Allusions in the Inferno The inferno takes the reader through Dante’s haunting journey in hell. On this journey Dante is guided by Virgil through nine circles that make up hell. Hell is shaped like a tunnel, and the further down it descends the worse the punishment is in each circle. Sinners are placed in the circles according to their sins. The more offensive the nature of the sin, the worse the punishment is, and the further down the tunnel is where the circle is placed. Dante illustrates his concerns and frustrations with the morality of his fellow countrymen and Christians by creating a specific circle and punishment for each type of sinner. He also shows his own personal belief that Jesus Christ is the only way to salvation. Allusions …show more content…
In using allusions he is able to vent his frustration by denouncing certain important figures during his time without any reprimand. Most of these character were fellow Italians. Dante chose these people to represent all those who are corrupt in politics. This being an especially personal issue for Dante because of his unjust exile from his beloved city devised by those in power. In canto XXVIII of the inferno Dante and Virgil are in the ninth circle of hell. There is where the sowers of discord lay. They’re punishment was to mutilated and drug around in pieces and bit to fit their sin of splitting apart what was intended to be united. Bertrand de Born and Mosca dei Lamberti are two of the political allusions mentioned in this canto. While they are there a shade cried “remember me:/ I am Bertrand de Born and it was I/ who set the young king onto mutiny, / son against father, rather against son.” (28.133-36) this particular shade had to walk around carrying its own head as a lantern to guide him through hell for all eternity. Showing the constant reminder of God’s justice above all. Just as he chose to split apart the young king and his father, he is now split apart himself. “An eye for an eye to all eternity.” (28.42) Along with its consistency in punishment this allusion helps warn the living to not go against what God has willed to be united. In this canto he also uses another political allusion to warn the …show more content…
Judas who was once an Apostle to Jesus Christ betrayed him by informing Chief priest who Jesus was. Although Dante places Judas, Marcus Julius Brutus and Gaius Cassius in the same chasm which shows how closely important and serious betrayal to the church and to the state are to him, Judas is damned to the worst punishment of all. Which is only just because he betrayed Jesus, our Lord and Savior, the Son of God. Such betrayal justly deserves to be the “soul that suffers the most.” (34.61) This allusion being both political and religious serves more than one purpose. Like the others it helps to warn people to not commit these same crimes and sins so that they don’t have the same misfortune as these famous figured did. The vivid descriptions of their punishment serve to make a strong impact on readers so that they don’t easily forget the torment that such sinners suffer.
Through these and many other allusions found throughout Dante’s Inferno the reader witnesses the strong sentiments Dante has towards those who sin against God, as well as those who commit acts of betrayal. By using such allusion Dante allows the reader to engage more easily because of the continuity created in using such literary device. Through the allusions the constant theme of God’s just being the ultimate truth and Jesus is the only way to salvation is clearly
Descending from the first to the second level of Hell, Dante witnesses the transition to greater agony and greater punishment for the damned. Overwhelmed by the sinner’s harrowing cries and the extensive list of seemingly innocent souls given to him by Virgil, Dante beckons for two lovers to approach him, desperate for some sense of comfort. The souls are known to be the historical figures Francesca de Rimini and her lover Paolo, forever trapped in the circle of lust due to their sinful adultery. Through her words spoken to Dante, Francesca shows how she feels she has been unjustly punished and is deserving of others’ sorrow, and Dante, despite his awareness that she is a sinner, pities her. A close reading of this passage is necessary to better understand Dante’s internal battle with showing compassion where it is not deserved and Francesca’s incessant denial of her sins.
When one tends to think of Inferno they tend to think of Hell and the fiery and evil place that it is. They think of all the terrible deeds that have been committed to put one there or the terrible things being done to the wicked people. Something that would slip most people's mind and really did not enter mine as I was reading it was the fact that a major theme of the book is actually love. Love is what motivated Dante to make this journey in the first place. Love is what kept him going when he wanted to give up. Love is the reason that Hell was created in the first place. God loved all his children so he created a place to punish those who deserved it.
