Classics and the Western Canon discussion
Divine Comedy, Dante
>
Background and Resources
Haaze wrote: "@Nemo[...] I can barely imagine how an Italian would perceive Dante's epic being stuffed into the "box" of English. "
Well, for me, it is kind of strange. I sometimes wonder why the translator chose some words over another one, or question about how he/she convey a determinate sentence. I think it is, overall, a matter of shades of meaning. It's a very subtle theme.
(Yes, I'm Italian)
I'm really intrigued to re-read Dante's work with you - not just because this seems to me a group of really curious, intelligent people, but also because I' eager to explore the world of Divina Commedia's translations. I adore this masterpiece and I studied it deeply both during high school and university (I'm studying what in the U.S. I think it's called "Humanities" disciplines).
Obviously I'm gonna read it in my language. I'm gonna use my school edition, which is provided with amazing notes and lots of interesting critical essays, as well as my high school and university lessons' notation.
I chose so because I think that to completely enjoy the story, the narrative aspect, one should know at least the most relevant information about Dante's background. Some characters that appears in the Inferno are directly taken from Dante's everyday life and have meaning and importance only if compared to what they meant in Dante's reality.
Honestly, I can't wait to start - I'm super excited. I'm sure there will be lot to talk about!
P.S. I'm delighted by all the iconographic material you've found! Great!
I've a copy (different by the one I'm reading for this) with beautiful reproductions of Doré's works. They're superb!
P.P.S. I hope I didn't write anything wrong - I'm a little bit worried about my English not being good enough for such dense discussions. If I wrote something wrong, I'll be glad if you'll point it out!
Patrice wrote: "Hooray! A bona fide Italian to help us!Hmmm bona fide? Sounds latin?"
Well, it is Latin: it means "good trust", or "good faith".
Anyway, thanks for such a warm welcome! :)
Nemo wrote: "Roger wrote: "Yesterday I ran across the following passage. It is near the end of the "Preface to Shakespeare" by the great commentator and critic Samuel Johnson. I thought it might be relevant t..."The pleasure of novelty ceases, but the pleasure of study begins.
Camilla P. wrote: "Haaze wrote: "@Nemo[...] I can barely imagine how an Italian would perceive Dante's epic being stuffed into the "box" of English. "
Well, for me, it is kind of strange. I sometimes wonder why the..."
Camilla, thank you so much for joining us! I agree with you that notes are needed (and fun), even for an Italian. We're counting on you to help us through the haze of translation, you who know both languages so well.
Roger wrote:"The pleasure of novelty ceases, but the pleasure of study begins."
Amen! Well said. Also the pleasure of returning to once-familiar faces and lands.
I have a pile of Dante translations and commentaries on the floor beside my reading chair, but I had not thought until just now to take down my Easton Press collector's edition from its shelf on my barrister's case full of the "100 Greatest Books Ever Written." It is a translation by Melville Best Anderson, with thirty-two drawings by William Blake. Blake's work is beautifully presented on these pages. The translation is in terza rima, but is not as pleasing as Dorothy Sayers's rhymes, to my ears. I look forward to Lily's and Haaze's and others' sharing of particular works of art with us as we discuss each canto.Here is my Easton set, which I collected one book at a time over many years.
http://www.eastonpressbooks.com/leath...
Arthur Livingston, who wrote the introduction to my Anderson translation, says that The Divine Comedy is like "a majestic symphony enriched with numberless motifs which beset the memory, which we finally memorize, and which recur to our minds in now this and now that situation in life, illuminating it now with wisdom, now with sentiment, now with humor. Thousands of people, as six centuries have passed [seven now], have read and relived, are reading and reliving, the Comedy in just this way. That is why, over the course of its six [seven] centuries of age,it continues to endure."
What a great find, Roger, of the Samuel Johnson quote! It reminds me of how I often approach a piece of 20th century classical music. I will put it on in the background for several auditions before I try to focus on any of its details. By some process I get comfortable with its flow and then, as the quote suggests, my curiousity is engaged.
On the other hand, so much of Dante's poem seems to assume familiarity with the characters. Indeed, as I am sure we will discuss in detail, his approach differs from that of traditional allegory. Instead of using abstractions as characters (Patience, Honor, Gluttony, etc.) he gives us real people that he knew his readers would be familiar with. If we as modern readers have no idea of who these people were, how can we grasp the point? (Actually, I think a case can be made that we can, but will leave that for when we are into the poem.)
