WEBVTT

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Prof: We are going to
try to finish with

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Inferno today and I would
like to look at the last Cantos

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XXX, XXXI, XXXII maybe a little
bit, XXXIII for sure,

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and there are a couple of
details in XXXIV.

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From one point of view,
I'll be talking about Dante's

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tragic mode at the bottom of
Hell.

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This is--I hope to argue with
you that--I will be arguing

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exactly, this is a tragic
representation.

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As soon as I say that,
you might wonder,

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you probably should wonder,
about the difficulty of such an

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enterprise.

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And the difficulty of the
enterprise has to do,

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first of all,
with the fact that this is a

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comedy.

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So that difficulty should go
away in the sense that the

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tragic is really part not an
end,

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not a final vision,
but part of a larger discourse

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that Dante will go into,
which is a comical idea.

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He really has this idea of a
comical vision,

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even of the divinity and
certainly of the cosmos.

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Comical, in the sense that it's
really the feast,

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the feast--in classical times,
it would be the feast of the

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gods.

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Here is the redemptive,
happy, harmonious sense of the

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whole.

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That's one of the difficulties.

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The other difficulty
that--about this mode of the

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tragic is that the--
within the Christian vision

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that Dante--
that sort of shapes Dante's

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poem, it's very difficult to
locate the tragic:

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there is no such a thing as a
Christian tragedy.

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Though one might say,
and I will say here,

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just to sort of give you a
sense of how nuanced the issue

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maybe,
is that within that vision,

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within that Christian vision,
we are always told that the

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only thing we know of God's
presence in history is the

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Crucifixion.

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There's the story of the dying
god, the story of the suffering

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of the divinity itself.

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It is not, once again,
a final vision.

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So there's a theological
problem that he has to confront

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and there is also an aesthetic
problem, a larger aesthetic

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problem.

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To really clarify these issues,
rather than just telling you

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that all this comes from--I will
look at these cantos from one

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point view.

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The point of view of Dante's
writing a particular text,

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a text about language.

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So it's really going to be
about language and tragedy,

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in the belief that this is
exactly Dante's insight about

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what the tragic may be.

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Let me tell you--I have to go a
little bit outside of the text

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for a while--
so that when I point out

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details here that we'll talk
about in other texts you will

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see what I mean.

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You know--this is a sort of
also a little bit of a

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recapitulation for you--you know
that Dante goes into exile in

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1302.

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By that time,
he had written only one book,

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an autobiographical book that
had he--the Vita nuova,

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the New Life.

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Had he written only that book,
he would still be known as one

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of the great poets of the Middle
Ages,

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but he would not really be
known for more than that.

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It's a little bit of a
self-enclosure,

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a lyrical poem,
self-enclosed:

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it's about,
as you recall,

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a kind of sense that the self
is absolute,

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that love is an absolute itself.

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It does not allow for the
intrusion of anything within its

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own orbit and its perimeter and
Dante finishes it off with a

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vision,
realizing that he has to do

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other things in order to go on
writing.

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He just doesn't write much at
that point.

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He may be writing some songs.

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He is involved in political
life, in the footsteps of his

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teacher,
Brunetto Latini,

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and hoping that his life will
really be very different from

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Brunetto Latini.

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Ironically, it is not,
because actually it's even more

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tragic than Brunetto Latini's
life,

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because Brunetto Latini is
politically involved in the

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history of Florence.

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He will experience exile,
but he will return to Florence

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enough to even go on teaching
Dante.

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He has written encyclopedic
texts, like the

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autobiographical allegories
about his life.

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Dante will go into exile in
1302 and the first thing that he

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writes is a treatise on language
which is called On the Vulgar

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Tongue.

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It's a text that--written from
the perspective of exile,

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very much like the Divine
Comedy,

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because, as I repeat,
Dante will never go back to

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Florence.

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The reasons why he writes this
kind of text--it's written in

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Latin--the reasons are very
unclear, also because he never

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finishes it.

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I'm going to suggest to you
that there are good reasons why

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he could never finish it,
but he wrote two books.

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We don't even know how many he
had conceived of writing.

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What is this text about?

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Let me give you a little bit of
a summary of the text and then

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you will see how it will go on
reappearing in Dante's poem,

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the final cantos of
Inferno,

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where in effect,
he rewrites,

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he writes and gives a whole--
a sense of the wholeness of

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this text and the difficulties
of--

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and he will share with us his
sense of the difficulties why

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that tract could never have been
finished.

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At any rate it starts,
it's called the De vulgari

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eloquentia as it deals with
the origin of the vulgar

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tongues.

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He starts very much like
medieval treatises start with--

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from a metaphysical standpoint,
from the very high:

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what does human language do,
is language something human and

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the answer that he gives is yes
and no.

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It is human because we are the
only ones who do speak,

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though he makes room for
animals, also occasionally

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speaking in a human voice and
being understood by human

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beings,
making sounds that are--and

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he's not talking about parrots.

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He's talking about miraculous
biblical scenes.

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He starts by saying the angels
do not speak.

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They don't use the language we
do.

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They communicate--Lucifer for
instance, he communicates,

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but he communicates with the
other angels or with God

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intuitively.

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There is a kind of--so there is
a reality that escapes the human

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language,
the language that we use,

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there are some things happening
that we do not have.

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Then the language is--it's only
human and yet,

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it's not human because it's
actually a gift.

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We couldn't really make it on
our own;

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it's really God's gift.

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This is the metaphysical
premise.

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Who was the first--who are the
first people to speak?

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He goes on: Adam and Eve in the
Garden of Eden.

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That's biblical enough;
I think it's fairly clear.

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What was the first language
that they spoke?

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Hebrew.

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Hebrew is acknowledged as the
primal language and he will even

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go on so far as to say that
Hebrew is never really

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extinguished by,
for instance,

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either the fall of man,
of mankind, or by the building

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of the Tower of Babel and the
whole question of Nimrod.

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There's a whole story about who
this Nimrod is--

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the famous biblical giant who
built the Tower of Babel,

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an act which he even--he,
Dante, but this is very much in

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the tradition of the so-called
patristic writings--

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we'll see as the counter to the
descent of the word,

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or the redemptive event of the
word made flesh,

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is really the counter to this
human effort;

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this ascent in pride of Nimrod
to try to bridge the gap between

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earth and heaven.

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And the effort to that fails.

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He will go on acknowledging
Hebrew, but I must say,

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not only he says that it
survives the story of Nimrod,

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he says it has never really
disappeared.

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He takes, and I'm only
qualifying it,

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what we would call an
ahistorical viewpoint.

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It was almost as if Hebrew is
accepted from--

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it does not belong to the flow
of history and the reality of

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the mutations to which all
things--

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all sublunary things--are prone
and are vulnerable:

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Hebrew is excepted from it.

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I stress this fact because I'm
going to come back to this,

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maybe toward the end of the
term, when we're going to read

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Paradiso XXVI,
where Dante meets Adam,

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and there blatantly,
he changes his mind.

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It is as if something has
intervened in between the

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writing of the De vulgari
eloquentia and the encounter

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with Adam,
when Adam says,

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look, the Hebrew language I
spoke completely,

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vanished as soon as I ate of
the fruit--

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of the forbidden fruit of the
tree.

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Dante goes on and says there's
no trace of the original

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language.

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That is to say,
in Paradise, Dante's

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ready to historicize the
question of human language,

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but not in this treatise of the
De vulgari eloquentia.

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He goes on describing the
descent of the word,

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so it's a theology of language
and then Book I ends and he

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moves on to Book II.

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In Book II, Dante gives a
completely different--takes a

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different direction in this
treatise.

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He starts talking,
not about the grammar of

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language,
what we can call the grammar of

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language,
that is to say the ordering,

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how this language was ordered--
that's what I mean by grammar.

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Of course it's a word that
explains letters,

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correct uses of things,
but also the ordering of a

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certain reality.

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He talks now about rhetoric and
he becomes almost a theorist of

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poetry and style.

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He goes on explaining,
for instance,

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he goes on wondering:
what are the three styles of

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writing poetry?

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And that you know,
because I have been mentioning

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some of them.

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You may recall the high style,
the medium style,

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the middle style,
and the low style;

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the style of comedy,
the style of tragedy and the

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style of the elegy,
the middle style,

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the elegiac style.

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He even suggests that style
should never really be thought

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of as a pure ornamentation.

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Some of us maybe we do whatever
we think about that:

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so and so has style.

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We all remember the phrase that
the style is the man,

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the character;
but sometimes we say,

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well that guy writes with
style, meaning that he has brio.

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He has a particular gift in
pulling together words and

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writing sentences.

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Dante sort of implies that
style is really a mode of

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knowledge.

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In the measure in which he says
there's a high style for high

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reality and the middle style for
the middle reality--

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the mixed world,
the elegiac world and then a

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low style for the comical world.

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He really says that if you
really want to understand those

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who are far below:
the fisherman,

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for instance,
or the clowns,

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you cannot really give them
the--

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treat them with the decorum
with which you treat the kings.

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Kings speak differently,
the sublime kind of language.

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Do you see what I'm saying?

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There is an idea that style
becomes an instrument of

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knowledge.

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He goes on describing the
theory of the song,

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which is the greatest poetic
lyrical form and it's the song

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because it's a way of bringing
out the music of the language.

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The music--Dante's
response--this is a little

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historical detail,
it's responding to a poetic

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revolution that had taken place
within--

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in Sicily at the court of
Frederick II.

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would be writing,
composing poetry,

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and would accompany their songs
with the lute,

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The Sicilians had divided those
two modes.

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It was possible to write poetry
in and of itself,

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without the accompaniment of
music,

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in the persuasion that the art
of poetry was the effort to

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bring out the inherent harmony
of the language.

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He discusses the song;
he discusses themes:

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what are the great themes of
poetry and we alluded to that

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with Bertran de Born,
because Dante says Bertran de

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Born was the greatest in writing
war poetry.

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The other themes of course are
rectitude--

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the rectitude of the will,
that is to say,

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a sense of the ethical:
what are the ethical directions

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that one should take?

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The word direction and
rectitude, they really have the

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same etymology.

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Then also love poems.

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So this is the way he precedes.

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He defines poetry, by the way.

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He ends with a great definition
of poetry: that poetry is that

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art that combines music--the art
of music--and rhetoric together

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and he ends there.

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It's unfinished.

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Dante will go on writing other
things,

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for instance,
a philosophical text about

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ethics,
which he also will leave

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unfinished and then will go on
writing the political text De

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Monarchia,
etc., which he finishes.

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This is the preamble to what we
are going to talk about today.

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I think that the best way to
begin is to tell you,

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since I'll be talking mainly
about tragedy and language,

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I really want to tell you how
much Dante retrieves of the

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De vulgari eloquentia.

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For instance,
and I'm not going to be--

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really giving you a lot of
details,

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but some, so that you can be
persuaded about this--

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that there's really a
deliberate pattern.

