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September 17, 2009
Dante Blogging - Inferno Canto XVI
Canto XVI
Dante shows the same reticence in Canto XVI about the sin and the same courteous interest in the sinners - three Florentines run up and find a different way to evade the 'no stopping' rule - they form a circle around the 2 pilgrims and keep moving - "as naked champions, muscles slicked with oil" (16.22). Again, I think we should remember the crowd at this level and wonder about the simile.
The four Florentines leave Virgil out of the conversation as they discuss the decline of their city. Ser Brunetto had blamed it on rustics moving in from Fiesole. Here, Dante blames the new-rich.
There is some odd by-play with Dante's belt - Virgil takes it and throws it over the edge of a cliff to summon the monster Geryon, on whom they will ride down to the 8th Circle. Esolen reminds us that though the belt is ambiguous, Dante won't have another one until Virgil makes him a new belt from a rush at the foot of Mount Purgatory. Belts obviously have something to do with restraint or constraint, but it's not clear quite what.
Most noticeable in the canto is Dante's naming the work! We're almost halfway through the 34 canti of Hell, and here Dante addresses the reader:
ma qui tacer nol posso; e per le note
di questa comedìa, lettor, ti giuro,
s'elle non sien di lunga grazia vòte
. . . but I cannot
keep silent here, and, Reader, by the notes
of this my Comedy, I swear - and may
They keep in favor long(16.127-130)
So - a comedy. Remember, comedy is what ends happily and is probably low and vulgar (or so Aristotle). Dante is certainly going to end happily, and he's writing in the volgare. That's enough for the name. The attribute divina shows up quite soon after his death - and the favor has lasted more than 700 years.
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Posted by CrankyProfessor at September 17, 2009 7:52 AM
Comments
Any chance you'll put these out as podcasts?
Posted by: Another Damned Medievalist 
at September 18, 2009 7:38 AM