Initially, I thought I had a bone to pick with part of the quote. "Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general effect of the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by interruptions..." Although I loved the image, surely, I thought, this is anachronistic.
Johnson lived from 1709-1784. Well, Wikepedia tells me that in 1756 William Cullen in Scotland experimented with refrigeration. And in 1758, Benjamin Franklin did.
Cudos to Dr. Johnson. And to Roger!
On the other hand, so much of Dante's poem seems to assume familiarity with the characters. Indeed, as I am sure we will discuss in detail, his approach differs from that of traditional allegory. Instead of using abstractions as characters (Patience, Honor, Gluttony, etc.) he gives us real people that he knew his readers would be familiar with. If we as modern readers have no idea of who these people were, how can we grasp the point? (Actually, I think a case can be made that we can, but will leave that for when we are into the poem.)
Initially, I thought I had a bone to pick with part of the quote. "Particular passages are cleared by notes, but the general effect of the work is weakened. The mind is refrigerated by interruptions..." Although I loved the image, surely, I thought, this is anachronistic.
Johnson lived from 1709-1784. Well, Wikepedia tells me that in 1756 William Cullen in Scotland experimented with refrigeration. And in 1758, Benjamin Franklin did.
Cudos to Dr. Johnson. And to Roger!
Welcome, Camilla! We expect lots of help from you as we move along -- obviously you know this book well, but I hope we can also offer you a few insights, too.By the way, re your "P.P.S. I hope I didn't write anything wrong - I'm a little bit worried about my English not being good enough for such dense discussions. If I wrote something wrong, I'll be glad if you'll point it out!"
I wish some of my American students, when I was teaching high school English, wrote half as well as you do.
Welcome Camilla. I doubt many American twenty-something year olds have studied (or even been exposed to) Dante's Comedia. I would be interested, and I suspect others as well, if you would describe for us its place in the Italian curriculum and contemporary culture.
When did you first encounter it? How was it taught in school? On a purely emotional level, what does it mean to you?
In your opinion, is your experience with the poem typical or exceptional?
When did you first encounter it? How was it taught in school? On a purely emotional level, what does it mean to you?
In your opinion, is your experience with the poem typical or exceptional?
"To refrigerate" has a now-obsolete meaning of "to cool down," from the Latin verb refrīgerō.
@Roger (68): Ah, so Johnson would have known the Latin. But, I suspect, he also knew the modern science. Perhaps I give him too much credit. Regardless, I think the "mind refrigerated by interruptions" is wonderful.
Still, I also recall my earlier comment that, right now, I am finding some of the interruptions as stimulating as the poetry.
Still, I also recall my earlier comment that, right now, I am finding some of the interruptions as stimulating as the poetry.
Roger wrote: "The pleasure of novelty ceases, but the pleasure of study begins."That's better than the original quote, imo. :)
How come the reader "throws away the book, which he has too diligently studied"? Too much pleasure?
Patrice wrote: "I have the pinsky translation and the facing page has the original. I get a kick out of trying to decipher the original. Italian is such a beautiful language.It's like watching an opera with sub..."
Totally agreed, it is fun. I do that with Latin or German too.
Nemo wrote: "Roger wrote: "The pleasure of novelty ceases, but the pleasure of study begins."That's better than the original quote, imo. :)
How come the reader "throws away the book, which he has too diligen..."
I suppose he studied prematurely, before drinking to the bottom from the cup of novelty.
Risa wrote The reason I haven't contributed is because I doubt I have anything intelligent or valuable to add.I very seriously doubt that.
It's probably time to stress a point I've made before, but sometimes needs to be repeated.
Comments that you think aren't valuable may be quite valuable to another poster, or may inspire a series of comments that winds up being a significant contribution.
I always encourage posters to ask questions even if they think they are stupid or trivial, because it's very likely that other posters have the same questions and are also holding back from posting them because they think they're stupid or trivial. But if any poster has a question, by definition it isn't stupid or trivial. And think of the satisfaction you will give some other poster who is able to say "ah-ha, I know the answer to that question!" So they can answer the question for you, and that's a gift to both of you.
So post, ask, contribute, even if you think your questions or comments aren't insightful or intellectual enough, and you may well wind up giving others "ah-ha" moments you never considered.