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This is a deliberate
retrospective view that he takes

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of his past, of a failure of his
own, of a certain way of--why

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does one fail?

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What is so unaccomplishable
about a particular task that--

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I'm using the words that Nimrod
uses for his own Tower of

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Babel--
I realize that it was an

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unaccomplishable task.

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And I find myself using those
words for Dante's earlier effort

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in writing on the vulgar tongue.

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Some connections between the
treatise and these lower--the

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cantos of lower Hell.

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Where are we by the way?

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We haven't talked about that,
we got to talk about these are

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the cantos of the lower Hell:
we are in the general area of

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fraud.

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You remember that, right?

15:57.279 --> 15:58.659
We saw violence.

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Now we see fraud,
but if you recall Canto XI

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where the map of--
the ethical map of

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Inferno had been given,
Dante distinguishes between the

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sins of fraud and the sins of
treachery.

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Treachery is a subdivision of
fraud because fraud can be

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rhetoricians,
falsifiers in general,

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flatterers, etc.

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These are the--but treachery is
worse than that.

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That's where we are now.

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We're in the realm of treachery.

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Treachery--the treacherous
sinners are those who engage in

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a deceptive violation of the
trust others place in us.

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This is not necessarily true
for all fraudulent people.

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There's those who can
perpetrate a fraud on you

16:47.375 --> 16:50.725
without even knowing you or
without even having anything to

16:50.726 --> 16:51.646
do with you.

16:51.649 --> 16:54.469
The question of treachery is
different.

16:54.470 --> 17:00.360
It implies a violation of what
Dante calls the erasure of the

17:00.356 --> 17:04.376
bonds of love,
because it implies friends,

17:04.380 --> 17:07.030
family, country,
hosts.

17:07.028 --> 17:10.168
I think, for instance,
Macbeth would belong to this

17:10.174 --> 17:13.444
type of--the tragedy of
Macbeth--would belong to this

17:13.444 --> 17:15.274
type of ethical judgment.

17:15.269 --> 17:19.949
The erasure of the bonds of
love and nature:

17:19.951 --> 17:26.051
it is as if the treacherous
sinners are really those who,

17:26.047 --> 17:30.177
in betraying,
they really betray nature

17:30.183 --> 17:31.603
itself.

17:31.598 --> 17:34.868
It is as if something is being
said about that,

17:34.865 --> 17:38.555
they annihilate all possible
ties within a community,

17:38.557 --> 17:40.757
within the self and others.

17:40.759 --> 17:46.989
Treachery is the language of
nothing.

17:46.990 --> 17:50.610
It's a way of saying that
nothing matters,

17:50.611 --> 17:54.761
there's no bond that I
can--that I could feel an

17:54.760 --> 17:56.440
attachment too.

17:56.440 --> 18:03.610
It's a--literally a severing of
self in the domain of a pure

18:03.605 --> 18:05.545
arbitrariness.

18:05.548 --> 18:08.328
I mean this:
I am above everything or I'm

18:08.328 --> 18:10.858
below everything;
it doesn't matter,

18:10.855 --> 18:14.405
but I certainly have no
attachments to anything around

18:14.406 --> 18:14.806
me.

18:14.808 --> 18:17.178
That's where we are,
there is so much to say where

18:17.182 --> 18:19.602
we are in the context,
but the connections with the

18:19.602 --> 18:21.202
De vulgari eloquentia.

18:21.200 --> 18:25.140
I think that even the story of
Ulysses can be read in the light

18:25.138 --> 18:28.378
of the De vulgari
eloquentia because it's the

18:28.380 --> 18:30.160
story of a tragic style.

18:30.160 --> 18:33.580
Dante had been describing the
tragic style,

18:33.577 --> 18:38.377
and the tragic style and the
failure of the tragic style.

18:38.380 --> 18:42.420
Even the canto--the successive
canto of Guido de Montefeltro

18:42.422 --> 18:45.092
can be--it's literally the
counterpoint,

18:45.094 --> 18:48.044
the rhetorical counterpoint to
Ulysses.

18:48.038 --> 18:51.398
It's a story of the comical
style.

18:51.400 --> 18:54.380
Certainly Bertran de Born is a
figure who,

18:54.380 --> 18:56.870
for the first time,
and now the second time,

18:56.868 --> 18:59.488
appears in the De vulgari
eloquentia,

18:59.490 --> 19:02.930
and Dante has a great
admiration for Bertran de Born's

19:02.925 --> 19:03.765
poetic art.

19:03.769 --> 19:08.129
He says the Italians don't have
the language of the poetry of

19:08.133 --> 19:12.203
war, but the one who has a
poetry of war and modernity is

19:12.204 --> 19:13.664
Bertran de Born.

19:13.660 --> 19:16.310
Clearly Dante has changed his
opinion here.

19:16.308 --> 19:21.268
He may admire Bertran de Born,
but the strife,

19:21.269 --> 19:25.679
the divisiveness that his
poetry fosters,

19:25.680 --> 19:30.200
now sort of has made a victim
of him.

19:30.200 --> 19:32.970
By the way, Pound writes a
great poem about--

19:32.970 --> 19:36.710
Ezra Pound--about Bertran de
Born, but really keeping in mind

19:36.712 --> 19:40.462
more that Bertran de Born of the
De vulgari eloquentia

19:40.458 --> 19:43.888
than the Bertran de Born,
as far as I can tell,

19:43.894 --> 19:45.314
of Inferno.

19:45.308 --> 19:49.828
We come to Canto XXIX,
which I already looked at

19:49.829 --> 19:51.599
that--
saw a little bit,

19:51.595 --> 19:54.285
but I will come to Canto XXX,
for instance,

19:54.289 --> 19:56.729
and Dante enters deliberately
now,

19:56.730 --> 19:59.150
and on the face of it very
little--There is very little

19:59.147 --> 20:01.877
here that has to do with the
De vulgari eloquentia,

20:01.880 --> 20:05.520
but here though,
he's talking about two

20:05.518 --> 20:09.538
experiences that define the
tragic mode.

20:09.538 --> 20:12.168
One is, look at this:
"In the time,"

20:12.165 --> 20:15.705
beginning from Canto XXX,
"In the time when Juno was

20:15.714 --> 20:20.364
enraged because Semele,
the mistress of Jupiter against

20:20.363 --> 20:25.173
the Theban blood as she showed
once and again,

20:25.170 --> 20:26.940
Athamas so insane."

20:26.940 --> 20:30.040
He's really talking about the
tragic text,

20:30.038 --> 20:33.838
the Thebaid,
where the gods themselves

20:33.840 --> 20:38.040
within the world--
the classical world--the gods

20:38.036 --> 20:43.046
themselves seem to have been
wounded by exactly the same mad

20:43.053 --> 20:47.393
passions that drive human beings
to destruction.

20:47.390 --> 20:48.780
This is Juno.

20:48.779 --> 20:53.979
Juno doesn't really die but she
will--she suffers the same

20:53.984 --> 20:54.994
passions.

20:54.990 --> 20:59.680
There's a language here of the
tragic and let's call it the

20:59.679 --> 21:00.729
mythopoeic.

21:00.730 --> 21:04.680
It's a kind of classical
theology being tied to it.

21:04.680 --> 21:08.030
And then the story of the
Trojans once again:

21:08.030 --> 21:12.600
"But no fury of Thebes or
Troy was ever so cruel against

21:12.602 --> 21:14.052
any," etc.

21:14.048 --> 21:22.148
Then even further on Canto XXX,
line 40, the story of Myrrha,

21:22.154 --> 21:28.374
the young woman who--it's a
classical story.

21:28.368 --> 21:32.698
It's an Ovidian story:
the woman who is inflamed by

21:32.696 --> 21:35.536
passion,
incestuous passion,

21:35.536 --> 21:41.286
and impersonates somebody else
in order to be able to sleep

21:41.292 --> 21:43.182
with her father.

21:43.180 --> 21:50.000
There is--this is part of all
this tragic, let me call it,

21:49.998 --> 21:55.498
tragic perimeter,
but everything focuses on the

21:55.500 --> 21:58.850
story of Sinon,
I think.

21:58.848 --> 22:01.778
I like this idea of Sinon who
is an impersonator and a

22:01.777 --> 22:02.437
falsifier.

22:02.440 --> 22:06.980
You don't really have to know a
lot of Italian to know that

22:06.984 --> 22:10.434
Dante is really punning on the
name Si / non,

22:10.432 --> 22:12.552
which means yes and no.

22:12.548 --> 22:18.128
The very representation of the
falsification of personality but

22:18.130 --> 22:20.590
it's the--
so the tragic is tied to some

22:20.587 --> 22:23.707
sense of identity,
people who do not know

22:23.709 --> 22:27.159
exactly--and that's
impersonation.

22:27.160 --> 22:32.160
Human beings who may not know
who they are and who may take on

22:32.164 --> 22:37.504
some kind of either figuration
or the reality of somebody else.

22:37.500 --> 22:42.120
So it's this idea of an
ambiguity already betrayed by

22:42.117 --> 22:47.267
the name, so the connection
between madness and tragedy.

22:47.269 --> 22:53.719
Let me move on to Canto XXXI
where Dante enters and now meets

22:53.718 --> 23:00.598
the giants, clearly a figuration
and an echo of the De vulgari

23:00.596 --> 23:02.636
eloquentia.

23:02.640 --> 23:05.740
One of them is Nimrod.

23:05.740 --> 23:08.140
So this is really a deliberate
reflection.

23:08.140 --> 23:12.750
Let me just read a little bit
of this on line 60 and

23:12.749 --> 23:17.449
following, where Dante hears
some kinds of sounds.

23:17.450 --> 23:23.180
And every commentator of yours,
mine certainly does,

23:23.184 --> 23:29.374
will tell you that Dante's
using just some gibberish.

23:29.369 --> 23:31.069
Nobody knows what it means.

23:38.029 --> 23:41.269
for which no sweeter psalms
were fit;

23:41.269 --> 23:46.519
and my Leader towards him:
'Stupid soul keep to thy horn

23:46.521 --> 23:52.061
and vent thyself with that when
rage or other passion takes

23:52.059 --> 23:52.919
thee.

23:52.920 --> 23:55.060
Search at thy neck,
bewildered soul,

23:55.059 --> 23:58.179
and thus shalt find the strap
that holds it tied.

23:58.180 --> 24:01.670
See how it lies across thy
great chest.'

24:01.670 --> 24:04.980
Then he said to me:
'He is his own accuser.

24:04.980 --> 24:09.130
This is Nimrod,
through whose wicked device the

24:09.131 --> 24:12.201
world is not of one sole speech.

24:12.200 --> 24:16.730
Let us leave him there and not
talk in vain,

24:16.728 --> 24:21.468
for every language is to him as
his to others,

24:21.465 --> 24:24.305
which is known to none.

