It is easy to be sidetracked with this Canto 14 in the Purgatorio. In other places, Dante the Poet hits us over the head with obvious lessons and morals. The cure for Pride is to force one to lower one’s eyes to the ground in humility by placing a great weight on one’s back. The punishment for lack of love for God and neighbor is to freeze the sinner in ice, since love is the source of all warmth in the medieval world view.
Envy, however, is far more subtle, at least as presented here by Dante the Poet. There is much to envy, in fact, in this very Canto. The opening is a dramatic tour-de-force, beginning with only an unknown voice asking an unknown other about an unknown visitor to his level. If they cannot see because their eyes are sewn shut, neither can the reader of these first few lines. Opacity is the rule of the day at the start.
1 'Who is this, circling our mountain
"Chi è costui che 'l nostro monte cerchia
2 before he has been given wings by death,
prima che morte li abbia dato il volo,
3 who can open his eyes at will and shut them?'
e apre li occhi a sua voglia e coverchia?"
4 'I don't know who he is but know he's not alone.
"Non so chi sia, ma so ch'e' non è solo;
5 Question him, since you are closer,
domandal tu che più li t'avvicini,
6 and greet him courteously that he may answer.'
e dolcemente, sì che parli, acco'lo."
It is an opening that pulls the reader in immediately, showing us the power of Dante’s dramatic and theatrical art.
For those of us who are well versed in poetry through the ages and who appreciate its rhythm and structure, there are passages in this Canto that simply sing with craft, even if the topic is not beautiful. The listing of the leaders and families in latter part of the Canto is brilliantly written, and some of the commentary I came across acknowledges this. Professor Prue Shaw reminds us that the roll call of names in vss. 97-111 is potent poetry, even if it is only a list of names.
When I studied Chaucer with the great Princeton professor John Fleming, we were required to read ‘The Consolation of Philosophy’ by Boethius. I recognized immediately where Dante the Poet got the analogy of humanity becoming beasts as the Arno flows further down toward the sea. It is right out of Boethius, Book 4; chapter iii. In the Medieval worldview, the more like a beast one becomes shows how far one has fallen from being made in the image of God. Dante the Poet puts this in the mouth of Guido del Duca in vss 28-54: from hogs to whelps to dogs to wolves to foxes. I can’t tell you how PROUD I felt (uh-oh…) to have unearthed his sources and appreciated his artistry. I surely WISHED I could write like this and be as subtle as he(uh-oh again…). Hmmm… am I missing something here in this Canto? Maybe it isn’t all about ART and PHILOSOPHY. Ya think?
Many forget that ultimately, the Commedia is still, at its core, a Christian work about the spiritual life in Christ, even though he uses all the resources of his world to accomplish this: philosophy, mythology, politics, theology, etc. This Canto is steeped in the sin of Envy. There is a proverb that reflects this Canto: “Envy eats nothing, except its own heart.” Damn right. And it begins in the very first few lines. Guido is already envious about this dude who can walk around and actually SEE, opening and shutting his eyes while Guido is unable to do so. Remember from Canto 13, everyone has their eyes sewn shut with wire because it is so often through the eyes that one becomes envious.
1 'Who is this, circling our mountain
"Chi è costui che 'l nostro monte cerchia
2 before he has been given wings by death,
prima che morte li abbia dato il volo,
3 who can open his eyes at will and shut them?'
e apre li occhi a sua voglia e coverchia?"
Guido ‘looks’ at all with a poisoned glance, even if it is represented at a slant by Dante the Poet. Guido wants to know where Dante the Pilgrim is from and who he is. When he discovers that he is from the valley of the Arno, we get the poisonous and vicious retort: “that accursed and ill-omened ditch!” - la maladetta e sventurata fossa. [vs. 51] There is nothing Guido mentions that smacks of light and health and hope. His eyes are shut in more ways than just physically, and it is all rooted in envy. This dude is going to be at this level for a long, long time, until the sin of envy is rooted out and drained from him.