If your local library has access to the OverDrive Audiobook service (or some other audiobook service) I strongly encourage seeing whether they have the Divine Comedy on audiobook. I got the Blackstone Audio recording with Ralph Cosham and it's very good. For me, it's a whole different experience hearing it than it is reading it. (For just one thing, I get every word, whereas when I'm reading I sometimes skim here and there.) I still read the text, too, but the double impact of eye and ear is potent. If you don't know Overdrive, see whether your library has it. I can use it from home to access both e-books and audiobooks over the Internet, all free (or, I should say, all paid for with the taxes I pay for library services). You can listen to it on the computer, or transfer it to an ipod or other MP3 player (I use a tiny little sansa mp3 player which plays WMA format files which are about half the size of MP3 (now MP4) files, so they download in half the time and transfer easily using the Overdrive software that you download from your library. It all works like a champ! If you don't have an MP3 player and listen to it on the computer, it will expire after the lending time and you have to redownload it, but my sansa doesn't delete it, so I listen until I'm done and then, being a responsible library patron, delete it from the player (leaving room for more audio books!)
Anyhow, the Blackstone recording of the DC is really very good. There are others, too, but I listened to the samples and liked this one.
Correction. It's not the Cosham Divine Comedy that I liked so much, it's the Naxos Audiobook with Heathcote Williams. That one is the straight work with no commentary. The Cosham one, which is also fine, has a introductory commentary both for the Inferno as a whole and for each canto, which I find a bit distracting for listening to, though once I get to the text it's fine.
Just joined to read the Commedia. In my copy I noted the year 1975, but I never read it. It is remarkable I spent money on Dante at all. That being the time when I felt all museums should be set on fire, meanwhile studying history nonetheless. But I was probably seduced by the prettiness of these three little volumes: bound in red and grey, shiny paper, roughly cut. It's an Italian-Dutch edition from 1943 (Bremer, Kuenen), third printing, originally published 1940. Just imagine, in the war years, in occupied Holland, they sold three printings of the Commedia in just as many years. People sitting behind their blackout blinds, reading classics. And maybe some even took a copy of the Inferno with them to a real hell.I have read a few other books since 1973, so why not Dante? Probably because the concepts of heaven and hell were never very close to my Erasmian heart. And because I felt Dante to be a forbidding figure. And what about someone pretending to love a woman of his own creation? Anyway, here I am, still doubting. But planning a trip through Tuscany and Umbria next spring, I felt I should first descend the circles of hell. Hoping you can help me to come out alive. Don’t expect much of a contribution from me, but I might make a little historical remark from time to time to pay my fare.
Wendelman wrote: "Just joined to read the Commedia. In my copy I noted the year 1975, but I never read it. It is remarkable I spent money on Dante at all..."Welcome to the group!
People sitting behind their blackout blinds, reading classics. And maybe some even took a copy of the Inferno with them to a real hell.
Hmm. "What book would you read if you have only one day to live?" Commedia is a reasonable choice, come to think of it, as least for people with religious beliefs. Why not prepare for your trip and learn more about your next destinations? :)
"And what about someone pretending to love a woman of his own creation?"
Don't we all do that, love someone of our own creation?
Thanks Nemo. But no, I’m sure my capacities would be utterly insufficient to create what and whom I love! And excuse me if I gave the impression that reading Dante during the war was a bad choice. If it was a choice.
Wendelman wrote: "I’m sure my capacities would be utterly insufficient to create what and whom I love! ..."That's an admirable and rare quality actually. If true, it means that you're never an idolater, and never deceive yourself.
Again, welcome to the group. :)
Guilty as charged. I also found a resource I did not see mentioned earlier: http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PI...
Wendelman wrote: "Guilty as charged. I also found a resource I did not saw mentioned earlier: http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PI..."Good resource, Wendelman. Thanks!
Haaze wrote: "Lily wrote: "Haaze, like you, I find an appeal in the Hollander editions. It is fun to attempt to eke out the Italian, but, for me, becomes overwhelmingly wearisome and too time consuming without e..."William Blake's final work was illustrations for DC.
Here's some insight into St. Lucy. (I apologize for the bad pun, but not too heartily.)http://albertis-window.blogspot.com/2...
For those who might not be aware, most saints can be identified in art by certain symbols that accompany them. Lucy's are eyeballs, frequently resting on a plate.
Patrice wrote: "Beautiful blog Larinmtz!"Thanks. I have never been to it before, but it does look like a wealth of art info. I've bookmarked it for when I have more time, but we all know how that goes...
Everyman wrote: "Correction. It's not the Cosham Divine Comedy that I liked so much, it's the Naxos Audiobook with Heathcote Williams. That one is the straight work with no commentary. The Cosham one, which is a..."Thanks for mentioning this, Everyman! I was able to download this to my iPad this morning thanks to my library's subscription to Overdrive. The translation, by Benedict Flynn, is really clear, and Williams's reading excellent.
