Humanities Cultural Programme Project Award: Dante in Oxford 2021

Drawing of Dante with plant headdress.

We are delighted to announce that Professor Gervase Rosser has been awarded a Humanities Cultural Programme grant for his project ‘Dante in Oxford 2021’.

Professor Gervase Rosser said: ‘In the 700th year since his death in 1321, Dante has much to say to us. The poet of the Divine Comedy wrote for a universal audience, and his multiple dialects, his vivid scenarios of everyday life, and his moral concerns speak directly to interests and sensitivities of our own. I am delighted with the Humanities Cultural Programme’s sponsorship of ‘Dante in Oxford 2021’, which will see an exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum and Bodleian Library and related events demonstrating the continuing power of the Comedy to generate new and provocative creative responses in a range of media.’

‘The most beautiful book in the literature of the world’ – this was Jorge Luis Borges’ description of the Divine Comedy. What has this extraordinary poem, a visionary account of the afterlife which reflects back at every point on the pains and hopes of life in the world, to say to audiences today? This TORCH-supported project takes up that question, in the 700th anniversary of Dante’s death in 1321. Focused on an exhibition at the Ashmolean Museum and Bodleian Library, it will expand into related events, which will explore both the enduring creative potential of the poem and its capacity to generate debate across the humanities about the future of culture and knowledge.

You can find out more about this Humanities Cultural Programme funded project by visiting the project page here: https://www.torch.ox.ac.uk/dante-in-oxford-2021