Hell, it isn 't a place where anyone really wants to end up, well permanently that is. Dante Alighieri however really enjoys taking a “trip” to hell to teach us and enlighten us on the ins and outs and where exactly all the sinners end up. Alighieri tackles this daunting task of making all of hell fit into a small pocket-able, yet very enjoyable story by using a variety of literary styles and devices. However, let’s take a look at one specifically, symbolism. This is one of the most prevalent and obvious device, but it is the most important because it not only makes the story easier for the reader to understand, as well as make the book as enjoyable as it was.
He had meticulously described it to illuminate the Bible’s interpretation, especially for the degrees of sin. For instance, during his journey through Hell, he had traveled through nine rings, each containing different forms of sin. Within the rings, Dante had met individuals who were cast into Hell for adultery and heretical beliefs. However, Dante had not only described who he saw, but also the quality of their lives in Hell. D’Epiro states, “The poet’s most famous portrait of flawed grandeur is that of Ulysses, whose sins as a false counselor have caused him to be enveloped in flames like a human torch.” (99) Dante had wanted to put an emphasis on how perilous Hell was because of the time period’s grasp on religion in 1320.
In the Inferno we follow the journey of Dante as he wanders off the path of moral truth and into Hell. The Virgin Mary and Santa Lucia ask Beatrice, Dante’s deceased love, to send some help. Thus, Virgil comes to the rescue and essentially guides Dante through Hell and back to the mortal world from which he came. However, things begin to seem kind of odd. When reading the Inferno one may begin to question the way Dante describes Hell and the things that occur within, or even the things we have always believed about Hell. Despite the way it is described and well known in western civilization, Hell is not at all how we expect it to be because of Dante's use of irony throughout this poetic masterpiece.
As Bloomfield stated, it is only how we interpret the words in an allegory that matters, each person can interpreted it in a slightly different way and allegories are most often personalized by a reader. Dante’s Inferno allegory is present throughout the entire poem. From the dark wood to the depths of Dante’s hell he presents the different crimes committed in life as they could be punished in death. One of the first punishments we observe comes from the fifth circle of Dante’s hell, the wrathful and the sullen, as the author expresses his thoughts of the fitting consequence with each sin.
“If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth reading or do things worth writing.” This maxim applies to the poet Dante Alighieri, writer of The Inferno in the 1300s, because it asserts the need to establish oneself as a contributor to society. Indeed, Dante’s work contributes much to Renaissance Italy as his work is the first of its scope and size to be written in the vernacular. Due to its readability and availability, The Inferno is a nationalistic symbol. With this widespread availability also comes a certain social responsibility; even though Dante’s audience would have been familiar with the religious dogma, he assumes the didactic role of illustrating his own version of Christian justice and emphasizes the need for a personal understanding of divine wisdom and contrapasso, the idea of the perfect punishment for the crime. Dante acts as both author and narrator, completing a physical and spiritual journey into the underworld with Virgil as his guide and mentor. The journey from darkness into light is an allegory full of symbolism, much like that of Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, which shows a philosopher’s journey towards truth. Therefore, Dante would also agree with the maxim, “Wise men learn by others’ harms; fools scarcely by their own,” because on the road to gaining knowledge and spiritual enlightenment, characters who learn valuable lessons from the misfortunes of others strengthen their own paradigms. Nonetheless, the only true way to gain knowledge is to experience it first hand. Dante’s character finds truth by way of his own personal quest.
Moreover, Dante, the narrator of the Inferno, has succeeded in not only telling the frightening story of the Inferno, but also pointing out the importance of the relationship between human’s sins and God’s retribution, using the monsters as the symbols for each kind of sin and its punishment throughout the progress of the story, which teaches his readers to be well aware of their sins through the literature – a part of humanities; the disciplines that teach a man to be a human.
