Panova, L. (2019). ‘Going Italian, going Russian’: Dante and Petrarch in the Silver Age discourse from the Symbolists to Mandelstam. Moscow: RGGU. (In Russ.)

Abstract

The review examines L. Panova’s monograph ‘Going Italian, going Russian’: Dante and Petrarch in the Silver Age discourse from the Symbolists to Mandelstam [‘Italianyas, ruseya’: Dante i Petrarka v khudozhestvennom diskurse Serebryanogo veka ot simvolistov do Mandelshtama] which explores Dante’s and Petrarch’s reception in the Russian literature of the 1900s — 1930s. The review discusses the structure of Panova’s book, its choice of material for analysis, and merits, as well as findings that are seen as particularly astonishing and ingenious, if contentious at times. Panova undertakes a project that is enormous and important, considering the profound and diverse nature of Dante’s influence on modernist literature in Russia and Europe alike. This book, therefore, will appeal to scholars of Russian literature and all readers interested in Silver Age poetry, as well as to comparativist philologists, as the study focuses on a ‘Russian’ Dante and Petrarch.