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Reading Dante: Exploring Grief, Healing, and the Mysteries of Love with Dr. Joseph Luzzi
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Joseph Luzzi received his Ph.D. from Yale University and is a Professor of Comparative Literature and Faculty Member in Italian Studies at Bard College, where he has taught since 2002 after being a visiting faculty member at the University of Pennsylvania. A frequent contributor to publications including the New York Times, TLS, and Chronicle of Higher Education, he is the author of 5 books, including "My Two Italies," a New York Times Editors' Choice selection and "In a Dark Wood: What Dante Taught Me About Grief, Healing, and the Mysteries of Love," a Vanity Fair “Must-Read” selection. His work has been translated into multiple languages and his many awards include a Yale College Teaching Prize, Dante Society of America Essay Prize, and Wallace Fellowship at Villa I Tatti, Harvard's Center for Italian Renaissance Studies. In 2017 he was named Cittadino Onorario/Honorary Citizen in Acri, Calabria, his Italian parents' birthplace. His next book is "Botticelli's Secret: The Lost Drawings and the Rediscovery of the Renaissance," which will be published by W. W. Norton. Professor Luzzi is the founder of the Virtual Book Club, an online community of readers dedicated to exploring some of the best books ever written. Learn more at JosephLuzzi.com.
This conversation is suitable for all ages.
60 minutes, including a 30 minute Q&A.
I have heard of course of Dante and the Devine Comedy but otherwise I was hopelessly uninformed. This lecture and the one on Botticelli's Secret by Professor Luzzi opened up a wonderful magical scholarly poetic world that I did not know existed! Dante's 14,000 line epic poem existed as a dead poet that only gained any interest on my part when I watched one of the Tom Hanks DiVinci films. Dante's profane and sacred love for Beatrice also captured my imagination but it is Dr Luzzi's love and passion for this subject that quite captured my spirit.. He is an articulate scholar who has a poet's heart and and a spirituality that informs his work and his words. His lectures are not to be missed whether you ever read Dante or just become acquainted with a few verses and the substance of his thoughtful contemplations about heaven and ****, the spiritual and the secular, and most importantly the "love that moves the stars".
This is an informative, well-crafted lecture about Dante: nobleman, scholar, statesman, poet -- wrapped up (like a gift to us) in pungent, everyday English by Dr. Luzzi.
The instructor is very sincere. This is a great lecture for people who interested in psychology and haven't had the opportunity to read the Classics. I was looking for something that probed the text.