24:24.308 --> 24:27.148
We made our way,
therefore, farther on,

24:27.150 --> 24:30.210
turning left,
and found the next a bowshot

24:30.214 --> 24:32.684
off, far savager and
larger,"

24:32.682 --> 24:33.432
etc.

24:33.430 --> 24:36.360
And he meets other--a number of
other giants.

24:36.358 --> 24:41.098
Why does Dante first of all
mention giants?

24:41.098 --> 24:43.888
Both the De vulgari
eloquentia and here,

24:43.893 --> 24:47.723
what is really the point of the
De vulgari eloquentia?

24:47.720 --> 24:51.290
There is a way in which the
De vulgari eloquentia is

24:51.294 --> 24:53.764
written from the viewpoint of
Nimrod,

24:53.759 --> 24:59.989
because what Dante wants to do
is something exactly like what

24:59.994 --> 25:01.974
Nimrod attempted.

25:01.970 --> 25:05.960
Nimrod wanted to combine all
the possible languages,

25:05.960 --> 25:09.640
that's how Babel,
the confusion of tongues comes

25:09.636 --> 25:10.416
about.

25:10.420 --> 25:14.760
He wanted to combine--to build
a tower whereby human beings can

25:14.759 --> 25:15.809
reach Heaven.

25:15.808 --> 25:20.558
And I said that it's really the
other side of the incarnational

25:20.560 --> 25:24.010
word: the word that joins Heaven
and Earth.

25:24.009 --> 25:27.229
One is one of descent,
the other one is the pride of

25:27.230 --> 25:27.800
ascent.

25:27.798 --> 25:35.968
Nimrod wants--this is the
giantess, this is--his is a sin

25:35.973 --> 25:38.313
of--not a sin.

25:38.308 --> 25:42.058
It's a trait,
it's a trait of his--of knowing

25:42.061 --> 25:42.831
things.

25:42.828 --> 25:47.738
He wants to occupy a kind of
superior perspective,

25:47.740 --> 25:51.550
that's what his being a giant
means.

25:51.548 --> 25:56.618
A superior perspective from
which he can really see the

25:56.621 --> 26:02.071
whole of the world around him
and then be able to transcend

26:02.067 --> 26:06.667
the world of contingency:
this is the problem with

26:06.669 --> 26:07.889
Nimrod.

26:07.890 --> 26:11.330
This is what the Tower of Babel
is about and the theological

26:11.332 --> 26:13.902
answer is that you don't do this
by pride.

26:13.900 --> 26:19.140
You really ought to do it by
humility, not by trying to go up

26:19.141 --> 26:21.501
but really by going down.

26:21.500 --> 26:24.320
What I'm really also saying and
we could talk about this,

26:24.318 --> 26:27.288
that there is a connection
between pride and perspective.

26:27.288 --> 26:31.738
The De vulgari
eloquentia is also a text of

26:31.737 --> 26:33.187
perspectivism.

26:33.190 --> 26:35.830
Do you know what I mean by
perspectivism?

26:35.829 --> 26:38.099
What we have read so far.

26:38.098 --> 26:41.918
Perspectivism simply means the
presence of viewpoints,

26:41.922 --> 26:45.312
various viewpoints,
which one somehow manages to

26:45.310 --> 26:47.980
control, or know,
all viewpoints.

26:47.980 --> 26:51.070
In Dante, this is the case--the
way the whole of Inferno

26:51.070 --> 26:51.720
is written.

26:51.720 --> 26:55.680
The perspective on styles:
Dante uses all possible styles

26:55.684 --> 26:59.864
that I have been exemplifying
for you here as we discuss the

26:59.862 --> 27:00.502
poem.

27:00.500 --> 27:03.860
He wrote--he uses the courtly
language and the courtly

27:03.855 --> 27:08.595
rhetoric of Francesca,
the other court--the legal

27:08.597 --> 27:13.907
court of Pier della Vigna,
the court of the--let's say,

27:13.913 --> 27:16.453
the schools,
with Brunetto Latini,

27:16.454 --> 27:18.724
the language of the prophets.

27:18.720 --> 27:21.250
He uses all perspectives.

27:21.250 --> 27:24.730
It's the whole of the Divine
Comedy is such a

27:24.727 --> 27:27.247
perspective, a perspectivist
story.

27:27.250 --> 27:29.950
Some of you might say,
well you really are using a

27:29.952 --> 27:32.932
language that doesn't belong to
Dante's own culture.

27:32.930 --> 27:36.520
That would be a very legitimate
objection because when we talk

27:36.515 --> 27:39.235
about perspective,
we usually think about--this is

27:39.244 --> 27:41.804
really the revolutionary
language of fifteenth-century

27:41.801 --> 27:42.141
art.

27:42.140 --> 27:44.700
You may--some of you may be art
historians.

27:44.700 --> 27:48.210
You may know that,
though I could respond to you

27:48.214 --> 27:52.484
that actually there was a
certain knowledge of perspective

27:52.479 --> 27:54.199
earlier than Dante.

27:54.200 --> 27:56.270
Nonetheless,
even if they did not have a

27:56.269 --> 27:59.079
theory of perspective,
which I'll explain in a moment,

27:59.083 --> 28:01.263
they had the practice of
perspective.

28:01.259 --> 28:05.119
In art--we usually speak of
perspective in art,

28:05.117 --> 28:08.557
and we usually link it with,
for instance,

28:08.557 --> 28:10.987
a figure such as Alberti.

28:10.990 --> 28:14.710
You know who he is,
this fifteenth-century theorist

28:14.713 --> 28:16.553
of art,
who wrote a treatise called

28:16.554 --> 28:20.634
On Painting,
in 1436, where he literally

28:20.630 --> 28:25.750
theorizes that which other
painters from Giotto,

28:25.749 --> 28:27.709
Dante's friend.

28:27.710 --> 28:32.110
Dante's--they were together in
Padua for years when Dante was

28:32.111 --> 28:36.591
in exile and Giotto was painting
in the Scrovegni Chapel right

28:36.586 --> 28:37.316
there.

28:37.318 --> 28:39.288
So you could imagine they would
be meeting;

28:39.289 --> 28:40.289
they knew each other.

28:40.288 --> 28:43.068
They were contemporaries:
one is a year younger than the

28:43.066 --> 28:43.466
other.

28:43.470 --> 28:46.070
Dante's a year older than
Giotto, actually.

28:46.068 --> 28:48.878
So there was a practice of
perspective.

28:48.880 --> 28:49.950
What is perspective?

28:49.950 --> 28:54.780
For Alberti,
it simply means the discovery

28:54.784 --> 29:01.744
that the mode of representation
practiced in the Middle Ages

29:01.740 --> 29:04.570
really lacked depth.

29:04.568 --> 29:06.538
Not only that,
lacked depth,

29:06.539 --> 29:10.849
and that somehow the belief
that the world of appearance and

29:10.845 --> 29:13.395
the world of reality coincided.

29:13.400 --> 29:17.250
Perspective means that the
world that I see shifts,

29:17.251 --> 29:20.331
changes according to the
position that I,

29:20.334 --> 29:24.114
the spectator,
occupy in the field of vision.

29:24.108 --> 29:26.918
I'm here and I can assure you
that I see things that you

29:26.915 --> 29:29.055
sitting there cannot see and
vice versa.

29:29.058 --> 29:32.978
You see things that I cannot
see, so the perception of

29:32.981 --> 29:36.981
reality changes according to the
position we occupy.

29:36.980 --> 29:38.090
That's perspective.

29:38.088 --> 29:40.978
Not only that,
it also implies the possibility

29:40.976 --> 29:44.626
of manipulation of the space
that we witness--we see--as a

29:44.632 --> 29:45.982
particular space.

29:45.980 --> 29:51.530
We can change it according to
distance, according to the laws

29:51.532 --> 29:57.182
of the eyes, the position of the
eye, according to the hour of

29:57.179 --> 29:58.289
the day.

29:58.288 --> 30:00.198
I see things which are always
different.

30:00.200 --> 30:03.750
So this is perspective and
therefore the language of

30:03.753 --> 30:05.673
Renaissance,
the so-called

30:05.666 --> 30:08.936
Quattrocento,
the fifteenth-century changes

30:08.936 --> 30:12.806
the whole medieval idea of
representation where things were

30:12.807 --> 30:15.407
represented the way they
appeared.

30:15.410 --> 30:17.580
They say that's not true.

30:17.578 --> 30:20.588
We are never going to give the
sense of the reality of things,

30:20.589 --> 30:22.119
but the appearance of things.

30:22.118 --> 30:24.608
So that's really the great--the
difference.

30:24.608 --> 30:27.518
Dante uses this perspectivism,
which I repeat,

30:27.519 --> 30:30.689
really means a way of
assembling various points of

30:30.688 --> 30:31.268
view.

30:31.269 --> 30:35.689
In the persuasion that this is
what really he has:

30:35.685 --> 30:40.055
he's in exile in 1302;
he has been traveling all over

30:40.055 --> 30:43.135
Italy;
and he thinks that he can go on

30:43.138 --> 30:47.028
forging the language,
the vernacular language of

30:47.034 --> 30:47.784
Italy.

30:47.779 --> 30:50.329
He will go on--let me just go
back to say other things about

30:50.327 --> 30:52.397
the De vulgari eloquentia
I didn't say.

30:52.400 --> 30:56.150
He will go on writing about the
proximity of the romance

30:56.151 --> 30:56.971
languages.

30:56.970 --> 30:59.140
He invents this idea of romance
language.

30:59.140 --> 31:01.320
And he says that the way in
which French,

31:02.900 --> 31:05.620
Italian are connected
together--he says it's one

31:05.623 --> 31:08.983
particle: the way we use the
'S' When he talks about

31:13.236 --> 31:19.256
it--they say 'Oc' when
they are to make affirmative

31:19.256 --> 31:20.626
statement.

31:20.630 --> 31:22.600
He goes on talking about this
'S,' the language of the

31:24.608 --> 31:29.528
This is the way the families of
languages are being built

31:29.531 --> 31:30.501
together.

31:30.500 --> 31:35.410
Nimrod, to go back to the text,
the story of Nimrod and the

31:35.413 --> 31:39.313
story of Dante seem to be
strangely very close.

31:39.308 --> 31:40.748
There's more.

31:40.750 --> 31:43.620
Look at what he does because
it's so--the link with the De

31:43.621 --> 31:45.871
vulgari eloquentia is just
extraordinary.

31:45.868 --> 31:48.608
Even this line,
that everybody thinks doesn't

31:52.980 --> 31:56.610
If you look at it carefully--I
really want to tell you

31:56.608 --> 32:01.898
something,
it is an imperfect--there's one

32:01.901 --> 32:09.001
letter anagram of a Hebrew line
from the Psalms,

32:09.000 --> 32:13.650
and the reference to 'sweeter
Psalms' next will tell you that

32:13.653 --> 32:16.683
Dante's really giving you the
source.

