Examples Of Contrapasso In Dante's Inferno

“A severe mercy — the phrase haunted him: a mercy that was as severe as death, a death that was as merciful as love. For it had been death in love, not death of love. Love can die in many ways, most of them far more terrible than physical death” (Mercy Vanaken). Suicide is often seen an act of selfishness because it causes the most pain to the people closest to the victim rather than on the victims themselves. While that may be true in some universes it certainly is not in Dante’s Inferno. Dante’s is an epic poem that describes the relationship between the severity of a sin with the severity of the punishment for those who have committed it.

In Dante’s Inferno punishments are often full of irony, this irony can also be defined as a contrapasso. A contrapasso is a punishment that is justified based on a sin. In Hell they get to experience the pain that they forced on others and get a taste of their own medicine. The punishment in Dante’s Inferno that is the most contrapasso is that of the suicides. The punishment for committing suicide, according to Dante is being transformed into a fragile and deformed tree as squanderers run past breaking off branches. The branches on these trees act as the victim's arms and when broken begin to hemorrhage. There are many reasons that I find this punishment best fitting for suicide, the main reason being that during their lives they wished for death so in death they are being forced to live.

4-6). The color of their leaves represents the dreariness from their previous lives while