Romano Guardini, Reader of Dante and Dostoevsky

Abstract

Aim of this paper is to detect the principles that guided the Catholic theologist Romano Guardini when working with literature, using as an example his works on Dante and Dostoevsky. The paper is divided into three parts. The first part identifies some key moments that Guardini shares with Dostoevsky and Dante about man and the world, most notably about the process of understanding. The reader is thus given not only the context of Guardini’s though, but also a suggestion about the reason of the closeness he felt with those authors. The second part of the paper is dedicated to Guardini’s experience as professor of Catholic Weltanschauung in Berlin, as the course he held there became a sort of breeding ground where his method of reading literature was born. The last part of the paper focuses on Guardini’s essays about Dante and Dostoevsky, and through concrete examples discloses the guidelines of his works under the light of the previous parts.

Keywords

• guardini
• dante and theology
• dostoevsky and theology
• theology and literature
• view
• catholic weltanschauung