32:16.680 --> 32:20.150
The line in the Psalm,
Psalm 22, is Eli,

32:20.152 --> 32:23.552
Eli, lama
sabachthani?

32:23.548 --> 32:26.688
The fact that there is no exact
correspondence only means that

32:26.692 --> 32:29.582
the editors have missed the
point: that they should amend

32:29.578 --> 32:30.248
the text.

32:30.250 --> 32:33.850
So it would be an argument for
textual emendation.

32:33.848 --> 32:36.648
That's something that the
philologists are very careful

32:36.645 --> 32:39.335
about doing but they always
welcome possibilities.

32:39.338 --> 32:42.498
This is really--it's an
amazing--so he's using Hebrew

32:42.498 --> 32:45.598
because that's what he had said
in the De vulgari

32:45.595 --> 32:48.305
eloquentia,
that Hebrew--this is an

32:48.314 --> 32:51.984
inverted, twisted language by
the builder of the Tower of

32:51.976 --> 32:53.846
Babel,
we are not supposed to

32:53.851 --> 32:56.961
understand it and yet behind all
confusion there is still

32:56.960 --> 32:59.470
something intelligible,
that's the argument.

32:59.470 --> 33:05.420
Behind all twisted appearances
of things there is a residue of

33:05.421 --> 33:07.921
intellect,
of intelligent,

33:07.921 --> 33:12.521
intelligible--an intelligible
message that is going to be

33:12.519 --> 33:13.259
given.

33:13.259 --> 33:16.349
What are these words,
by the way?

33:16.348 --> 33:18.548
Eli, Eli,
lama,

33:18.548 --> 33:22.318
sabachthani?--I am going
right past it very quickly in

33:22.320 --> 33:24.730
the belief that you could--
that everybody will know it.

33:24.730 --> 33:30.120
These are the words,
Psalm 22, they are the words

33:30.115 --> 33:35.015
that Jesus on the Cross cites,
"Father,

33:35.017 --> 33:38.607
Father why have you forsaken
me?"

33:38.608 --> 33:43.168
It's really the tragic moment
or the moment of the Crucifixion

33:43.174 --> 33:47.594
where the Son feels that he is
completely abandoned and that

33:47.589 --> 33:52.669
somehow the whole divine play,
the whole divine order is no

33:52.666 --> 33:54.946
longer responsive to him.

33:54.950 --> 33:59.040
It's really the moment of the
theological despair,

33:59.038 --> 34:00.118
they call it.

34:00.122 --> 34:00.792
Okay.

34:00.788 --> 34:05.238
Dante's aware that if
Nimrod--that's what he's--

34:05.240 --> 34:07.940
Dante, I think is telling
Nimrod obliquely,

34:07.940 --> 34:11.790
had he not been so stupid he
would have known by using this

34:11.791 --> 34:14.351
kind of language,
the way in which it would have

34:14.353 --> 34:15.263
been reaching Heaven.

34:15.260 --> 34:20.270
The way to Heaven is the way to
go down into humility and not up

34:20.268 --> 34:23.608
through the building of the
Tower of Babel,

34:23.606 --> 34:26.226
and the confusion of tongues.

34:26.230 --> 34:29.380
Then there is this whole
argument here which I'm not

34:29.380 --> 34:31.540
going to go into,
but the confusion,

34:31.543 --> 34:34.143
the perceptual confusion,
perspective.

34:34.139 --> 34:38.149
Dante makes his--he is far away
and he mistakes the giants for

34:38.152 --> 34:40.552
towers,
reference to this famous town

34:40.550 --> 34:44.150
that is still--
if you go on the highway you

34:44.150 --> 34:48.920
can still see Monteriggioni,
that's what Dante went by and

34:48.916 --> 34:51.516
he thinks that the giants are
towers,

34:51.519 --> 34:53.899
because you have no perspective.

34:53.900 --> 34:56.760
Because in perspective,
you learn that you see

34:56.757 --> 35:00.437
according to the distance of
the--where you arrive from the

35:00.440 --> 35:01.140
object.

35:01.139 --> 35:05.989
This is the basic mathematics,
the geometry that rules and

35:05.990 --> 35:09.140
sustains the theory of
perspective.

35:09.139 --> 35:16.699
Then it will continue with--let
me just go on to a further case

35:16.697 --> 35:23.887
of this question of perspective
and I want to read with some

35:23.889 --> 35:25.839
care XXXIII.

35:25.840 --> 35:29.630
Let me turn to Canto XXXII with
more, pursuing this line of

35:29.634 --> 35:32.844
references to the De vulgari
eloquentia.

35:32.840 --> 35:34.520
Look at this,
"Had I the harsh..."

35:34.518 --> 35:36.658
It's at the beginning of the
text.

35:36.659 --> 35:40.579
Would you like to read?

35:40.579 --> 35:46.739
We're reading from Canto XXXII,
line 1 to 12.

35:46.739 --> 35:48.689
Student:  The version I
have is only Italian.

35:48.690 --> 35:50.580
Prof: I'm impressed.

35:50.579 --> 35:53.809
I didn't mean that--you go
ahead.

35:53.809 --> 36:01.049
From Canto XXXII,
line 1 to 12 in English.

36:01.050 --> 36:03.740
Student:  "Had I
the harsh and grating rhymes

36:03.742 --> 36:06.482
that would be fitting for the
dismal hole on which all the

36:06.481 --> 36:09.031
other rocks bear down,
I would press out more

36:09.032 --> 36:11.142
completely the sap of my
conception;

36:11.139 --> 36:16.069
but since I have not,
it is not without fear I bring

36:16.065 --> 36:19.765
myself to speak,
for to describe the bottom of

36:19.771 --> 36:23.261
all the universe is no
enterprise to undertake in sport

36:23.257 --> 36:27.757
or for a tongue that cries,
mamma and babbo.

36:27.760 --> 36:31.530
But may those ladies aid my
verse who aided Amphion to wall

36:31.530 --> 36:35.240
in Thebes, so that the telling
may not be diverse from the

36:35.235 --> 36:35.815
past.

36:35.820 --> 36:40.170
O beyond all others misbegotten
crowd who are in the place it is

36:40.170 --> 36:43.420
hard to speak of,
better had you here been sheep

36:43.416 --> 36:44.726
or goats!"

36:44.730 --> 36:46.040
Prof: Thank you.

36:46.039 --> 36:51.709
Here, this is the beginning
that in many ways rehashes what

36:51.713 --> 36:56.023
last time I called the
ineffability topos.

36:56.018 --> 37:00.548
You remember at the beginning
of Canto XXVIII,

37:00.554 --> 37:06.304
Dante there is talking about
the sublime, sort of parodic,

37:06.297 --> 37:10.627
a sort of inverted form of the
sublime.

37:10.630 --> 37:15.320
So the horror of what he was
witnessing was such that he

37:15.318 --> 37:20.178
could not know that he could
find the metaphors for it.

37:20.179 --> 37:24.939
This is now the deployment of a
variant of that conceit.

37:24.940 --> 37:29.070
The conceit here is that
Dante's looking for a style,

37:29.070 --> 37:30.740
he has perspective.

37:30.739 --> 37:34.589
There must be a unique style
for this particular reality and

37:34.592 --> 37:38.642
he starts, I cannot go on using
the language of familiarity.

37:38.639 --> 37:40.989
I have to use the babbo
and mamma,

37:40.989 --> 37:43.719
the language of the child
because this is just--

37:43.719 --> 37:46.139
they are the treacherous souls
who have betrayed,

37:46.139 --> 37:49.289
first of all,
family so there is a sort of

37:49.286 --> 37:53.046
tragic resonance even around
that little motif.

37:53.050 --> 37:56.650
This cannot be done in the
ordinary familiar language of

37:56.654 --> 38:00.394
everyday because these sinners
have indeed betrayed all of

38:00.389 --> 38:00.979
that.

38:00.980 --> 38:04.740
Nor can it probably be done at
all,

38:04.739 --> 38:08.239
because I'm aware,
and how he could not be,

38:08.239 --> 38:10.279
in this area of treachery and
fraud,

38:10.280 --> 38:14.470
that words and deeds do not
necessarily belong to him.

38:14.469 --> 38:15.839
And I'm only paraphrasing the
text.

38:15.840 --> 38:19.450
A search for style,
which he understands as a form

38:19.445 --> 38:22.305
of what is convenient,
what is decorous,

38:22.313 --> 38:24.083
what is appropriate.

38:24.079 --> 38:25.589
That's the metaphor he uses.

38:25.590 --> 38:27.390
It's, by the way,
an argument of the De

38:27.394 --> 38:30.334
vulgari eloquentia,
the principle of convention and

38:30.333 --> 38:33.173
convenientia:
in Latin the convenience of a

38:33.166 --> 38:36.516
particular language over another
when one is dealing with a

38:36.521 --> 38:37.911
particular reality.

38:37.909 --> 38:43.559
The further problem of what
kind of style do I have?

38:43.559 --> 38:48.639
Is it--can I get in order to
represent this kind of world?

38:48.639 --> 38:51.909
He appeals to Amphion and the
building of Thebes.

38:51.909 --> 38:54.839
Once again, this is a tragic
story of Thebes,

38:54.842 --> 38:57.242
and obliquely,
he's also appealing to

38:57.240 --> 39:00.040
something that he himself has
written.

39:00.039 --> 39:04.889
Since Amphion is the poet who
moves stones by the power of his

39:04.893 --> 39:08.283
language,
a version of Orpheus,

39:08.282 --> 39:13.342
who placates,
tames the savage beasts within

39:13.342 --> 39:17.982
the heart within us,
he wants to be a kind of

39:17.983 --> 39:18.813
Amphion.

39:18.809 --> 39:21.679
The fact is that he has written
stony rhymes,

39:21.677 --> 39:23.697
he has written--he is moving.

39:23.699 --> 39:26.009
It is a sort of retrospective
view that he takes.

39:26.010 --> 39:31.330
He thinks that the only kind of
style adequate to this reality

39:31.327 --> 39:36.817
is the style of the crazy poems
representing a crazy time of his

39:36.820 --> 39:42.400
life for this Lady of stone who
would change him into stone.

39:42.400 --> 39:47.040
We--an illusion to this
appeared in the canto of the

39:47.039 --> 39:50.679
Medusa in Canto IX of
Inferno,

39:50.679 --> 39:57.719
so that's really--it begins
with this search for a

39:57.724 --> 40:06.644
particular style and Dante will
go on through this kind of--

40:06.639 --> 40:14.089
this whole world of furthering
to the frozen iciness of Hell.

40:14.090 --> 40:16.120
There is no fire, burning fire.

40:16.119 --> 40:19.629
And now that's how the canto
ends.