Dante’s The Divine Comedy illustrates one man’s quest for the knowledge of how to avoid the repercussions of his actions in life so that he may seek salvation in the afterlife. The Divine Comedy establishes a set of moral principles that one must live by in order to reach paradise. Dante presents these principles in Inferno, where each level of Hell has people suffering for the sins they committed during their life. As Dante gets deeper into Hell, the degrees of sin get progressively worse, as do the severity of punishment.
Seeing as this work was written by Dante, and the journey is taken by Dante, he has a unique opportunity to judge his fellow man and decide how they will be punished. He also gets to place his enemies in hell, forever besmirching their names for generations to remember. Perhaps unknowing to Dante, that is worse than any of the punishments that he placed his enemies in. The reality of The Inferno is unlikely and therefore these punishments are nothing but a fictiona...
Dante’s Inferno presents the reader with many questions and thought provoking dialogue to interpret. These crossroads provide points of contemplation and thought. Dante’s graphic depiction of hell and its eternal punishment is filled with imagery and allegorical meanings. Examining one of these cruxes of why there is a rift in the pits of hell, can lead the reader to interpret why Dante used the language he did to relate the Idea of a Just and perfect punishment by God.
Dante's "Inferno" is full of themes. But the most frequent is that of the weakness of human nature. Dante's descent into hell is initially so that Dante can see how he can better live his life, free of weaknesses that may ultimately be his ticket to hell. Through the first ten cantos, Dante portrays how each level of his hell is a manifestation of human weakness and a loss of hope, which ultimately Dante uses to purge and learn from. Dante, himself, is about to fall into the weaknesses of humans, before there is some divine intervention on the part of his love Beatrice, who is in heaven. He is sent on a journey to hell in order for Dante to see, smell, and hear hell. As we see this experience brings out Dante's weakness' of cowardice, wrath and unworthiness. He is lead by Virgil, who is a representation of intellect. Through Dante's experiences he will purge his sins.
Inferno, the first part of Divina Commedia, or the Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri, is the story of a man's journey through Hell and the observance of punishments incurred as a result of the committance of sin. In all cases the severity of the punishment, and the punishment itself, has a direct correlation to the sin committed. The punishments are fitting in that they are symbolic of the actual sin; in other words, "They got what they wanted." (Literature of the Western World, p.1409) According to Dante, Hell has two divisions: Upper Hell, devoted to those who perpetrated sins of incontinence, and Lower Hell, devoted to those who perpetrated sins of malice. The divisions of Hell are likewise split into levels corresponding to sin. Each of the levels and the divisions within levels 7,8, and 9 have an analogous historical or mythological figure used to illustrate and exemplify the sin.
... Moreover, such belief in human reason signifies Dante's hope towards a bright society and the pursuit of God’s love as the other part of self-reflection. In conclusion, a great deal of tension and contrast between “dark” and “light” in The Inferno helps us to explore Dante’s self portrait—he fears dangerous desires and sinful darkness, but shows much courage and hope towards life since he nevertheless follows his guide Virgil to dive into horrible Hell. As shown in Canto I, such emotional reaction to dark and light symbols lays a great foundation for developing Dante’s broad and universal traits as his journey progresses.
... without someone Heavenly to guide them. Dante shows that Virgil usually gets what he wants throughout the Inferno, but is now restricted by his lack of faith. He shows that even though Virgil is one of the greatest poets and a huge role model for Dante, Virgil can also fail. Dante has Virgil illustrate his imperfections to the character of Dante, because it is vital for Dante to understand that he must be mindful of God and sin to avoid the fate of Virgil. Virgil cannot ever move on to Heaven from Limbo as he cannot completely put his faith in God, so he guides Dante to do so. This growing faith in God allows Dante to grow more judgmental of sinners as they progress on their journey, as opposed to his sympathy for sinners before. By having his hero fail, Dante learns that he must avoid the mistakes of his guide, Virgil, by understanding the divine justice of God.