The Doctor reads from La Vita Nuova
Captain Janeway reading La Vita Nuova late at night in her quarters
La Vita Nuova ("The New Life") was a literary piece written in a prosimetrum style, alternating between prose and poetry, by Dante in 1295. It is the story of the life-changing love of Dante for a young woman named Beatrice Portinari, a character who also figured prominently in his Divine Comedy.
Captain Kathryn Janeway was reading a translation of the book in 2375 while helping The Doctor cope with an ethical conflict. At one point, Captain Janeway left her copy in the holodeck with The Doctor, who read a section from it aloud to himself:
- In that book which is my memory,
- On the first page of the chapter that is the day when I first met you,
- Appear the words, 'Here begins a new life'. (VOY: "Latent Image")
Background information[]
The quotation that The Doctor reads is paraphrased from Dante's La Vita Nuova. The original Italian is more literally translated by D.G. Rossetti in 1861:
- "In that part of the book of my memory,
- Before which is little that can be read,
- There is a rubric, saying, 'Incipit Vita Nova'. (Here beginneth the new life.)"