40:19.630 --> 40:23.550
And we start with the next
canto: "We already left

40:23.550 --> 40:28.410
him," line 122,
"when I saw two frozen in

40:28.409 --> 40:32.149
one hole,
so that the one head was a hood

40:32.146 --> 40:36.276
to the other,
and, as bread is devoured for

40:36.279 --> 40:41.659
hunger" So you know we're
approaching the most,

40:41.659 --> 40:45.539
to me, the most unbearable
scene of Inferno,

40:45.539 --> 40:50.319
the cannibalization:
a human being cannibalizing,

40:50.320 --> 40:52.990
literally eating, the other.

40:52.989 --> 40:57.239
I know that some of you may
have your sense of--your taste

40:57.235 --> 40:58.645
can be different.

40:58.650 --> 41:02.870
To me, this is really the worst
possible representation,

41:02.865 --> 41:05.085
tragic representation here.

41:05.090 --> 41:08.860
"The one above set his
teeth in the other at the place

41:08.856 --> 41:13.306
where the brain joins the nape;
Tydeus gnawed the temples of

41:13.313 --> 41:18.443
Menalippus for rage just as he
was doing with the skull and the

41:18.440 --> 41:19.680
other parts.

41:19.679 --> 41:26.079
'O thou who by so bestial a
token shows the hatred against

41:26.077 --> 41:31.337
him thou eatest,
tell me the cause,' I said,

41:31.342 --> 41:36.002
'on this agreement,
that if thou has reason in thy

41:36.003 --> 41:40.383
complaint against him I,
knowing who you are and what

41:40.382 --> 41:45.722
his sin,
shall yet requite thee in the

41:45.724 --> 41:50.084
world above,
if this tongue I talk with be

41:50.079 --> 41:54.179
not withered.'"
We are approaching a moment

41:54.179 --> 41:59.849
where literally silence envelops
all possible representations.

41:59.849 --> 42:02.619
It's something that
nothing--not all can be

42:02.615 --> 42:03.995
altogether sayable.

42:04.000 --> 42:07.860
It is something that
can--escapes the sayable and

42:07.856 --> 42:11.626
it's that boundary,
we are at that boundary that

42:11.632 --> 42:13.242
Dante places us.

42:13.239 --> 42:19.259
This is--you know where this--I
have to read this exchange.

42:19.260 --> 42:22.630
I will read it and then try to
comment on it.

42:22.630 --> 42:25.770
I wish you could have a
discussion about this canto.

42:25.768 --> 42:29.288
"That sinner,"
actually the Italian really

42:29.289 --> 42:32.479
begins--
the sentence structure of the

42:32.483 --> 42:36.033
English wouldn't allow it--
begins with 'the mouth.'

42:36.030 --> 42:40.870
That occupies the primary place
in the line.

42:40.869 --> 42:43.069
In Italian it's la
bocca,

42:43.065 --> 42:43.755
the mouth.

42:43.760 --> 42:48.990
The object is primary here.

42:48.989 --> 42:52.699
In English: "That sinner
lifted his mouth from the savage

42:52.702 --> 42:55.242
meal,
wiping it on the hair of the

42:55.239 --> 43:00.279
head he had wasted behind,
then began: 'Thou wilt have me

43:00.275 --> 43:06.335
renew desperate grief which even
to think of already wrings my

43:06.344 --> 43:09.334
heart before I speak of it.

43:09.329 --> 43:14.109
But if my words are to be seed
that may bear the fruit of

43:14.114 --> 43:18.904
infamy to the traitor I gnaw,
thou shalt see me speak and

43:18.898 --> 43:23.158
weep together.'"
If we had time and I were to

43:23.155 --> 43:26.935
ask you whether these lines
remind you of anything in

43:26.938 --> 43:29.638
particular,
I'm sure some of you would

43:29.635 --> 43:31.485
immediately jump and tell me.

43:31.489 --> 43:37.949
These are clearly an echo of
Inferno V,

43:37.947 --> 43:41.247
Francesca's language.

43:41.250 --> 43:46.840
The language of love has become
now a language of hatred,

43:46.840 --> 43:49.920
because from the point of view
of Ugolino,

43:49.920 --> 43:54.390
and that's part of his tragedy,
he can't tell them apart.

43:54.389 --> 43:59.559
He does not know what love is
and what hatred is,

43:59.559 --> 44:03.869
and he can exchange one for the
other.

44:03.869 --> 44:07.419
You could even argue that
retrospectively,

44:07.420 --> 44:10.170
the language of love of
Francesca maybe was also the

44:10.172 --> 44:13.332
language of hatred,
but you would be pushing it

44:13.331 --> 44:15.961
beyond the limits of
believability.

44:15.960 --> 44:20.760
I think that Dante's really
echoing Francesca and the love,

44:20.760 --> 44:25.980
and the romance with Paolo,
in order to explain this hatred

44:25.983 --> 44:30.763
and that's the blindness of
Ugolino and I use the word

44:30.757 --> 44:32.287
deliberately.

44:32.289 --> 44:37.479
What he lacks is any
perspective on himself and on

44:37.481 --> 44:39.921
the world around him.

44:39.920 --> 44:43.170
He then continues,
"Thou art--

44:43.170 --> 44:48.390
I know not who thou art,
nor by what means thou hast

44:48.387 --> 44:52.667
come down here,
but indeed thou seemest to me

44:52.672 --> 44:55.622
Florentine when I hear
thee."

44:55.619 --> 44:57.669
The focus is on language.

44:57.670 --> 45:01.770
Language here,
which is a part of one managing

45:01.771 --> 45:05.961
to, first of all,
know the other and understand

45:05.963 --> 45:07.243
the other.

45:07.239 --> 45:10.359
They may know the inflections
of the dialects,

45:10.360 --> 45:13.840
the Florentine dialect,
and they may even think that

45:13.838 --> 45:15.608
indeed,
and Dante has a lot to say in

45:15.606 --> 45:16.916
the De vulgari
eloquentia,

45:16.920 --> 45:20.850
about the question of the
dialects and the instances that

45:20.853 --> 45:22.473
they can communicate.

45:22.469 --> 45:26.249
In effect, there's no possible
communication between the two of

45:26.251 --> 45:26.681
them.

45:26.679 --> 45:31.219
If I were to define for you the
rhetorical genre that Dante

45:31.219 --> 45:34.429
deploys here,
it is that of what we call a

45:34.429 --> 45:36.229
dramatic monologue.

45:36.230 --> 45:42.280
Ugolino goes on speaking and
therefore he expects nor does he

45:42.275 --> 45:46.205
get, any response from his
interlocutor,

45:46.206 --> 45:49.226
his apparent interlocutor.

45:49.230 --> 45:52.600
It's a dramatic monologue when
he goes on telling us the story

45:52.603 --> 45:54.433
of his life the way he sees it.

45:54.429 --> 45:58.829
You all know nineteenth-century
dramatic monologues in English

45:58.831 --> 45:59.771
literature.

45:59.768 --> 46:04.138
This is an occurrence of that
genre: I can speak;

46:04.139 --> 46:05.129
I can tell you.

46:05.130 --> 46:08.920
I can go on fictionalizing
myself and I believe that my

46:08.922 --> 46:12.782
perspective or the way I
fictionalize myself will become

46:12.784 --> 46:13.984
your reality.

46:13.980 --> 46:18.340
Dante entices of course Ugolino
to do exactly that because this

46:18.335 --> 46:21.075
is exactly--
this is the way in which you

46:21.081 --> 46:24.731
are in Hell: where you go on
really believing that whatever

46:24.731 --> 46:27.771
you tell,
that you can go on telling

46:27.768 --> 46:32.888
stories and deceive yourself
that others are going to believe

46:32.887 --> 46:34.847
what you are saying.

46:34.849 --> 46:40.229
The reality that you're going
on constructing is everybody's

46:40.228 --> 46:41.958
accepted reality.

46:41.960 --> 46:46.050
This is one of the issues,
clearly, that we are going to

46:46.050 --> 46:46.870
confront.

46:46.869 --> 46:52.499
"Thou art to know that I
was Count Ugolino and this is

46:52.496 --> 46:55.596
the Archbishop Ruggieri."

46:55.599 --> 46:57.259
What an extraordinary line.

46:57.260 --> 47:01.030
What makes this extraordinary
is, first of all,

47:01.028 --> 47:05.038
the occurrence of what we call
attributes, titles,

47:05.043 --> 47:08.243
and then the shift in verbal
tense.

47:08.239 --> 47:15.099
Ugolino will go on attributing
time, "I was Count

47:15.097 --> 47:18.637
Ugolino and this is...

47:18.639 --> 47:22.059
" That is to say the
object of his hatred is

47:22.059 --> 47:24.079
unalterable,
is timeless,

47:24.076 --> 47:28.886
and that object of his hatred
is exactly what goes on defining

47:28.887 --> 47:29.437
him.

47:29.440 --> 47:32.690
I-- time belongs to me.

47:32.690 --> 47:35.640
I know that I belong;
I have a history.

47:35.639 --> 47:39.969
There is a history behind me
and there is--and this one here,

47:39.965 --> 47:43.495
the reified the object of my
hatred is unchanging,

47:43.498 --> 47:45.228
Archbishop Ruggieri.

47:45.230 --> 47:48.830
There is the secular and the
sacred, if you wish:

47:48.833 --> 47:52.813
Guelfs and Ghibellines,
with the idea that Ugolino had

47:52.811 --> 47:54.991
really betrayed the side.

47:54.989 --> 47:58.839
A Guelf became a Ghibelline and
a Ghibelline became a Guelf and

47:58.842 --> 47:59.342
so on.

47:59.340 --> 48:03.720
So it's the recapitulation of
all the Inferno satanic

48:03.715 --> 48:05.715
sins we have seen so far.

48:05.719 --> 48:10.659
"How by means of his evil
devices..."

48:10.659 --> 48:14.849
"I shall tell thee now why
I am such a neighbor to

48:14.847 --> 48:18.177
him…"
What another extraordinary

48:18.184 --> 48:21.924
line,
because it's the idea of what a

48:21.918 --> 48:26.688
neighbor is and what the
neighborhood has become.

48:26.690 --> 48:32.350
This is the way:
the neighbors cannibalizing,

48:32.349 --> 48:36.209
one cannibalizing the other.

48:36.210 --> 48:40.570
"How by means of his evil
devices, confiding him,

48:40.565 --> 48:45.165
I was taken and then killed,
there is no need to tell;

48:45.170 --> 48:47.380
but what thou canst not have
learnt, that is,

48:47.376 --> 48:50.026
how cruel was my death,
thou shalt hear and shalt know

48:50.034 --> 48:51.744
if he has done me wrong."

48:51.739 --> 48:56.679
Now he tells the story that he
was put as a prisoner in a

48:56.677 --> 49:01.877
tower, which we are meant to
understand all the languages of

49:01.878 --> 49:03.728
the other towers.

49:03.730 --> 49:08.470
A tower which isolates him is a
tower in Pisa.

