NOTE: This is DAY TWO - ensure you sign up for both days: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/manage/collections/4228193/events
Join us for the concluding conference of the AHRC-funded project 'Envisioning Dante, c. 1472-c. 1630: Seeing and Reading the Early Printed Page', at the historic John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester, 29-30th May 2025.
Our project offers the first in-depth study of the material features of the early printed page for almost the entire corpus of prints (1472-1629) of Dante's Comedy, using cutting-edge machine learning computational technologies and image matching in addition to book-historical, literary and art-historical approaches.
This two-day event presents papers by world experts in Dante’s print history, material bibliography, and computer vision, plus an encounter session for participants with many of the iconic early printed editions of Dante’s poem held in the outstanding Rylands Dante collections, and the launch of the first part of the online Manchester Digital Collections Digital Dante Library.
Attendance is free, but registration is required for catering purposes. A small number of travel bursaries for postgraduate students are available; please contact the John Rylands Research Institute administrator for further details: kelly.jones-3@manchester.ac.uk.
Banner image based on woodcut from Commedia (Brescia, 1487), fol. dd8v. John Rylands Library R64484.
Day 1: Thursday 29th May
9.15–10am: Registration & coffee
Guyda Armstrong (PI: Envisioning Dante)
Welcome
10-11am: Session 1: The social and commercial world of publishers
Angela Nuovo (Università degli Studi di Milano Statale) & Andrea Ottone (University of Oslo)
The Market of Dante Editions in the Sixteenth Century
Simon Gilson (University of Oxford)
Pairing and Comparing Dante and Petrarch in Print
11-11.30am: Coffee break
11.30am -12.30pm: Session 2: Illustrations
Matthew Collins (Harvard University)
The Textual, Visual, and Discursive Networks of the Early Printed Commedia Illustrations
Laura Banella (University of Notre Dame)
How to Make the Invisible Visible: Illustrating the Paradiso in the Renaissance
12.30-2.00pm: Lunch
2-4pm: Session 3: Technologies of the book
Giles Bergel (University of Oxford)
Book Segmentation in Historical Perspective: From Excision to Computer Vision
Rhiannon Daniels & John McTague (University of Bristol)
‘Dante Re-Born in Print’
4-5pm: Break & Dante close-up encounter
Participants can view selected early printed Dante editions upstairs in the Christie Room.
5-6.30pm: Drinks reception and Project Presentation
‘Envisioning Dante at the Rylands: Seeing and Reading the Early Printed Page’. Launch of the Manchester Digital Dante Library Incunables Collection.
7pm: Conference dinner
Day 2: Friday 30th May
10am-12.30pm Session 4: Materiality and Design, In and Beyond the Text
Guyda Armstrong (John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester)
Publishing Dante in Lyon and Venice in the 1540s and 1550s: Materiality and Printing Networks
Gloria Moorman (Newberry Library)
From the Subterranean to the Stars: Editing Dante and the Ownership of Discovery, c. 1506-1700
Catherine Keen (University College London)
The Vita nova With and Without Prose: Shaping, Selecting and Framing on the Way to 1576
12.30-2pm: Lunch
2-3.45pm: Session 4: Paratexts and Positioning the Poem in Florence
Rebecca Bowen (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florence–Max-Planck-Institute)
‘Simil alle rare, e pregiate gemme’: The Commedia as Commodity in the Court of Francesco de’ Medici
Brian Richardson (University of Leeds)
The Accademici della Crusca’s Divina commedia of 1595: From Preparation to Presentation
3.45-4pm: Closing words
Guyda Armstrong and Simon Gilson
