Dante

An important part of the first canto is the animals that block him from the path to Purgatory and Heaven. It’s a lion, a she-wolf, and a panther. These animals all have different meanings. The panther represents concupiscence, the she-wolf, fraud; and the lion violence. These animals came from Jeremiah 5:6, "Wherefore a lion out of the wood hath slain them, a wolf in the evening hath spoiled them, a leopard watcheth for their cities: every one that shall go out thence shall be taken, because their transgressions are multiplied, their rebellions strengthened". These sins each are a section of Hell, because Hell is split into three parts. Hell blocked him from going anywhere but into Hell itself. These three umbrella sins just dominated his life that much, that he felt they controlled him. It’s really interesting that he chose to present himself in that way.

Close Reading-

            Almost as famous as the opening phrase “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (New International Version, Gen. 1.1) is the first sentence of Dante’s Divine Comedy: “Midway through the journey of our life, I found/ myself in a dark wood, for I had strayed/ from the straight pathway to this tangled ground.” Born in 1265, Dante the Poet wrote as if Dante the Pilgrim was 35, halfway through the life expectancy of 70 as stated in Psalms 90:10: “The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.” (NIV Bible)

It is interesting to note that Dante doesn’t expect himself to be strong enough to live to 80. This trilogy is written in past tense, so he’s either writing as if he didn’t expect to live past 70 back then, or as if he knows that the journey through Hell all the way to God himself and having met souls all across the spectrum of Good and Evil will not make him any stronger. Also, that sentence contains a key part of the Comedy as a whole: the use of the world “our”. This can mean two things. First, that Dante’s journey is something anyone can do, if they have the drive. “Our life” could refer to any reader of the novel, meaning that they could traverse through Hell and back.

It could also simply be referring to the existence of “dual minds” in this novel. One belongs to Dante the Pilgrim. This is the Dante featured in the story that is narrated in the series, the actual character in the book. The other “mind” belongs to Dante the Poet, who narrates the novel. He is looking back, after returning from Heaven, and he is recording his travels. At this point, “our life” could also be a new Dante and an old Dante, in that he has turned over a new leaf, but that he still retains the identity of the old Dante.

 Scholarly video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO2MPVQsHes

Mazzotta explains the three levels of Dante's humble style in this beginning video. High style is sublime and tragic, having a certain sense of aptness, used to talk about kings and other high beings. Medium is elegiac style, which refers to an elegy, a poem for the dead or for mourning. Next is low style,a style of comedy. Dante focuses on this third style the most, in calling it a comedy. The low style is also reflected in Dante's use of Italian as opposed to the normal epic poem language of Latin.