49:08.469 --> 49:11.819
By the way it's really the
tower--this has nothing to do

49:11.822 --> 49:14.172
with,
but I find it irresistible--If

49:14.166 --> 49:16.826
you read the Cantos of
Ezra Pound,

49:16.829 --> 49:20.329
some of the most extraordinary
poetry of his,

49:20.329 --> 49:25.919
I think, comes from when he was
declared a traitor in the

49:25.916 --> 49:29.506
aftermath of the Second World
War.

49:29.510 --> 49:33.000
He was put in a cage not too
far from this tower of Pisa

49:32.998 --> 49:36.678
which is really one of the most
beautiful part is where the

49:36.675 --> 49:39.335
Scuola Normale in
Pisa,

49:39.340 --> 49:44.350
and he writes this poetry about
the tower that he sees.

49:44.349 --> 49:48.099
Clearly his own sense of trying
to understand what treachery

49:48.101 --> 49:52.621
really means,
and what I'm really saying is

49:52.617 --> 50:00.217
these are issues that keep being
present in the consciousness of

50:00.219 --> 50:05.889
the leading imaginative figures
of our time.

50:05.889 --> 50:10.759
He goes into this--the tower of
the hunger, as it is called,

50:10.762 --> 50:12.252
and was shut up.

50:12.250 --> 50:12.700
"...

50:12.697 --> 50:15.577
had already shown me through
its slits several moons when I

50:15.579 --> 50:18.959
had the bad dream which rent for
me the veil of the future."

50:18.960 --> 50:23.670
He had dreams that--he has a
dream and the mistake he makes

50:23.670 --> 50:27.650
is to think that the dream is
going to be real.

50:27.650 --> 50:31.140
And the dream is this:
"This man appeared to me

50:31.141 --> 50:34.971
as master and lord hunting the
wolf and the whelps,"

50:34.974 --> 50:38.584
the word Guelf comes from wolf,
Guelf and Ghibellines,

50:38.576 --> 50:41.316
"on the mountains for
which the Pisans cannot see

50:41.315 --> 50:41.775
Lucca.

50:41.780 --> 50:45.260
With hounds lean,
trained and eager he sent them

50:45.262 --> 50:46.302
the Gualandi..

50:46.298 --> 50:50.518
.that when I awoke"--he
has this idea of destruction,

50:50.521 --> 50:53.931
the mutual destructions of the
wolf, etc.

50:53.929 --> 50:56.989
"When I awoke before
morning I heard my children,

50:56.994 --> 51:00.004
who were with me crying in
their sleep and asking for

51:00.001 --> 51:00.581
bread.

51:00.579 --> 51:03.819
Thou art cruel indeed if thou
grieve not now,

51:03.815 --> 51:07.715
thinking what my heart
forboded, and if thou weep not,

51:07.715 --> 51:10.065
at what does thou ever weep?

51:10.070 --> 51:14.450
They were now awake and the
hour approached when our food

51:14.449 --> 51:18.499
used to be brought to us,
and each was afraid because of

51:18.503 --> 51:22.043
his dream and I heard below the
door of the horrible tower

51:22.041 --> 51:24.661
nailed up;
at which I looked in the faces

51:24.664 --> 51:26.304
of my sons without a word.

51:26.300 --> 51:30.600
I did not weep,
I so turned to stone within.

51:30.599 --> 51:33.809
They wept, and my little Anselm
said…"

51:33.811 --> 51:37.341
By the way,
to understand how there is a

51:37.344 --> 51:42.674
counter: there is a sort of
movement between the horror of

51:42.668 --> 51:47.838
this tragedy and the tenderness,
the pathos of it.

51:47.840 --> 51:51.230
One of the ways in which Dante
suggests this,

51:51.228 --> 51:54.928
is the use of diminutives for
Anselmuccio,

51:54.925 --> 51:58.155
this little kid that he has,
this kid.

51:58.159 --> 52:01.099
"Thou lookest so,
father, what ails thee?'

52:01.099 --> 52:03.659
At that I shed no tears,
nor answered all that day,

52:03.659 --> 52:06.269
nor that night after,
till another sun came forth on

52:06.271 --> 52:06.991
the world.

52:06.989 --> 52:11.169
As soon as a little ray made
its way into the doleful prison

52:11.168 --> 52:15.558
and I discerned in four faces my
own look, I bit both hands for

52:15.561 --> 52:18.721
grief;
and they, thinking I did it

52:18.724 --> 52:23.004
from a desire to eat,
rose up suddenly and said,

52:23.000 --> 52:28.640
'Father it would be far less
pain for us if thou eat of us.

52:28.639 --> 52:34.209
Thou didst clothe us with this
wretched flesh and do thou strip

52:34.210 --> 52:35.290
us of it.'

52:35.289 --> 52:38.179
I calmed myself then,
not to make them more unhappy,

52:38.184 --> 52:40.744
that day and the next we stayed
all silent.

52:40.739 --> 52:43.629
Ah hard earth,
why didst thou not open?

52:43.630 --> 52:47.880
When we had come to the fourth
day Gaddo threw himself

52:47.878 --> 52:52.608
outstretched at my feet saying,
'My father why dost thou not

52:52.606 --> 52:53.646
help me?'

52:53.650 --> 53:00.240
I don't think it's far fetched
if I were to ask you to overhear

53:00.242 --> 53:05.242
behind this question of one of
the children,

53:05.239 --> 53:10.069
exactly an echo of the prayer
of Jesus on the Cross that we

53:10.070 --> 53:13.950
heard,
that we read, a few cantos back.

53:13.949 --> 53:20.009
There is a way in which the
violence inflicted on Ugolino's

53:20.005 --> 53:26.055
children seems to repeat or
re-enact the great drama of the

53:26.063 --> 53:28.573
Christian sacrifice.

53:28.570 --> 53:33.500
"There he died,"
also crucified,

53:33.500 --> 53:35.950
in fact, "there he died
and,

53:35.949 --> 53:38.949
as thou seest me,
I saw the three drop one by one

53:38.947 --> 53:41.257
during the fifth day and the
sixth;

53:41.260 --> 53:43.430
therefore I gave myself,
now blind."

53:43.429 --> 53:45.749
That's what it is,
the lack of perspective:

53:45.753 --> 53:46.753
he sees nothing.

53:46.750 --> 53:49.480
He therefore has no distance
from anything,

53:49.476 --> 53:53.496
nor can he tell things apart or
distinguish things one from the

53:53.501 --> 53:54.801
other, "...

53:54.800 --> 53:59.070
to groping over each and for
two days called on them after

53:59.067 --> 54:00.337
they were dead.

54:00.340 --> 54:04.410
Then fasting had more power
than grief."

54:04.409 --> 54:09.199
An extraordinarily ambiguous
line because we really do not

54:09.202 --> 54:11.222
know what he's saying.

54:11.219 --> 54:13.799
According to Rodin,
for instance,

54:13.795 --> 54:18.455
who will go on making a statue
of this, it's at the--at the

54:18.463 --> 54:21.203
MOMA, you can go and see that.

54:21.199 --> 54:26.359
The story is that of--that
Ugolino ate his own children,

54:26.358 --> 54:31.328
"then fasting had more
power than grief."

54:31.329 --> 54:36.659
I yielded to the appetites,
the urging of hunger more than

54:36.661 --> 54:37.411
grief.

54:37.409 --> 54:40.319
Or maybe he's saying just
something else.

54:40.320 --> 54:43.870
Maybe he's saying then fasting
had more power than grief,

54:43.865 --> 54:47.285
I really died of fasting for
hunger rather than for the

54:47.286 --> 54:47.916
grief.

54:47.920 --> 54:51.280
We don't know,
and I think that part of the

54:51.284 --> 54:55.454
tragic mode that Dante is trying
to convey to us,

54:55.449 --> 54:57.479
is that we are left--and this
is by the way,

54:57.480 --> 55:01.310
is Borges' reading.

55:01.309 --> 55:05.659
Borges writes nine lectures on
Dante, what else?

55:05.659 --> 55:08.699
Realizing the importance of
number nine for Dante,

55:08.699 --> 55:12.239
he writes nine lectures on
Dante and one of them is on the

55:12.237 --> 55:13.537
story of Ugolino.

55:13.539 --> 55:16.569
And he says,
he actually wants us to leave--

55:16.570 --> 55:18.500
he wants to leave us in
suspension,

55:18.500 --> 55:22.120
to believe that it's possible
that he may have been eating the

55:22.117 --> 55:24.967
children,
but maybe it is the sensibility

55:24.969 --> 55:29.109
of so many critics have been
offended by this suggestion that

55:29.114 --> 55:33.124
he actually could go on
cannibalizing his own children.

55:33.119 --> 55:37.739
I think that Borges is right,
that we are not supposed to be

55:37.740 --> 55:41.660
able to tell apart,
that the ambiguity of that line

55:41.657 --> 55:44.787
is never going to be quite
resolved.

55:44.789 --> 55:46.979
It's going to be forever there.

55:46.980 --> 55:50.360
But, the most important element
of this tragic occurrence and

55:50.356 --> 55:52.996
Dante--before I go on let me
just say, "Ah,

55:53.003 --> 55:53.963
Pisa..."

55:53.960 --> 55:57.310
Dante goes on into an
apostrophe against Pisa,

55:57.311 --> 56:02.231
again with this language of now
he talks, he breaks the silence.

56:02.230 --> 56:04.400
"Ah Pisa,
shame of the peoples of the

56:07.250 --> 56:10.180
Another little touch,
another little echo of the

56:10.184 --> 56:12.124
De vulgari eloquentia.

56:12.119 --> 56:14.589
That is to say,
in the moment where he's

56:14.585 --> 56:18.185
dealing with treachery,
which I call the most

56:18.188 --> 56:22.378
nihilistic of all sins,
because you really declare null

56:22.376 --> 56:25.366
and void any bond that you may
have with others,

56:25.369 --> 56:31.179
he uses, and the irony is,
to me, glaring the affirmative

56:31.182 --> 56:31.912
part.

56:31.909 --> 56:34.609
As if here, there is a possible
affirmation, there is none.

56:34.610 --> 56:34.970
"...

56:36.400 --> 56:40.610
since thy neighbors are slow to
punish thee make Capraia and

56:40.606 --> 56:44.806
Gorgona shift and put a bar on
Arno's mouth so that it drown

56:44.811 --> 56:46.881
every soul in thee."

56:46.880 --> 56:50.080
This is really the kind of
language that Ugolino himself

56:50.079 --> 56:53.279
had used when before the
consumation of the tragedy,

56:53.280 --> 56:56.490
he really begs the earth for an
earthquake,

56:56.489 --> 57:00.299
that the earth may open up and
swallow all of them.

57:00.300 --> 57:02.590
Here Dante is using exactly the
same language.

