Studying “Purgatorio” – Reading 1

"Dante and Virgil," Camille Corot

For the first set of readings, read Purgatorio Cantos I-II. These serve to introduce some of the major themes of Purgatorio: keep an eye out for things like memory, desire, trial, and hope. It will be helpful to us to remember a few preliminary notes that I will review for you now.

Let us spend some time recalling what Dante (“the pilgrim”) has endured so far. When we first encounter him at the beginning of Inferno, the pilgrim is lost in a dark wood and in fear for his life – his eternal life as well as his mortal one. A shade appears to help him, and this shade turns out to be the great Roman poet, Virgil, whom Dante deeply admires. Virgil says that he has been sent by someone in Heaven to rescue the pilgrim, but the journey will be difficult: they must traverse through the depths of Hell, into Purgatory, and then finally he will be able to see his intercessor in Heaven. This intercessor is Beatrice, Dante’s great love, who died some years ago to his immense devastation. Beatrice is now his saintly advocate, and she sends him on this perilous journey to intervene for his sake. Having finished the descent through Hell with his guide, Virgil, the pilgrim and his poetic escort now stand at the beginning of Purgatory. Thus Purgatorio opens.

Purgatory is an island upon which there is an immense mountain to be climbed by the souls that populate it. According to the legend at work here, the island of Purgatory was formed when Satan was cast down from Heaven. Satan fell to the earth, forming the pit of Hell deep within, and the displaced earth forced out from the impact emerged on the other side as the island of Purgatory. Just so we all know, Dante is fully aware that the earth is round (as this fun little video explains). His understanding of the universe is based heavily on the idea of the music of the spheres, and the poetic structure of the cosmos is closely interwoven with its spherical harmony. That is to say, the entire universe is beautiful, ordered, and harmonic. We will talk about this more as we begin to read Purgatorio.

PLEASE NOTE THIS IS THE READING, AND NOT YET THE NOTES ABOUT IT. Read first!

The Divine Comedy is available for free online. The link I have provided allows you to choose the volume (Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso), the canto, and the lines as well as the translation (called “edition”). I recommend the edition labeled “Mandelbaum,” as it is the easiest to read, even though it is not in fact Mandelbaum’s famous translation (which is very difficult). If you want to buy a copy of Dante’s work, I would suggest one called The Portable Dante published by Penguin Classics. It is a good, readable translation.

Studying “Purgatorio” – Introduction (Lent 2012)

Purgatorio Canto 1, Gustave Doré

I am going to be running a little reading group on sections of Dante Alighieri’s Purgatorio from the Divine Comedy during Lent this year. The goal is to see the text as a spiritual help and source of reflection during the Lenten season, a place to form and ask questions about the spiritual life, sin, and redemption. It will help us to locate the importance of penance, and thus also Lent, in Christian spiritual life. In other words, our journey through Purgatorio will assist us in the journey through Lent.

The space here will serve to review my own notes on the topics in the hopes of allowing for others to join in reflection across distances. The reading group and my reflections are not identical – I will not be posting about our actual discussions – but I hope nevertheless to facilitate something like it on the Internet, and my personal notes for either venture will be outlined similarly.

I will be notifying you of our basic plans if you want to follow along. If you desire more commentary or if you have any questions for me, feel free to contact me.

The Author to the Exegete

Shall I write it down for you?
Shall I squeeze it onto a page or two?
Emotions strained through a fragile brain,
transmutated into couplets and refrains:
a pretty poem for you, a recollected instance
of feeling – filtered at a disjunctive distance.

If I complete the transposition,
if through coldness I wrestle affection
into the thoroughly signified and phrased,
if I connote and suggest and insinuate:
will you grasp me then? Will I have shown
myself, will I have made myself known?

A hot pulse translated onto a static page,
warm and red and unmoving and staid,
slick feeling denoted by facile words –
heat cooled into instantiated forms.
Beauty glittering at a sickening remove:
vertigo downsized into poetic proofs.

If so shortened and so summarized, I
succeed in cruelly pouring myself dry –
will you then see what I try to mean?
Will you perceive the painful knots of dreams?
Or will the glossy cool reflect like glass,
and will you only see yourself at last?

—

Anne M. Carpenter