The Divine Comedy

from Wiki:

The Divine Comedy is an epic poem written by Dante Alighieri between 1308 and his death in 1321. It is widely considered the preeminent work of Italian literature, and is seen as one of the greatest works of world literature. The poem's imaginative and allegorical vision of the afterlife is a culmination of the medieval world-view as it had developed in the Western Church. It helped establish the Tuscan dialect, in which it is written, as the standardized Italian language. It is divided into three parts: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso.

On the surface, the poem describes Dante's travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven; but at a deeper level, it represents allegorically the soul's journey towards God. At this deeper level, Dante draws on medieval Christian theology and philosophy, especially Thomistic philosophy and the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. Consequently, the Divine Comedy has been called "the Summa in verse."

The work was originally simply titled Comedìa and was later christened Divina by Giovanni Boccaccio. The first printed edition to add the word divine to the title was that of the Venetian humanist Lodovico Dolce, published in 1555 by Gabriele Giolito de' Ferrari.

Structure and story

Detail of a manuscript in Milan's Biblioteca Trivulziana (MS 1080),
written in 1337 by Francesco di ser Nardo da Barberino,
showing the beginning of Dante's Comedy.

The Divine Comedy is composed of 14,233 lines that are divided into three canticas (Ital. pl. cantiche)—Inferno (Hell), Purgatorio (Purgatory), and Paradiso (Paradise)—each consisting of 33 cantos (Ital. pl. canti). An initial canto serves as an introduction to the poem and is generally considered to be part of the first cantica, bringing the total number of cantos to 100. It is generally accepted, however, that the first two cantos serve as a unitary prologue to the entire epic, as well as the opening two cantos of each cantica serving as a prologue to each of the three cantiche.[9][10][11] The number three is prominent in the work, represented here by the length of each cantica. The verse scheme used, terza rima, is hendecasyllabic (lines of eleven syllables), with the lines composing tercets according to the rhyme scheme aba, bcb, cdc, ded, ....

The poem is written in the first person, and tells of Dante's journey through the three realms of the dead, lasting from the night before Good Friday to the Wednesday after Easter in the spring of 1300. The Roman poet Virgil guides him through Hell and Purgatory; Beatrice, Dante's ideal woman, guides him through Heaven. Beatrice was a Florentine woman whom he had met in childhood and admired from afar in the mode of the then-fashionable courtly love tradition which is highlighted in Dante's earlier work La Vita Nuova.

The structure of the three realms follows a common numerical pattern of 9 plus 1 for a total of 10: 9 circles of the Inferno, followed by Lucifer contained at its bottom; 9 rings of Mount Purgatory, followed by the Garden of Eden crowning its summit; and the 9 celestial bodies of Paradiso, followed by the Empyrean containing the very essence of God. Within the 9, 7 correspond to a specific moral scheme, subdividing itself into three subcategories, while two others of more particularity are added on for a completion of nine. For example, the seven deadly sins of the Catholic Church that are cleansed in Purgatory are joined by special realms for the Late repentant and the excommunicated by the church. The core seven sins within purgatory correspond to a moral scheme of love perverted, subdivided into three groups corresponding to excessive love (Lust, Gluttony, Greed), deficient love (Sloth), and malicious love (Wrath, Envy, Pride).

...The last word in each of the three parts of the Divine Comedy is stelle, "stars."

from wiki:

The Kiss (Rodin sculpture)

The sculpture, The Kiss, was originally titled Francesca da Rimini, as it depicts the 13th-century Italian noblewoman immortalised in Dante's Inferno (Circle 2, Canto 5) who falls in love with her husband Giovanni Malatesta's younger brother Paolo. Having fallen in love while reading the story of Lancelot and Guinevere, the couple are discovered and killed by Francesca's husband. In the sculpture, the book can be seen in Paolo's hand. The lovers' lips do not actually touch in the sculpture, suggesting that they were interrupted and met their demise without their lips ever having touched.

When critics first saw the sculpture in 1887, they suggested the less specific title Le Baiser (The Kiss).

Rodin indicated that his approach to sculpting women was of homage to them and their bodies, not just submitting to men but as full partners in ardor. The consequent eroticism in the sculpture made it controversial. A bronze version of The Kiss (74 centimetres (29 in) high) was sent for display at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The sculpture was considered unsuitable for general display and relegated to an inner chamber with admission only by personal application.


Francesca da Rimini
Artist Auguste Rodin
Year 1882
Type Marble
Dimensions 181.5 cm × 112.5 cm × 117 cm (71.5 in × 44.3 in × 46 in)
Location Paris
Owner Musée Rodin

^

The System of Dante's Inferno [Hell]

Neutrals

Circle 1. Virtuous Heathen

Incontinent

Circle 2. Lascivious
Circle 3. Gluttons
Circle 4. Avaricious and Prodigal
Circle 5. Wrathful

Violent

Circle 7.

(1) Violent against others
(2) Violent against self
(3) Violent against God, nature, and art

Fraudulent

Circle 8. Simply Fraudulent

(1) Panders and Seducers
(2) Flatterers
(3) Simonists
(4) Diviners
(5) Barrators
(6) Hypocrites
(7) Thieves
(8] Fraudulent counselors
(9) Makers of discord
(10) Falsifiers

Circle 9. Treacherous

(1) to kindred
(2) to country and cause
(3) to guests
(4) to lords and benefactors

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Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Speaking of the Devil...

