Despite the wave of global optimism following Obama's election victory, I've decided on Hell for the theme of this week's blog, or more precisely Dante's Inferno. Returning to Florence recently reawakened my interest in this epic Italian poem from the 1300s, a macabre vision of severed heads and talking trees that depicts a pilgrim's journey into the underworld and provides a map of mediaeval spirituality. Dante called it a comedy and not a tragedy because all conflicts in the end are reconciled, with the pilgrim reunited with his childhood love Beatrice and God himself in Paradise. Such was the power of Dante's poem that people at the time actually thought he had made the trip through hell and purgatory to the celestial heavens.
Dante wrote the Divine Comedy in exile, cut off from his family in Florence for the last 20 years of his life. Just a few decades after it was written, La Commedia was held in spiritual awe by the Church and Dante's contemporaries, unique for a poem not written in Latin but Italian vernacular. He hoped the renown he might gain from writing La Commedia would act as his passport back to Florence, the "bello ovile ov'io dormi' agnello" (the pen where I slept as a lamb), although in his heart he knew it was impossible. Dante's sadness and anger at the warring Black Guelphs who forced him out of his beloved city of Florence can be felt in each of the 100 "cantos" or poetic chapters of the Divine Comedy, spanning three sections (Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso) and divided into rhyming lines of three ("terza rima").
Structure is important to Dante's poetic vision, with hell shaped like a funnel of
descending concentric circles all the way down to Lucifer at the centre of the earth. The structure reveals the medieval mindset, with sins of "incontinence" or lack of self-control considered least heinous, followed by sins of "violence" against God or fellow humans, then worst of all sins of "fradulence" or cunning which are not brought about by weakness but a twisted nature. Although Dante based his map of hell on those of other Christian philosophers like Thomas Aquinas, he did add a few personal touches. One is the vestibule of the "indifferent" or uncommitted, those who fail to take a stand in life, whether it be for love or politics. This shows Dante's personal attachment to the virtue of commitment, demonstrated by his unwillingness to compromise his own political beliefs to allow him to return to his family from exile.
Guiding the pilgrim on his journey is the Roman poet Virgil, Dante's "maestro e autore" (master and author), writer of the Aeneid, the mythical story of how Aeneas journeyed from Troy to establish the city of Rome. After being ferried across the river Styx, the pilgrim and Virgil arrive in the antechamber of Limbo, where they encounter classic Greek and Roman poets and famous figures from antiquity who pre-date the arrival of Christ, including Homer, Socrates and Aristotle, all of whom are guilt-free but cannot be saved, the "virtuous without faith". Dante is shocked to find such esteemed company in hell, and many readers have difficulty with the idea that great minds could be condemned to damnation simply for being born before Jesus, but there are few grey areas in the Catholic faith. Only the virtuous Hebrews, including Moses, Abraham and Noah, receive a "get out of jail for free" card.
However, it's important to point out that Hell is not a prison but a fortress, the chosen dominion of a subordinate Satan who refused to work for God. This king of traitors is found in the lowest, coldest circle of hell feasting on other traitors, most notably Judas and Brutus, the latter the murderer of Julius Caesar and enemy of the Holy Roman Empire, of which Dante believes himself a descendent. Before we meet Satan though, we are led through the circles of hell one by one, each with its own separate class of sinners. Dante had a particular genius for matching the punishment with the crime using a system of "contrapasso", a visual demonstration of each dead soul's primary sin in life. For example, fortune tellers have their heads turned round and so bump into things, "schismatics" or sowers of discord are continually chopped in two and panderers and seducers are marooned in pools of faeces. Nice.
Once through the suburbs of Sin City that form the first 5 circles of hell, home to the "incontinent" or sinners so infatuated with one aspect of life (sex, food or power) that it has become grotesque, Dante the pilgrim arrives at the gates of Dis. Within the walled city are the most despicable of hell's sinners, and the ramparts are protected by the angels of death known as the Furies, who threaten to call on Medusa to turn Dante to stone. In this situation, Virgil reveals his limitations as a pagan and the pair are saved by an angel from heaven who opens the gates with a wave of her wand. Inside, one of the many dead souls that Dante encounters is his old teacher, Brunetto Latini, condemned among the sodomites to run around on sand chased by flickers of flame. Bizarrely Brunetto Latini was not gay but is punished here because he loved astrology and literature above all else, and sought salvation in art and not God. So now I know where I'll end up once I've shuffled off this mortal coil.