57:02.590 --> 57:05.510
The idea that it is so
horrifying, he's a spectacle;

57:05.510 --> 57:08.520
that he has been in the tragic
spectacle he has been

57:08.523 --> 57:12.073
witnessing, that the whole world
here could be an apocalyptic

57:12.070 --> 57:13.490
ending to the world.

57:13.489 --> 57:17.389
To go back to the key
issue--there may not be time for

57:17.385 --> 57:20.175
a discussion today and I
apologize--

57:20.179 --> 57:25.479
but the real tragic event
though, what is the tragic event

57:25.476 --> 57:26.866
other than...

57:26.869 --> 57:29.439
"What if Count Ugolino had
the name of betraying thy

57:29.440 --> 57:32.150
strongholds,
thou shouldst not have put his

57:32.152 --> 57:35.592
children to such torment,"
So this has been the

57:35.590 --> 57:37.480
crucifixion of innocence.

57:37.480 --> 57:40.650
"Their youthful years,
thou new Thebes,"

57:40.650 --> 57:43.600
Pisa is the new Thebes,
a new Thebaid that we have been

57:43.599 --> 57:45.059
witnessing now,
"...

57:45.056 --> 57:48.556
made them innocent,
Uguccione and Brigata and the

57:48.559 --> 57:51.769
other two named already in my
song."

57:51.768 --> 57:54.968
This is really the
tragic--Dante has been using now

57:54.969 --> 57:58.199
the tragic language indeed,
that he had been hoping and

57:58.197 --> 58:01.057
theorizing in the De vulgari
eloquentia and then they

58:01.056 --> 58:01.586
move on.

58:01.590 --> 58:04.110
What is the really tragic
occurrence?

58:04.110 --> 58:07.250
The tragic occurrence is in the
very presence of the

58:07.253 --> 58:09.783
Christological language in this
canto,

58:09.780 --> 58:15.840
because the sacrifice of the
cross means one thing and one

58:15.842 --> 58:22.332
thing only: that now that all
violence is finished and because

58:22.329 --> 58:27.309
we have found the scapegoat,
the voluntary scapegoat,

58:27.306 --> 58:30.786
who goes around saying that
we're all innocent and that he

58:30.793 --> 58:32.903
is the guilty one,
that's how we are

58:32.898 --> 58:34.638
declared--that's how we are
redeemed,

58:34.639 --> 58:42.429
that's why we are made innocent
once again, right?

58:42.429 --> 58:45.799
The story here,
re-enacting and echoing the

58:45.804 --> 58:48.624
story of the cross,
seems to say the

58:48.617 --> 58:53.677
futility--seems to announce the
futility of that sacrifice.

58:53.679 --> 58:57.519
Retrospectively,
he says that that sacrifice too

58:57.518 --> 59:02.008
was just one of the senseless
acts of violence that have

59:02.012 --> 59:06.672
happened in history and that
punctuate human history.

59:06.670 --> 59:10.140
Of course, this is not the end
of the poem,

59:10.139 --> 59:13.089
but it's the most desperate
part of the poem,

59:13.090 --> 59:20.260
because Dante comes to believe
that the law of history,

59:20.260 --> 59:23.300
that the law of the world is
really a tragic law.

59:23.300 --> 59:26.710
And there is something absolute
about it, and not quite

59:26.710 --> 59:27.470
escapable.

59:27.469 --> 59:32.109
We shall see how he's going to
move through this and I really

59:32.106 --> 59:35.426
have to go into Canto XXXIV a
little bit.

59:35.429 --> 59:37.089
I will not say too much this
time.

59:37.090 --> 59:39.690
Canto XXXIV is where Dante
meets Satan.

59:39.690 --> 59:43.710
So the encounter with Satan is,
first of all,

59:43.710 --> 59:46.380
that which gives incredible
coherence to the whole movement

59:46.375 --> 59:48.585
of Inferno,
because as you remember the

59:48.588 --> 59:51.178
story of Inferno began
with the neutral angels,

59:51.179 --> 59:55.739
those who had been sitting,
watching the spectacle of the

59:55.739 --> 59:57.939
disruption of the cosmos.

59:57.940 --> 1:00:02.780
Now the neutral angels at the
time of the Lucifer's rebellion

1:00:02.775 --> 1:00:05.065
of--
against God and now it ends

1:00:05.072 --> 1:00:08.102
with Lucifer,
so it's really as a kind of

1:00:08.101 --> 1:00:10.921
angelic,
cosmic proportion.

1:00:10.920 --> 1:00:14.470
The other thing that I have to
say is that if you imagine,

1:00:14.469 --> 1:00:18.179
those of you who are readers of
Milton and Paradise

1:00:18.175 --> 1:00:21.825
Lost,
and you know what a brilliant

1:00:21.827 --> 1:00:27.827
rhetorician Satan-- Lucifer--is
in Paradise Lost,

1:00:27.829 --> 1:00:29.679
you'll be disappointed.

1:00:29.679 --> 1:00:32.059
In fact, T.S. Eliot,
who writes a commentary of

1:00:32.061 --> 1:00:34.591
this,
he says, I really recommend the

1:00:34.592 --> 1:00:38.422
first time readers of the
Divine Comedy to skip Canto

1:00:38.420 --> 1:00:42.640
XXXIV because it's strange that
Lucifer-- Satan doesn't speak.

1:00:42.639 --> 1:00:45.679
And that was exactly the point
that, I'm sorry to say,

1:00:45.679 --> 1:00:47.059
T.S. Eliot,
at this time,

1:00:47.056 --> 1:00:49.976
really had probably had never
read the De vulgari

1:00:49.980 --> 1:00:51.300
eloquentia.

1:00:51.300 --> 1:00:54.570
He's not supposed to speak,
because he's one of the angels

1:00:54.567 --> 1:00:57.087
who really do not use the human
language,

1:00:57.090 --> 1:01:01.970
but more importantly,
because he represents evil

1:01:01.967 --> 1:01:03.107
defeated.

1:01:03.110 --> 1:01:07.890
From this point of view,
Canto XXXIV stands in radical

1:01:07.885 --> 1:01:10.855
sharp contrast to Canto XXXIII.

1:01:10.860 --> 1:01:14.670
In Canto XXXIII we saw--we have
witnessed the sovereignty of

1:01:14.668 --> 1:01:15.118
evil.

1:01:15.119 --> 1:01:18.769
It is as if it were all
engulfing and hovering over all

1:01:18.771 --> 1:01:19.651
of reality.

1:01:19.650 --> 1:01:24.880
Here now we witness exactly the
opposite, how Satan becomes a

1:01:24.876 --> 1:01:29.576
reified, dumb object and
actually an instrument for the

1:01:29.579 --> 1:01:31.409
pilgrim's ascent.

1:01:31.409 --> 1:01:36.499
It's going through the body of
Lucifer that the pilgrim can go

1:01:36.498 --> 1:01:38.648
on,
and the guide and Virgil can

1:01:38.646 --> 1:01:42.406
turn themselves upside down and
finally re-emerge to the light.

1:01:42.409 --> 1:01:44.359
The rest of the canto--good.

1:01:44.360 --> 1:01:45.680
I think that we are going to
have a few minutes,

1:01:45.684 --> 1:01:47.324
but I have to say something
about the rest of the canto.

1:01:47.320 --> 1:01:53.060
The rest of the canto deals
with a cosmological argument and

1:01:53.059 --> 1:01:59.089
the cosmological argument is
where does Purgatory come from?

1:01:59.090 --> 1:02:02.270
And Dante gives an
extraordinary--invents--a poetic

1:02:02.273 --> 1:02:02.723
myth.

1:02:02.719 --> 1:02:07.459
And the poetic myth that he
invents is that when Lucifer

1:02:07.463 --> 1:02:11.953
fell at the time of the grand
angelic disruption,

1:02:11.949 --> 1:02:16.749
the first rebellion against the
Deity,

1:02:16.750 --> 1:02:21.090
the earth retreats out of fear
at the approaching of this

1:02:21.092 --> 1:02:25.052
fallen angel and re-emerges on
the other side of the

1:02:25.047 --> 1:02:28.147
hemisphere, the southern
hemisphere.

1:02:28.150 --> 1:02:30.370
That's the beginning of
Purgatory.

1:02:30.369 --> 1:02:33.479
You see the connection from an
evil act,

1:02:33.480 --> 1:02:38.140
the chances of redemption,
how in affecting Dante's

1:02:38.137 --> 1:02:41.187
cosmos,
there is nothing which cannot

1:02:41.186 --> 1:02:44.116
be utilized,
no evil which cannot be

1:02:44.117 --> 1:02:46.937
utilized to the ends of the
good.

1:02:46.940 --> 1:02:51.210
Everything--the real defeat of
evil is when that itself can

1:02:51.208 --> 1:02:55.698
become the stepping stone over
the threshold of evil itself in

1:02:55.697 --> 1:02:58.787
order to reach the purgatorial
island.

1:02:58.789 --> 1:03:01.949
The last little detail that I
will tell you is--I ask you to

1:03:01.952 --> 1:03:03.672
read the last line of Canto XXX.

1:03:03.666 --> 1:03:04.736
You'll like this.

1:03:04.739 --> 1:03:06.989
It's a little detail that
you'll like, I hope.

1:03:06.989 --> 1:03:09.959
The last line of Inferno
is: e quindi

1:03:09.960 --> 1:03:12.410
uscimmo a
riveder le

1:03:12.411 --> 1:03:15.611
stele--
and therefore we came out to

1:03:15.610 --> 1:03:17.710
see once again the stars.

1:03:17.710 --> 1:03:24.480
Just a little detail to remind
you about the extraordinary love

1:03:24.483 --> 1:03:30.223
of symmetry in Dante's poem,
that each canticle will end

1:03:30.224 --> 1:03:33.284
with that same word
stele,

1:03:33.280 --> 1:03:35.290
stars, stars, and stars.

1:03:35.289 --> 1:03:40.199
That is to say each canticle
ends with us looking up,

1:03:40.195 --> 1:03:46.135
reminding us of where we are
and still longing for the stars.

1:03:46.139 --> 1:03:51.459
I have come to--in a hurry I
have reached the end of the--of

1:03:51.456 --> 1:03:52.986
Inferno.

1:03:52.989 --> 1:03:55.759
There's Purgatory now
and then see if there are

1:03:55.762 --> 1:03:56.392
questions.

1:03:56.389 --> 1:04:06.889


1:04:06.889 --> 1:04:08.509
Yes?

1:04:08.510 --> 1:04:12.790
Student:  Can you say a
little bit more about how Dante

1:04:12.786 --> 1:04:17.126
was trying to construct almost
like a total perspective through

1:04:17.134 --> 1:04:20.434
his construction of the various
languages,

1:04:20.429 --> 1:04:23.669
from seeing different forms of
Italian and trying to get an all

1:04:23.666 --> 1:04:26.696
encompassing perspective,
can you say how that relates

1:04:26.699 --> 1:04:26.979
too?

