3. Dante and Beatrice
Despite their names being inextricably linked to one another as lovers, Dante and Beatrice met but twice in their lifetimes. On the first occasion, Dante was nine years of age, according to most accounts, Beatrice was a year younger. Dante later encountered her again on a street in Florence, when he was in his mid-twenties. By then he was in an arranged marriage to Gemma, the daughter of a powerful Florentine family, and eventually had several children with her. Yet it was to Beatrice that Dante wrote several sonnets and poems, and praise of the woman permeated his Divine Comedy and several other works. His wife Gemma failed to appear in any of his works. When his daughter Antonia became a nun, she took the name, Sister Beatrice.
The evidently non-existent love affair which dominated Dante’s existence throughout his professional life is unimportant, except that Beatrice served as the inspiration for poetry and literature which thoroughly changed the world. Dante’s work challenged papal authority, civil authority, and shaped the writings of those who followed him. He also wrote in the Tuscan dialect, becoming one of the fathers of the modern Italian language, rather than in Latin as had those who preceded him. Eventually, his political and religious views led to his exile from Florence. The exile did not silence him. His great work, Inferno, placed many of his political and religious enemies within the circles of hell, while his work Paradise admitted his allies and friends to glory. Beatrice served as his guide in Paradise.