Dante wrote the Divine Comedy in exile, cut off from his family in Florence for the last 20 years of his life. Just a few decades after it was written, La Commedia was held in spiritual awe by the Church and Dante's contemporaries, unique for a poem not written in Latin but Italian vernacular. He hoped the renown he might gain from writing La Commedia would act as his passport back to Florence, the "bello ovile ov'io dormi' agnello" (the pen where I slept as a lamb), although in his heart he knew it was impossible. Dante's sadness and anger at the warring Black Guelphs who forced him out of his beloved city of Florence can be felt in each of the 100 "cantos" or poetic chapters of the Divine Comedy, spanning three sections (Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso) and divided into rhyming lines of three ("terza rima").
Structure is important to Dante's poetic vision, with hell shaped like a funnel of
descending concentric circles all the way down to Lucifer at the centre of the earth. The structure reveals the medieval mindset, with sins of "incontinence" or lack of self-control considered least heinous, followed by sins of "violence" against God or fellow humans, then worst of all sins of "fradulence" or cunning which are not brought about by weakness but a twisted nature. Although Dante based his map of hell on those of other Christian philosophers like Thomas Aquinas, he did add a few personal touches. One is the vestibule of the "indifferent" or uncommitted, those who fail to take a stand in life, whether it be for love or politics. This shows Dante's personal attachment to the virtue of commitment, demonstrated by his unwillingness to compromise his own political beliefs to allow him to return to his family from exile.Guiding the pilgrim on his journey is the Roman poet Virgil, Dante's "maestro e autore" (master and author), writer of the Aeneid, the mythical story of how Aeneas journeyed from Troy to establish the city of Rome. After being ferried across the river Styx, the pilgrim and Virgil arrive in the antechamber of Limbo, where they encounter classic Greek and Roman poets and famous figures from antiquity who pre-date the arrival of Christ, including Homer, Socrates and Aristotle, all of whom are guilt-free but cannot be saved, the "virtuous without faith". Dante is shocked to find such esteemed company in hell, and many readers have difficulty with the idea that great minds could be condemned to damnation simply for being born before Jesus, but there are few grey areas in the Catholic faith. Only the virtuous Hebrews, including Moses, Abraham and Noah, receive a "get out of jail for free" card.
However, it's important to point out that Hell is not a prison but a fortress, the chosen dominion of a subordinate Satan who refused to work for God. This king of traitors is found in the lowest, coldest circle of hell feasting on other traitors, most notably Judas and Brutus, the latter the murderer of Julius Caesar and enemy of the Holy Roman Empire, of which Dante believes himself a descendent. Before we meet Satan though, we are led through the circles of hell one by one, each with its own separate class of sinners. Dante had a particular genius for matching the punishment with the crime using a system of "contrapasso", a visual demonstration of each dead soul's primary sin in life. For example, fortune tellers have their heads turned round and so bump into things, "schismatics" or sowers of discord are continually chopped in two and panderers and seducers are marooned in pools of faeces. Nice.
Once through the suburbs of Sin City that form the first 5 circles of hell, home to the "incontinent" or sinners so infatuated with one aspect of life (sex, food or power) that it has become grotesque, Dante the pilgrim arrives at the gates of Dis. Within the walled city are the most despicable of hell's sinners, and the ramparts are protected by the angels of death known as the Furies, who threaten to call on Medusa to turn Dante to stone. In this situation, Virgil reveals his limitations as a pagan and the pair are saved by an angel from heaven who opens the gates with a wave of her wand. Inside, one of the many dead souls that Dante encounters is his old teacher, Brunetto Latini, condemned among the sodomites to run around on sand chased by flickers of flame. Bizarrely Brunetto Latini was not gay but is punished here because he loved astrology and literature above all else, and sought salvation in art and not God. So now I know where I'll end up once I've shuffled off this mortal coil.
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