Dante and the Night Journey

This book is a psychological reading, emphasizing Dante’s universality.  The Jungian concept of the “night journey,” the descent into the darkest areas of the self and of human nature, which is the precondition for spiritual growth, informs Dante’s journey through the three realms of the afterlife.  Personal testimony about despair and recovery stands side by side with detailed close readings of much-discussed passages.

Dante and the Night Journey articulates a psychological approach to the Commedia, based on the Jungian concept of the descent into the darkest possibilities of the self and of human nature, which is necessary for spiritual progress.  Different chapters explore Dante’s growth in the problematic areas of love, anger, and ambition, and draw analogies between his journey through purgatory and contemporary experiences of recovery.  The last chapter, “Identity in Paradise,” examines telepathic communication there in the light of Object Relations work on inter subjectivity.

 The book emphasizes Dante’s universality, and takes issue with the tendency among professional dantisti to read him exclusively in terms of the theology of his time.  I think it will be of particular use to those who teach Dante to undergraduates, allowing students to connect their reading with their own lives.  My hope is that the personal side of the book will also speak to those who have undergone their own night journeys, or embarked on a spiritual path.