Dante the Poet then has Guido launch into an extended list of all those great people who USED to be in Tuscany, but are no longer around and, heaven help us, only idiots are to be found in Tuscany now. They just don’t make them like they used to, do they? [Hmmm, does this remind anyone of our current spate of politicians and presidential candidates as compared to the past choices?] This, however, is regular foil used by poets and writers through the centuries. Ubi Sunt is Latin for ‘where have they gone’ with an eye toward the fact that all the current characteristics and choices are crap.
“The world is passing through troublous times. The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint. They talk as if they knew everything, and what passes for wisdom with us is foolishness with them. As for the girls, they are forward, immodest and unladylike in speech, behavior and dress.”
No, this is not about the Millennials, or Gen-X or even the Baby Boomers. It was written by Peter the Hermit in 1274, almost 740 years ago.
Invidious comparisons and complaints ooze out of this conversation at every point. Guido has to put down others in order to make himself feel good. He even attacks his companion in suffering by revealing that some of his family will take part in selling off humans and taking part in their murder. Envy forces one to destroy others and their reputation so that, even if one does not have what they do, then at least one can bring them down a peg or two. Guido has a long way to go to rid himself of envy. It was Eubie Blake that said: “Never trust anyone who wants what you've got. Friend or no, envy is an overwhelming emotion.” Amen to that.
There's an old legend about a greedy man and an envious man who were walking along when they were overtaken by a stranger who got to know them. And after a bit he said, as he departed from them, that he would give each of them a gift. Whoever made a wish first would get what he wanted, and the other would get a double portion of what the first had asked for. The greedy man knew what he wanted, but he was afraid to make his wish because he wanted the double portion for himself and didn't want the other to get it. And the envious man felt the same way, and he was also unwilling to wish first. After a while the stronger of the two grabbed the other by the throat and said he would choke him to death unless he made his wish. And at that the other man said, "Very well. I make my wish -- I wish to be made blind in one eye." Immediately he lost the sight of one eye, and his companion went blind in both. Both eyes of every person are sewn shut on this level.
Let’s not forget, of course, that the area around Tuscany, and Florence in particular, is indeed a poisonous nest of vipers, rife with backstabbers and tragedy. Dante the Poet is exiled from his beloved Florence as a result of this toxic culture, so yes, indeed, things are bad. And yet, as we go through the Commedia, Dante the Poet recognizes that he has played his own part in creating the very culture which has exiled him and caused such sorrow. There is mutual culpability here, says Dante the Poet. He comes to the place where he cannot caricature the bad people and idolize the good ones. All have ownership in the current reality. Guido does not understand this, at all. Dante the Pilgrim will grow into this knowledge, and if each of us has the patience to journey with him through the rest of the Commedia, we too will grow in compassion and self-awareness.
NATURE OR NURTURE Before we leave Canto 14, I want to raise a question that will be addressed in the next few Cantos. It is, in fact, a hidden jewel in the midst of Guido’s ranting and raving. It is a two line question that is crucial to us all. Why, in every society, do so many flee integrity, honesty and truth as if it were a snake? Is character flaw that built into us like Dickens created Uriah Heep, or is it a result of a fallen world and a sinful society? Guido puts it succinctly: 37 'all flee from virtue as if it were a snake, vertù così per nimica si fuga 38 an enemy to all, whether some curse da tutti come biscia, o per sventura 39 is on the place or evil habits goad them on, del luogo, o per mal uso che li fruga: So are all these people evil at heart, and would they be evil no matter where they lived or in what century they were born? Or, is it merely bad luck that they were born into a vicious place that forced them to be evil just to survive? How easy is it for those of us born into middle class America to condemn and judge the street urchins who rob and brutalize others simply in order to live into the next week? It is not an arbitrary scenario. In Guido’s conversation, he wonders is it either because of the “ill fortune of the place” (“sventura / del luogo”) or because of the “evil habit” (“mal uso”) that forms them and makes them bad. This is in fact a profoundly serious question about free will, and Dante the Poet knows it. It will come up again. Soon. |