Course Details in 2026/27 Session

Module Title	LH Dante: word, music, image
School	Lan, Cult, Art Hist & Music
Department	Modern Languages
Module Code	09 34927
Module Lead	Paolo De Ventura
Level	Honours Level
Credits	20
Semester	Semester 2
Pre-requisites
Co-requisites
Restrictions	None
Contact Hours	Lecture-10 hours Seminar-20 hours Guided independent study-170 hours Total: 200 hours
Exclusions
Description	This course will focus on Dante’s poetry and on its afterlife in the realms of the arts and popular culture. Passages from the Vita nova and the Comedy, as well as from Dante’s theoretical works, will be analysed in order to illustrate Dante’s notion of poetry: a summative art “made of both word and music”, aiming at visualisation. Students will better understand the poetic passages in Dante’s works and their relevance by exploring how they were “rewritten” in the context of modernity and beyond, by looking at specific case studies, including Tennyson’s poem Ulysses and Dan Brown’s Inferno, Rossetti’s painting Beata Beatrix, Liszt’s “Dante Symphony” and Dante Sonata.
Learning Outcomes	By the end of the module students should be able to: Show a full understanding of the complex correlation of poetry and arts in the Middle Ages; Demonstrate an advanced knowledge of the most representative texts by Dante Alighieri, the father of the Italian language; Critically evaluate the sophistication and construction of poetic language, as well as to develop analytical skills in analysing and interpreting literary texts in light of their rewriting (including translations and adaptations) in a different language and in different art forms; Show confidence in exploring the critical material, as well as demonstrate the capacity to articulate the relevance of their findings during in-class presentations.
Assessment	34927-01 : Recorded presentation in Italian : Presentation (25%) 34927-02 : 2,500 word essay in Italian : Coursework (75%)
Assessment Methods & Exceptions	Assessment: 1 x 5-7 minute oral presentation in Italian, followed by questions (25%); 1 x 2,500 word essay in Italian (75%). Reassessment: No resits are permitted in final year. If students miss the assessed task owing to extenuating circumstances, the failed task would be rescheduled at a later date.
Other
Reading List