Dante's Divine Comedy is one of those classics I've been meaning to read for years and just haven't gotten around to. Likening the mild stickiness of the London tube to the allegorical cosmology of Inferno, the first part of The Divine Comedy, led me to look up the infamous nine circles that comprise that cosmology, and as it turns out, the London Underground is far worse than the first circle of hell! So is London, for that matter.


Botticelli's map of Dante's Inferno.

Here are descriptions of the nine circles, based on this tour of Dante's hell (with an assist from Wikipedia).

First Circle. Aka Limbo. The realm of non-sinners who don't get their Heaven ticket punched on account of being non-Christians. Includes green meadows and a nice castle - a sort of eternal retirement home for many of history's greatest poets and philosophers including Avicenna, Horace, Ovid, Aristotle, Socrates, Plato, Virgil and Homer. Sounds way, way cooler than Heaven itself.

Second Circle. Realm of the lustful - the "carnal sinners who subordinate reason to desire." Violent storms whip sinners' souls here to and fro. Some famous romantics ended up here, including Cleopatra, Dido, Achilles, and Helen.

Third Circle. A punishment for gluttons. Snowballs actually have a pretty decent chance here, as its inhabitants are forced to lie in a slushy mix of snow, hail, and freezing rain. Guarded by a three-headed dog.

Fourth Cirlce. Destination for the avaricious (though certain Christians might not realize their souls are headed here). Medievals saw this sin as "most offensive to the spirit of love." Actually, for Dante both the free-spenders and the tight-fisted would end up here, where they could annoy each other for all eternity.

Fifth Circle. A swampy place, and the realm of the angry, who take two forms: the wrathful (who express their anger), and the sullen (who repress it); the former spend eternity picking fights with each other, and the latter grumble and gurgle in a muddy bog. Beyond the fifth circle, the really heavy-duty hells begin, as the punished sins become more serious.

Sixth Circle. This hell reserved for heretics, who Dante defines as those who deny the immortality of the soul. They included epicureans, who saw the soul as mortal and enjoyed the boozin' and the feastin'. This circle also would seem to be more fun than Heaven, if not for the flaming tombs...

Seventh Circle. Getting into some serious damnation now... the seventh circle is for violent sinners - murderers, suiciders, blasphemers, userers, and sodomites. Those who commit violence against others are punished in a river of blood; those who do violence against themselves (suicides and "squanderers") are condemned to a horrid forest; a third region - a barren desert, torched by "flakes of fire" - is for those who commite violence against God.

Eighth Circle. Land of the fraudsters, including thieves, falsifiers, and specialists in fraudulent rhetoric, including "divisive individuals who sow scandal and discord." Presumably where Glenn Beck will find himself after the sad day he passes on. Punishments include being licked by flame and getting turned into a lizard.

Ninth Circle. The helliest hell of all and the realm of the worst of the worst: traitors. Like the third circle, it's a cold place, as the sinners in the ninth circle are entombed in ice at least up to their necks. Certain folks here like to gnaw on each other's heads. Satan is at the very center of this circle, waist-deep in ice, perpetually weeping, and munching on traitors (Brutus and Cassius in particular - one for each of his mouths).

Dore's illustrations:


Paolo and Francesca [Inferno Canto 5]
...the lovers in Rodin's The Kiss


Phlegyas ferries Dante and Virgil across the Styx
[Inferno Canto 5]

blue moon wrote:Likening the mild stickiness of the London tube to the allegorical cosmology of Inferno, the first part of The Divine Comedy, led me to look up the infamous nine circles that comprise that cosmology, and as it turns out, the London Underground is far worse than the first circle of hell! So is London, for that matter.

Precisely. That's my book, in a nutshell.

Don't know what hourly rate demons get paid for shoving red-hot pitch-forks up sinners' rectums, but it's not enough.

There are a few Dore illustrations in the book, but they're much more disturbing that the ones you've posted, which make hell look quite cute.

The Doomed Souls embarking to cross the Acheron [Dore]

Dante addresses Pope Nicholas III
[Dore]

The Angels Descending the Heavenly Ladder
[Dore]


crowds descending escalator [not London]

This isn't Dore, it's Stradano:


The Hell of Excrement.

Working in the transport industry in London has its unglamorous aspects.

eddie wrote:This isn't Dore, it's Stradano:


The Hell of Excrement.

Working in the transport industry in London has its unglamorous aspects.

....brings to mind the saying 'up shit creek without a paddle'

The shit is often literal.

"Fifth Circle. A swampy place, and the realm of the angry, who take two forms: the wrathful (who express their anger), and the sullen (who repress it); the former spend eternity picking fights with each other, and the latter grumble and gurgle in a muddy bog. Beyond the fifth circle, the really heavy-duty hells begin, as the punished sins become more serious."

"The Fifth Circle of Hell contains the river Styx, a swampy, fetid cesspool in which the Wrathful spend eternity struggling with one another; the Sullen lie bound beneath the Styx’s waters, choking on the mud. Dante glimpses Filippo Argenti, a former political enemy of his, and watches in delight as other souls tear the man to pieces."

...gulp...this is where those who repress their anger end up????

..I need to start venting, then!

I've been reading spark notes etc.

pinhedz wrote:I remember my attempt to read the Divine Comedy; the volume of notes necessary to explain the contemporary references was almost equal to the work itself.

I concluded that the Divine Comedy was probably lots of fun to write, but modern-day non-Italian readers have little chance of getting the in-jokes.

I've had to change quite a few names and rearrange a few faces.Too explicit contemporary references could land me with multiple libel suits. Every word I've written is true, though.