Dr. Jonathan Juilfs

And there's this paradox.

How are we getting this terrible news in the middle of heaven?

There's a literary thing that's going on here, and I don't know that I can explain it, but I set this in front of us thinking, this is the thesis that I have in mind, that in order for Dante to truly enjoy the blessedness of the rose in the last third of the poem, that this is the moment when he must truly die to himself.

He must lose his status as Florentine.

as Roman, as Virgilian, if he gets to become properly a Christian who is blessed.

Yeah.

I throw that out.

What do we think?

is such a crucial intertext here.

It permeates Paradiso.

And if you get the Oxford Derling edition, Derling's notes are, he's even got the Oqui Perpetua, the Metron 3.9 translated in the back of the text.

And it's so important because Boethius was the great tale of exile, right?

His was the alienation.

And

I always laugh because I teach Boethius as well in the humanities course that we do.

And I teach it with Dante in mind a few weeks later kind of thing.

And part of what I draw attention to, I always ask the students, how does lady philosophy look?

Because Boethius gives us a pretty descriptive picture of what she's wearing.

And she's wearing a dress.

She's a queen.