#la commedia

[queenforthirteen]

[most-sane-classicist]

WHAT ARE THEY ABOUT TO DO TO MY CHILD

Ok so I watched the trailer it doesn't seem bad and might raise some awareness about Dante in non European countries.

Relieved when I found it wasn't like a commedia adaptation because that would inevitably suck.

Probably won't watch but ehh still

[ancientsstudies]

Illustrations from Early Printed Editions of the Commedia.

[hilarymantels]

from “In Unknowability as Love: The Theology of Dante’s Commedia” by Vittorio Montemaggi 

[photo id: 

“Poetry, for Dante, is one of the highest expressions language. And, give his understand of language as both a physical and a rational phenomenon, one can see why Dante might have regarded poetry, with its conscious foregrounding of the physical as much as the rational features of language, as among the noblest forms of communication. Given the importance ascribed by Dante to the embodied nature of human beings, moreover, one can see why he might have ben profoundly attracted not simply by poetry but specifically by narrative poetry, with the possibility this entails for the representation of the ways in which language not only speaks, but also generates community; and of the ways in which language not only expresses understanding but embodies understanding as individual human beings move and interact in space and time (and, in the Empyrean, even beyond space and time); and finally, of the ways in which language might be related not only to saying and knowing but also to loving. end id] 

[forgotten-daydreamer]

《Amor, ch’a nullo amato amar perdona,

mi prese del costui piacer sì forte,

che, come vedi, ancor non

m’abbandona》

[most-sane-classicist]

I'm starting to read Divine Comedy, since I'm studying to join English Literature major and I need to improve my English etc.

Any tips or something I should look forward to?

alright

so first It's a good idea to have a good understanding of the classical world generally because the whole thing is full of references (specifically to the iliad and the aeneid because dante fucking loved the aeneid and directly quotes it many times throughout), which i am sure you already do.

It's important to note that dante was a patriot, like seriously, he loves florence and he loves rome and so there is naturally bucketloads of roman and florentine propaganda to be looking out for. You will also quickly understand the people he doesnt like (ie. the greeks and certain florentine families i will touch on in a sec) as you read the inferno.

secondly it would be a good idea to understand the context in which the context was written, specifically the last 150 years or so of florentine/holy roman politics SPECIFICALLY the conflict between the Guelfs and the Ghibellines and THEN the splitting of the Guelphs into white and black. I have a few good books on this but there is a great wikipedia article here that should give you the gist, aswell as the wikipedia article on dante here. All this should be a good contextual basis for understanding the contemporary and classical references in the poem. A couple more things to note:

Guido Cavalcanti one of the most important figures in dante's life is not present in the poem. It is believed dante purposefully backdated the poem to just before he died so he would not have to put Cavalcanti in hell (Cavalcanti was an atheist and would have gone to circle one of inferno). We do however see Cavalcanti's father whose name i have forgotten in circle six (heresy). Cavalcanti is also mentioned i believe in purg. 11 or 12 (one of the two)

look out for all your faves and the fun ways they get punished. like basically everyone from classical mythology is there.

Love is a big theme throughout. All terraces of purgatory are perversions of love (eg. lust is love overzealous, greed and gluttony are love misdirected, sloth is too little love). It also is the main theme when dante sees god: the last line of para. 33 is "The love that moves the sun and other stars". Also both para. and inf. and maybe purg. end in the word 'stars' if that means anything interesting. Also beatrice is a metaphor for love (cf. vita nuova) and acts as a guide.

Inferno is funny as hell, eg. look out for canto i believe somewhere around 20, punisment of the corrupt politicians with the demons and the lake of tar, the dialogue between the demons and their names are funny ash.

The dark wood and the three animals at the start of the poem are believed to all be metaphorical (the animals are lust pride and greed iirc, the dark wood is a metaphor for a sinful life), and virgil's appearance can represent education.

have fun really getting into the details, dante writes beautifully, and can go from grand narrative writing like that of virgil or homer to beautiful descriptive writing like ovid seamlessly.

Hope you enjoy it. I'm happy to answer asks about more specific sections of the poem as you go through it!!!!

[most-sane-classicist]

Beatriz in the Divine Comedy of Dante 4. If you could put this character in any other media, be it a book, a movie, anything, what would you put them in?

i mean I'd probably have to say dark (because I'm planning a commedia/dark crossover fic), I think she fits in the setting quite well and would figure out the (SPOILERS FOR DARK) time loop etc pretty quickly and could act as a figure like claudia/Eva/older jonas in the narrative just as she acted as a guide for dante. The whole like, thing that she is really screams dark to me.

[most-sane-classicist]

MOOTS please help me i was reblogging a post that said "you are now legally obligated to refer to the commedia as something other than self insert fanfic" and i was writing a fucking ESSAY in the tags about how much i agreed and. MY LAPTOP DIED. I've lost it. i think it was from a moot with a lightly coloured pfp but im looooking for the postttt