ABSTRACT
The poetry of the Paradiso rises to the height of devotional music offering up a liturgy in celebration of the Creator. Self-reference, as it emerges specifically in Dante's language, enacts an inclusive logic of immanent self-transcendence. Self-reference in Dante's language draws attention to the taking-place of language, to the "place" where language originates-to the enunciating in which meaning becomes incarnate and truth is revealed. Not, finally, an act of terminal self-enclosure, self-reflection is the original act of Creation that gives birth to the entire cosmos. Nevertheless, it is an act that is described as speech-as "discorrer". Divine creation is grasped by Dante as a discursive act of self-reflection. The language act of Creation is the original template for all created speech acts, including the original speech act of human self-consciousness, the primiloquium, which is the archetypal example Dante adduces of self-transcending self-reflection in created being.
