The Divine Comedy. The World Structure and The Role of Virgil Essay

The Divine harlequinade. The World Structure and The Role of Virgil - Essay ExampleThus, there atomic number 18 at least 3 dimensions of Dantes relationship with Ancient Greek and Roman culture the poetical one, that is, the influence of the language and symbolism of the previous ages the residual in world order in Dantes and classic thinkers visions and the most specific one, Dantes relationship with Virgil as outlined in the Divine comedy. This rise addresses all 3 of them. Poetical Aspect Many Dante scholars agree that the most important cultural trait of Classical poetry in the Divine Comedy is its style, that is, its verse, rhetorical topoi, strictness of composition, and the characteristics of genre (Curtius 353-358). Virgil, as well as other figures of ancient writers/rhapsodes such as Lucan and Homer, was the one of the regulated poets whose writing had an imprint of work out poetical systems (Curtius 354). Dante wanted his verse and his vision of afterlife to be system atic and logical. Dantes constructiond of Inferno is even more elaborate than Virgils in the Aeneid (VI), Aeneus travels through only three sectors of Hell, not shaped as circles and surrounded by different basins rather than parts of one system (Virgil). Still, the overall structure is the same it is a descriptive journey with a powerful guide (Sybil in Aeneuss case) beginning in the dark wood and ending on the light mountain top And takes a rising ground, from thence to see / The long procession of his progeny (Aeneid VI.1024). As for merely linguistic influences, Curtius finds numerous Latinisms in the Divine Comedy , such as his use of the river (Fuime) image used to demonstrate the eloquence of Dantes speech as related to Virgils (Curtius 356). almost of these Latinisms are Medieval, not related to Renaissance poetics (Curtius 354). They indicate that Dante perceived Virgils worldview mainly through medieval lens. Thus, his ideas of human nature and the structure of the worl d are different from Virgils and much closer to Christianity. The World Structure The meaning of Hell is strikingly different in the Divine Comedy and the Classic culture. Dantes Hell and Purgatory are designed for sinners, being roughthing like a disciplinary place for corrupted souls thus, it has a strict hierarchy, and every punishment is logically committed with the crime, like the Diviners in Canto XX who are forced to walk with their heads turned back. The punishments are arranged according to the severity of crime, descending into the depth and ending with the quick-frozen circle, like in other medieval literary descriptions of Hell (Turner 87). As the main function of Hell is punishment, the characters are described vividly, in the flesh, and usually with some moral assessment Those spirits, faint and naked, color changd, And gnashd their teeth, soon as the cruel words They heard. God and their parents they blasphemd, The human kind, the place, the time, and seed That did engender them and give them birth (Divine Comedy III.94-98) This is the description of the souls (disembodied) about to be transported by Charon. In Virgils version, it is Charon who provokes disgust the souls of the dead are described in a neutral if not pity way An airy crowd came rushing where he stood, Which filld the margin of the fatal flood Husbands and wives, boys and unmarried maids, And mighty heroes more majestic shades, And youths, intombd before their fathers eyes, With hollow groans, and shrieks, and crippled cries (Aeneid VI.422-427). Virgils vision of the afterlife, like that of many other Ancient Greeks and Romans, is morally neutral its a fate, an important category of Ancient worldview. Like Ovid, Virgil believed that wipeout is a