Laurele wrote: "Everyman wrote: "Correction. It's not the Cosham Divine Comedy that I liked so much, it's the Naxos Audiobook with Heathcote Williams. That one is the straight work with no commentary. The Cosha..."If you get hold of the CDs, they come with written footnotes, so you aren't left completely without. Also there is a CD of background information on Dante and the DC.
From Terry Teachout's blog.
"The translator, let me suggest in passing, must never be frightened of the word 'paraphrase'; it is a bogey of the half-educated. As I have already tried to point out, it is almost impossible to translate a sentence without paraphrasing; it is a paraphrase when you translate 'Comment vous portez-vous?' by 'How are you?'"
Ronald Knox, On Englishing the Bible
"The translator, let me suggest in passing, must never be frightened of the word 'paraphrase'; it is a bogey of the half-educated. As I have already tried to point out, it is almost impossible to translate a sentence without paraphrasing; it is a paraphrase when you translate 'Comment vous portez-vous?' by 'How are you?'"
Ronald Knox, On Englishing the Bible
See this link for a reproduction of "Dante and Virgil," by Eugène Delacroix. http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/cu...
I skimmed the accompanying article on reading an ebook versus a traditional book -- a subject that interests me considerably. Somehow, I never found it compelling, but rather like a thesis that Piper was exploring from every perspective he could conjure. (That the touch of a book has a different human impact than that of an ebook? That is probably an inaccurate and unfair statement of Piper's thesis. But what exactly it was eluded me.)
Lily wrote: "http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/cu......"Thanks for the link Lily! I share your interest and probably spend too much time thinking about the cultural impact of digital books. A very interesting article. I seems as if the media is talking quite a bit about the fiscal cliff lately, but the Slate article brought up a vision of a literary abyss in which the written word descends into an infinite maelstrom. *shivers* I have been acquiring way too many "old" sets of books lately. Perhaps it is this vision that makes me do so.....
Lily wrote: "See this link for a reproduction of "Dante and Virgil," by Eugène Delacroix. http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/cu......"
Thanks, Lily. I don't remember seeing this painting before. I agree with you on the article. The writer seems to be in love with the body rather than the spirit of books.
More on illustrations: See also Rhonda's post 66 under "Inferno 6: Gluttony," where she suggests the following link for Salvador Dali:http://www.lockportstreetgallery.com/...
It is an excellent site for reproductions of the Dali watercolor/woodblock engravings. (I believe this is a site I reached years ago, but I couldn't find it a few weeks ago when I entered Msgs 43 and 46 above. I haven't checked whether the Columbia U or Hollander links will get here as well.) THANKS, Rhonda, for getting us there directly!
Clicking on the title should give a nice sized image on your screen of an individual drawing.
I picked up a couple of books at the library today.
Background/Side reading.
Bits and Pieces I found of interest. (No spoilers.)
(view spoiler)
Background/Side reading.
Bits and Pieces I found of interest. (No spoilers.)
(view spoiler)
Background. "Structure"
"To understand the Inferno ... it is important, first, to understand its structure.
A reader might first expect that the sinners in Hell will be arranged according to the customary medieal hierarchy of the seven deadly sins.
But while that arrangement provides the structure of Dante's Purgatory, it is absent from the Inferno.
In part this is probably because the convention of the seven deadly sins is a Christian construct, and Hell is outside the church entirely.
The organization, therefore, is borrowed from Aristotle's classification of sins in his Nicomachean Ethics."(Ruud, Jay).
"To understand the Inferno ... it is important, first, to understand its structure.
A reader might first expect that the sinners in Hell will be arranged according to the customary medieal hierarchy of the seven deadly sins.
But while that arrangement provides the structure of Dante's Purgatory, it is absent from the Inferno.
In part this is probably because the convention of the seven deadly sins is a Christian construct, and Hell is outside the church entirely.
The organization, therefore, is borrowed from Aristotle's classification of sins in his Nicomachean Ethics."(Ruud, Jay).
Francesca and Paolo.
"According to legend, the handsome Paola was sent to arrange a marriage between Francesca and his crippled brother, Giovanni. Thinking the emissary was the proposed husband, Francesca fell in love at first sight. When he became aware of their affair, Giovanni sought to kill Paolo by a sword thurst that went through Paolo's body and killed Francesca as well. The greiving Giovanni buried them in the same tomb.
