This very worthwhile collection of essays is based on lectures given during the annual Dante Series at University College, Dublin, between 1987 and 1990. Taking the title Word and Drama in Dante as their theme, the eight contributors have ably tackled a rich and varied selection of issues.

The first two essays, by Jennifer Petrie and Cormac Ó Cuilleanáin, deal with the question of drama and dialogue. Petrie's essay examines the importance of direct speech in the narrative poem, noting the precedents in early Italian lyric poetry and classical Latin models, but attributing the main influence to the Boethian model in The Consolation of Philosophy. Petrie's discussion highlights the self—revelatory nature of the dialogues with the infernal inhabitants, the poet's effective use of repetition and symmetry, the impact of moral discourse in Purgatorio and Paradiso and suggests that the mind—reading capabilities of the paradisiacal souls in no way limit the possibilities for discourse which in the Paradiso belongs to the sphere of celebration and love".