); the sense of the "maggior cura" tormenting and confusing Dante is lightened by referring to Dante's Epistle VII (a text pivotal for the interpretation of the whole Canto) and to the Psalms (par. 6); the names of the Eunoè river and Matelda are eventually "decoded", by resorting to further biblical and patristic sources, and by focusing on the peculiar roles they function as at the moment of their being named in the final reconciliation of the soul (Dante-as-new Adam) with God (par. 7).