That was the legend.
In fact, Giovanni (who was somewhat deformed but a valiant soldier) made a political marriage to Francesda." The 40-year-old Paola was married with two children... The affair was carried on for several years. Giovanni burst into the bedroom and killed both Paola and Francesca (Ruud, Jay).
"According to legend, the handsome Paola was sent to arrange a marriage between Francesca and his crippled brother, Giovanni. Thinking the emissary was the proposed husband, Francesca fell in love at first sight. When he became aware of their affair, Giovanni sought to kill Paolo by a sword thurst that went through Paolo's body and killed Francesca as well. The greiving Giovanni buried them in the same tomb.
That was the legend.
In fact, Giovanni (who was somewhat deformed but a valiant soldier) made a political marriage to Francesda." The 40-year-old Paola was married with two children... The affair was carried on for several years. Giovanni burst into the bedroom and killed both Paola and Francesca (Ruud, Jay).
Francesca and Paolo.
Not a spoiler. But commentary/or interpretation. But it's quite neat... and we're well past this Canto.
(view spoiler)
Not a spoiler. But commentary/or interpretation. But it's quite neat... and we're well past this Canto.
(view spoiler)
www.rcwalton.com/Inferno.pdfAnother set of summaries of the Inferno cantos, with some study questions.
http://www.paradoxplace.com/Perspecti...
"Dante, as a crowd member in 'Paradise' [see link below, standing in the darker coloured cloak] by his contemporary and friend Giotto (1267 - 1337), in the Chapel of the Podesta in the Palazzo del Bargello, Florence. This is the only accurate likeness around, and can lay claim to being one of the earliest real life portraits. Most people who visit the Bargello do not get to the chapel and if they do they mostly walk straight past the wall [see link] without registering it!"
http://www.paradoxplace.com/Perspecti...
Numerous other portraits of Dante are here.
Contemporaries: Dante (c. 1265–1321), Giotto (1267 - 1337), Marco Polo (1254 - 1324)
"Good-looking", "haughty", perhaps "scholarly" are adjectives I would use.
http://dante.ilt.columbia.edu/library...Was looking for something else, but I cite this for the comments (near the middle) on Ulysses and exactly what was the crime of Bolgia 8.
Lily wrote: "http://dante.ilt.columbia.edu/library...... comments (near the middle) on Ulysses..."
"Maria Corti sees Ulysses as a symbol of the radical Aristotelians"
"radical Aristotelians" sounds like an oxymoron. I'm curious who those people are and what they stand for.
Nemo wrote: "... "radical Aristotelians" sounds like an oxymoron. I'm curious who those people are and what they stand for."Do let us know if you find out and it is worth the knowing.
The radical Aristotelians were philosophers who took took Aristotle a little too far for the church, or for Thomas anyway. Siger of Brabant and Boethius of Dacia are names to look for.
The Muslim philosopher Averroes, whom we met in Limbo, was mentioned as a proponent of "radical Aristotelianism" as well, but I haven't read enough of him to form a rough sketch of his ideas.
This article (Wikipedia) outlines some of the Aristotelian and Averroist "heresies" that concerned the medieval church: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condemna...
http://www.ivodavidfineart.com/Divine...These may be somewhere else among our links, but tonight was my first awareness of this still another set of illustrations of Commedia, these by Ivo David. "A painter and poet born in Italy, Ivo David is the founder of the artistic movement 'The Fusionism, '56' originating in Europe." http://www.ivodavidfineart.com/Bio.html
I found the comments in the PDF on his illustrations provide insight into his interpretation of DC and of the extension of its ideas into the modern world. I'll add those on Ulysses in Canto 26 to that discussion later, even though I can't find the illustration itself.
Two Lectures to the Florentine Academy On the Shape, Location and Size of Dante's Infernoby Galileo Galilei, 1588
https://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/mpe...
(Mazzotta in one of his lectures says that Galileo estimates the circumference of Hell to be approximately the size of Florence. )
Classics and the Western Canon
Books mentioned in this topic
Paradiso (other topics)To Hell & Back with Dante: A Modern Reader's Guide to the Divine Comedy (other topics)
Monsters, Gods and Heroes (other topics)
The Drawings By Sandro Botticelli For Dante's Divine Comedy After The Originals In The Berlin Museums And The Vatican (other topics)
Sandro Botticelli: The Drawings for Dante's Divine Comedy (other topics)
More...
Great quote!
In layman's terms, we read for pleasure, and when pleasure ceases, we study because of character?