Il Teatro in Dante: Lo spettacolo dell’invidia

Theatre as an art form consists of a series of actions created by a writer and animated by actors in the presence of an observing public. Canto XIII of Purgatorio develops with the aid of linguistic devices that are transformed into dramatic effects, identifiable with a modern performance. Scene description, lighting, and sound effects serve to highlight the essential aspects of the Canto of the repenting Envious. There evolves a spectacle of Envy – of ‘seeing’ and ‘not seeing’, of ‘observing’, ‘listening’ ‘hearing’ and ‘participating’. These verbs are utilized in order to create the drama central to the episode: the contrast between the ‘seen’ and ‘unseen’ and the visual significance and memory/confession of the principal persona Sapia of Siena. Her recollection creates a new dramatic reality. The action is controlled/directed by the author who reinvents his own person in order to converse and comment from inside the text/stage. The ‘performance’ involves the reader/ public and highlights both the difference and affinity between a theatrical presence and a reading of a dramatic text.