Closing the Dante Contest
546 THE COMMONWEAL October 13, 1926 view more profoundly the bases of the national cul- CLOSING THE DANTE...
...The average revolutionary in Latin America would discuss life with him...
...The tenaciously by the most modern of the cientificos...
...once belonged to the crown of Castile is cherished We would draw attention to what this means...
...He went back and donned his of professional endeavor, have read and meditated Spanish mental costume as tranquilly as if he had never carefully upon work which Matthew Arnold, for inbeen out of it...
...But pink because it had once been gorgeously red...
...Almost every state in the circumstances the renascent strength of an old race...
...been done in the spirit of Spain...
...submitted are trivial or without value...
...Nor were the conservatives, for their stance, accepted as the norm for the judgment of all part, very much wiser...
...In grapple between stark conservatism and unbounded more ways than one he is the encyclopaedist of humanprogress...
...They, too, have been stifled by the death man were the objects of his long, relentless pursuit...
...All the really constructive, fess to believe that Dante is a waning star...
...The judge of an schools from which they came furnish abundant proof essay contest is likely to wish he could remember those of awakened intellectual life in the mother country...
...Some of the where else in the world, a culture-a civilization-is papers received undoubtedly contain information never absolutely essential...
...There, as every- world have sent in their contributions...
...But these are turbed at the delay which may be required in reaching only such as have never cared to understand or profit a decision...
...But though Dante Dr...
...These are the abidingly valuable, work in South America has those who will themselves soon be utterly dead...
...And those who promote this, published before...
...The final result was a reawakening surrounded with more confusion, nor has a of the national confidence, and of a new interest in mind more completely in a hubbub, than I experience at the affairs of South America...
...But surely Dante is none of sure to have a great and salutary effect upon the old these things...
...words and quote them effectively...
...that our practical powers are taxed to the utmost...
...546 THE COMMONWEAL October 13, 1926 view more profoundly the bases of the national cul- CLOSING THE DANTE CONTEST ture...
...tiliousness, the total result of the contest has been most If all this is interesting when applied to Spain, it encouraging...
...Still more noteworthy, however, is with whatever modifications or additions, will neces- the proof of deep interest in the Divine Comedy manisarily continue to draw strength from the mother fested by people in all walks of life who have hitherto source, wedding to their colonial and often primitive seldom appeared in print...
...They borrowed a few weak important literature and which a Sovereign Pontiff social principles, a handful of random original ideas, crowned as the most magnificent poetic expression of from Europe and then seemed content with setting the spirit of Christendom...
...Meanwhile, we trust change...
...Con- our contest proves how large is the number of those tact with Anglo-Saxonism seldom modified this shallow who, without making the study of the poet an object apostle of change...
...is of even greater importance to us because of the Many eminent Dantean scholars in all parts of the possible effect upon Latin America...
...In them, as in the mother country, extrem- ity who wrestles exactingly with all its being and its ists were forever setting the world on fire or freezing problems, and who requires a good deal of those who it stiff...
...age, according to the run of critics, is superficial, mateAs a consequence, the awakening life of Spain is rialistic, and flippant...
...A privilege which evoked by any other medium...
...Without arought to be the first to view it with acclaim...
...It is important that interest in this master of EuroIf there is now to be a rebirth, the United States pean thought and art should increase...
...We rogance, we hope that The Commonweal will have have nothing to fear, everything to gain, from the served to promote this end...
...Best of all, scarcely any of the papers tradition, language, and aspiration are all different...
...Spanish academicians the present moment," said the poet, William Cowper, now teach in Hispanic universities, even while the in a moment of friendly confidence...
...Even such a matter as has been a person-or a member of the "Loges"- carefully reading through necessary Dantean commenwho fancied that the world might well be beautifully tary will consume many an afternoon and evening...
...Artigas draws particular attention to the "increas- essays in great number have come into this office, necesing scientific achievement of the Spanish clergy, as sitating a considerable expenditure of effort and puncexemplified by a number of distinguished periodicals...
...It became apparent that European civilization was not all nimbus, even though its progress in method « HAOS himself, even the chaos of Milton, is not is admirable...
...Union, European nations like England and Italy, and No amount of will-power will ever make the United far-off countries such as New Zealand and South Africa States the civic model of Latin America, because race, are represented...
...Both the intellect and the emotions of colonies...
...The CommonIt is, in fact, astonishing how tenaciously even "liberal" weal contest, it is safe to say, brought to light a deeper citizens of Chile or the Argentine cling to time-honored and wider interest in the work of Dante than has been customs and transmitted ideas...
...A few may be stunned by the sight of a that those who have given so much of their time and Spain which they believed dead suddenly "raising her- energy to the preparation of papers will not be disself like a strong man after sleep...
...There are some who prothem neatly upon paper...
...The proportions assumed by the endeavor by history, and in whom certain romantico-reformatory prove so much larger than anything we had anticipated myths have taken the place of intellectual vertebrae...
Vol. 4 • October 1926 • No. 23
