The annual event in honour of the “father of the Italian language” will be particularly significant this year as Italy marks the 700th anniversary of Dante’s death.
There will be more than 500 initiatives in over 100 locations across Italy throughout the year.
Most of the commemorative events will take place later in the year, closer to the actual anniversary of Dante’s death on September 14.
They include a series of exhibitions, workshops and readings, as well as the release of a documentary film on Dante’s life and free tours of the parts of Florence that appear in Dante’s works.
Many of the events will take place online, due to the coronavirus pandemic.
March 25 was chosen for Dantedì as it is the date given by scholars for the start of the journey to the afterlife in Dante’s epic, The Divine Comedy.
The long narrative poem represents a 14th-century vision of the afterlife, describing Dante’s journey through the three realms of the dead: Inferno (hell), Purgatorio (purgatory), and Paradiso (heaven).
Dante, who began composing the groundbreaking trilogy in or around 1308, wrote the poem’s 14,233 lines in the vernacular, opting for the Tuscan dialect which was accessible to the masses rather than the traditional Latin reserved for the most educated readers.
That is a point made by Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini, who said earlier this month that Dante’s work “helps us feel we are a national community, giving us confidence during a difficult time for our country struggling with the pandemic”.
To view the program, visit the Italian culture ministry’s website.
