Introduction
DGR clearly translated this passage from the
<hi rend="i">Purgatorio</hi>
because he read Dante's text as a prolepsis of the
contemporary situation of the Pre-Raphaelites, whose programmatic goal
was to introduce into England a whole new approach to artistic practise.
The location of the only known text of the translation (on a
blank
page at the end of DGR's and his father's annotated copy of the
<hi rend="i">Poeti del Primo Secolo</hi>
) is highly significant. DGR was using that text as one of his
major sources for the translations of early
Italian poets he was making at the time. The
intimate relation of these translations to the ideas that helped
to found the PRB is underscored by a
marginal
note DGR made in volume 2 of the
<hi rend="i">Poeti del Primo Secolo</hi>
,
marking lines 1-6 of a canzone (incorrectly) attributed to Cavalcanti
with the note: “Motto for the P. R. B.” The passage in
the canzone translates: “It is important to judge
every figure for its ability to reveal, both in its form and in its attitudes,
a purified appearance of its natural character; because art should follow nature
to such a degree that it doesn't fail to render likewise its own
essential quality”.
The passage in Dante carries a subtle allusion to the historical relation between
John the Baptist and Jesus, with Cimabue and Giotto appearing as their
later secular equivalents. In addition, the passage alludes to Guido Cavalcanti
succeeding Guido Guinicelli as the dominant figure in the emergence of early
Italian poetry, and in the final line Dante points to himself as the
culminating poet in this important moment of cultural history. DGR
then remediates Dante's text to create a further historical reference, this
time to the emergence of the Pre-Raphaelites.