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August 24, 2010
Danteblogging - Purgatory Canto I
Purgatory Canto I
I rush on with the pilgrims to the mountain of Purgatory.
My little ship of ingenuity
now hoists her sails to speed through better waters,
leaving behind so pitiless a sea
The commonplace is that everyone finds Hell more interesting than the other two realms. We'll see how Romantic our students are.
Dante begins the canticle with an invocation of the Muses, but the strangest, most backhanded invocation of classical precedent I can think of -- he calls on Calliope to sing this canticle of pardon while reminding her that she is merciless.
Here rise to life again, dead poetry!
Let it, O holy Muses, for I am yours,
and here, Calliope, strike a higher key,
Accompanying my song with that sweet air
which made the wretched Magpies feel a blow
that turned all hope of pardon to despair.
(Purg 1.7-12)
Esolen's note reminds us that Virgil addressed Calliope and that Ovid told us the story (Metamorphoses 6.294-340, 662-78). Some foolish humans engaged in a singing match with the muse. She won, of course, and to remind them of their presumption turned them into magpies. No one ever came out ahead in those challenges to the Olympian gods - Arachne, Marsyas, these girls - and no mercy was shown, no chance of forgiveness. Dante is subtle here, reminding us that however much he loved those old poets, he did not love their gods.
The first soul they meet, the guardian of the beach of Mt Purgatory, is a puzzler - Marcus Porcius Cato - pagan, anti-Caesarian, and suicide. At best you'd think we was with the virtuous pagans in Limbo, at worst getting chewed by Satan, and most logically in the wood of the suicides. But here he is!
Esolen's note helps a lot.
The explanation lies in Cato's motive and in the meaning of Purgatory. Dante insisted (De monarchia 2.5) that Cato's death was an act of devotion to freedom, a self-sacrifiing witness to its pricelessness. It was an act, althought Cato himself was not aware of it at the time, in imitation of Chrsti, who died that all men might be free. Dante could claim impressive precedent from the poet Lucan, whose Cato, after decrying the injustice of the Roman gods in leading the nation into civil war, seems to wish to do what those gods would not exclaiming: "Would it were possible for me to lay my head down, condemned by the gods of Heaven and Hell, and take upon myself all punishments!" (Pharsalia 2.306-7). "Let my blood redeem the nations" (2.312), he cries, longing not to enjoy freedom himself but to restore freedom to others. And freedom--the liberation of will from sin--is the aim of Purgatory. ( (Purgatory, 412)
There were some astronomical moments in the Inferno, but they become more frequent in Purgatory -- here we see the the Southern Cross in the sky. I've got to look up how much of that was fancy and how much based on reports from sailors.
In Hell Dante and Virgil sometimes bargained with the damned - they wanted information and they offered fame through Dante's poetry in return. In Purgatory they will offer or the souls will request that news be taken to their loved ones so that prayers can be said for them. The first attempt to carry news falls flat, though -- Virgil offers to carry news to Martia, Cato's wife, who is in the Limbo of Virtuous Pagans. Cato refuses the favor. He remembers their love, but tells the pilgrims that now they are divided by the river Acheron, "più muover non mi può," "she can no longer move me, now nor ever" (Purg 1.90).
Hard divisions.
One of the first moments where I will be telling students to flip back to the Inferno to compare and contrast is the reed-pulling scene. Cato tells Virgil to wash Dante's face and belt him with a reed from the shore. They do so, and just at the end of canto 1 Dante sees:
Oh wonder to behold! Where he had torn
the lowly reed he'd chosen, suddenly
A reed exactly like it was reborn
Contrast that with the gruesome twig-plucking in the forest of the Suicides in Inferno XIII. When Dante breaks off a twig it begins to gush blood and talk. There's lots of violence and no rebirth in that canto. Things will be different in Purgatory.
I'm going to note again I think it was an odd editorial decision (not one I think Esolen made) to call the first canticle Interno, but to call the next two Purgatory and Paradise. Perhaps market research proves that "Dante's Inferno" is a recognizeable English phrase? I would prefer all three in English or all three in Italian, but that's me.
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Posted by CrankyProfessor at August 24, 2010 7:33 AM