1:04:26.980 --> 1:04:28.460
Prof: Yeah,
the question is,

1:04:28.463 --> 1:04:29.863
can I say more--good question.

1:04:29.860 --> 1:04:33.330
The question is can I say more
about how Dante's trying to

1:04:33.327 --> 1:04:36.247
construct how he uses total
perspectives and--

1:04:36.250 --> 1:04:40.200
you mean both in the De
vulgari eloquentia and here?

1:04:40.199 --> 1:04:42.529
Yes, thank you,
because in effect,

1:04:42.525 --> 1:04:46.815
I was hoping that someone would
ask me this question because I

1:04:46.822 --> 1:04:49.502
really did not tell you how
this--

1:04:49.500 --> 1:04:52.590
the De vulgari
eloquentia is completed here

1:04:52.585 --> 1:04:56.555
and why couldn't Dante complete
the De vulgari eloquentia

1:04:56.556 --> 1:04:58.316
when he wrote the tract.

1:04:58.320 --> 1:05:02.560
When he wrote the tract,
he wanted to unify--

1:05:02.559 --> 1:05:05.839
he believed that they are--the
dialects,

1:05:05.840 --> 1:05:09.840
fourteen dialects in Italian,
he acknowledged,

1:05:09.840 --> 1:05:11.670
he recognizes fourteen dialects.

1:05:11.670 --> 1:05:17.440
He knew some of them very well
and he wanted to make a unified

1:05:17.438 --> 1:05:22.028
language out of that,
a kind of artificial language,

1:05:22.030 --> 1:05:24.290
a sort of--
let's call it Italian

1:05:24.289 --> 1:05:27.579
Esperanto: something that you
could bring together.

1:05:27.579 --> 1:05:30.359
And what he was lacking,
so much so,

1:05:30.360 --> 1:05:32.720
that there are those scholars
who work on--

1:05:32.719 --> 1:05:34.769
who have been working--I don't
agree with that,

1:05:34.768 --> 1:05:38.088
is that almost Dante seemed to
have a kind of--

1:05:38.090 --> 1:05:46.350
seemed to be in agreement with
the so-called logicians,

1:05:46.349 --> 1:05:51.889
those who have a kind of--the
idea that language has a sort

1:05:51.887 --> 1:05:53.837
of,
let's say, a Cartesian

1:05:53.842 --> 1:05:54.662
linguistics.

1:05:54.659 --> 1:05:59.389
There's a kind of rational
structure to it and that can be

1:05:59.391 --> 1:06:00.721
really remade.

1:06:00.719 --> 1:06:03.239
The point is that when he
writes the De vulgari

1:06:03.242 --> 1:06:04.842
eloquentia,
this is true.

1:06:04.840 --> 1:06:08.520
I don't buy the idea that he's
following the logicians of the

1:06:08.521 --> 1:06:12.021
Middle Ages, the grammarians,
who are really logicians.

1:06:12.018 --> 1:06:16.918
What he really lacked was a
historical sense and the little

1:06:16.916 --> 1:06:21.896
detail that Hebrew was still the
surviving language from the

1:06:21.900 --> 1:06:25.700
creation of man to our own time
because--

1:06:25.699 --> 1:06:27.929
and he had a good theological
argument for that,

1:06:27.929 --> 1:06:31.349
because it would be
inconceivable that the Redeemer

1:06:31.351 --> 1:06:35.181
of the world would use a
language other than the language

1:06:35.184 --> 1:06:37.584
that had been employed by Adam.

1:06:37.579 --> 1:06:39.449
When he comes to
Paradise,

1:06:39.449 --> 1:06:42.779
to the Divine Comedy he
completely changes view.

1:06:42.780 --> 1:06:44.950
In Paradiso XXVI,
as I'm going to tell you,

1:06:44.952 --> 1:06:45.842
Dante says no,
no.

1:06:45.840 --> 1:06:48.660
Hebrew disappeared
with--immediately after Adam

1:06:48.659 --> 1:06:49.089
fell.

1:06:49.090 --> 1:06:50.930
With the fall of Adam through
the Garden,

1:06:50.929 --> 1:06:54.519
there was no longer the primal
language and he goes on

1:06:54.519 --> 1:06:58.719
elaborating the idea that God
does not use any language of--

1:06:58.719 --> 1:07:01.289
that is to say,
human beings are the letters

1:07:01.293 --> 1:07:03.333
and syllables of God's language.

1:07:03.329 --> 1:07:05.729
It's not Hebrew,
it's not Latin,

1:07:05.733 --> 1:07:08.453
it's not Greek,
it's not whatever,

1:07:08.452 --> 1:07:11.912
it's not Chinese,
that's really the--We are the

1:07:11.909 --> 1:07:15.889
syllables: that's Dante's idea
of Paradiso XXVI.

1:07:15.889 --> 1:07:19.439
This was the--that's the real
change.

1:07:19.440 --> 1:07:22.920
What does it mean in terms of
the Inferno?

1:07:22.920 --> 1:07:26.950
It's that he had understood
that, in order to write about a

1:07:26.949 --> 1:07:29.589
unified language,
he had to descend.

1:07:29.590 --> 1:07:35.530
He could not go on the tower
and from there watch all the

1:07:35.532 --> 1:07:39.802
qualities: aesthetic,
what is the sweet--what is the

1:07:39.795 --> 1:07:42.995
well combed language and what is
the less well combed,

1:07:43.000 --> 1:07:45.700
the harsh language,
what are the sounds that he

1:07:45.702 --> 1:07:48.702
really should be applying and
adopt into Italian.

1:07:48.699 --> 1:07:51.999
What he really understands that
in order to have a unified

1:07:51.998 --> 1:07:55.638
language you have to descend in
the political realities of these

1:07:55.643 --> 1:07:56.283
cities?

1:07:56.280 --> 1:08:00.230
That's the difference between
the De vulgari eloquentia

1:08:00.226 --> 1:08:03.326
and the lower Inferno,
a sense of history,

1:08:03.333 --> 1:08:05.473
that's really the difference.

1:08:05.469 --> 1:08:09.589
To see this--the sense of
history--you can be in a tower

1:08:09.586 --> 1:08:11.586
as Ugolino is,
and be blind,

1:08:11.592 --> 1:08:14.922
or you can be in a tower like
Nimrod is and do not even know

1:08:14.920 --> 1:08:18.420
what you are talking about,
who can go on completely

1:08:18.422 --> 1:08:21.382
reversing,
messing up, and confusing the

1:08:21.380 --> 1:08:23.820
Hebrew that he should have
known.

1:08:23.819 --> 1:08:25.639
Do you understand what I'm
saying?

1:08:25.640 --> 1:08:27.320
That's really the difference
between the two.

1:08:27.319 --> 1:08:31.629
Good question because it
allowed me to focus on a detail

1:08:31.631 --> 1:08:35.241
that I probably didn't explain
very clearly.

1:08:35.238 --> 1:08:38.438
Student:  I don't
understand how he could have

1:08:38.435 --> 1:08:40.645
said that Hebrew died at the
Fall.

1:08:40.649 --> 1:08:44.479
Prof: You don't
understand why?

1:08:44.479 --> 1:08:45.909
Student:  I don't
understand how Dante could

1:08:45.912 --> 1:08:47.192
think--
Prof: Make that

1:08:47.185 --> 1:08:47.675
statement?

1:08:47.680 --> 1:08:49.450
Student:  Yeah,
is that what you're saying he

1:08:49.447 --> 1:08:49.687
said?

1:08:49.689 --> 1:08:52.309
Prof: Yeah,
that's--I don't think that

1:08:52.309 --> 1:08:54.809
there are any traces of Adam's
language.

1:08:54.810 --> 1:09:01.930
The question is why--it's a
sort of predicament and I don't

1:09:01.930 --> 1:09:05.520
know if it--
he says he doesn't quite

1:09:05.523 --> 1:09:09.133
understand why--
how Dante could say that Hebrew

1:09:09.131 --> 1:09:11.121
died with the fall of man.

1:09:11.118 --> 1:09:15.338
That's what he--Adam will tell
him.

1:09:15.340 --> 1:09:17.980
He meets Adam;
he's another poet,

1:09:17.979 --> 1:09:20.709
because he's the one who names
the world.

1:09:20.710 --> 1:09:22.900
Student:  Where do the
Scriptures come from in Dante's

1:09:22.895 --> 1:09:23.875
>

1:09:23.880 --> 1:09:27.020
Prof: The Scriptures are
not in Hebrew,

1:09:27.016 --> 1:09:30.566
Scriptures are--the language of
Jesus, for instance,

1:09:30.573 --> 1:09:31.623
is Aramaic.

1:09:31.618 --> 1:09:34.858
We have to be careful about
what kind of--

1:09:34.859 --> 1:09:40.169
the kind of--is that Adam's
language or is that the

1:09:40.173 --> 1:09:43.443
language--
it's a language that changes in

1:09:43.439 --> 1:09:44.949
time,
that's all, that's all he's

1:09:44.949 --> 1:09:45.539
really saying.

1:09:45.538 --> 1:09:50.528
But the New Testaments are in
Aramaic, for instance,

1:09:50.525 --> 1:09:52.575
which is a dialect.

1:09:52.579 --> 1:09:54.899
Yes?

1:09:54.899 --> 1:09:58.029
Student:  So this goes
back a little bit to the last

1:09:58.025 --> 1:10:00.475
lecture,
but looking back over the

1:10:00.480 --> 1:10:04.660
entirety of Inferno,
it seems like Dante expresses

1:10:04.662 --> 1:10:08.342
different levels,
I guess, of sympathy or pity

1:10:08.344 --> 1:10:13.394
for the people who are trapped
in certain circles of Hell,

1:10:13.390 --> 1:10:15.820
especially for the sowers of
discord,

1:10:15.819 --> 1:10:19.699
and then later in other cases,
like at the end of Canto

1:10:19.702 --> 1:10:20.352
XXXIII.

1:10:20.350 --> 1:10:23.950
He's happy to be with Charles,
to someone who's being

1:10:23.949 --> 1:10:26.139
tormented--
Prof: Yes,

1:10:26.143 --> 1:10:27.513
Bocca degli Abati.

1:10:27.510 --> 1:10:28.440
Student:  What's that?

1:10:28.439 --> 1:10:29.159
Prof: Okay go on.

1:10:29.158 --> 1:10:30.918
Student:  Right,
and I just--

1:10:30.920 --> 1:10:36.540
it's interesting though the
re--the different relationships

1:10:36.542 --> 1:10:40.502
that Dante has to--
the different reactions he has

1:10:40.501 --> 1:10:41.911
to these punishments.

1:10:41.908 --> 1:10:44.058
Given that he's essentially
created all of--

1:10:44.060 --> 1:10:48.680
the Inferno is supposed
to be a representation of divine

1:10:48.680 --> 1:10:52.210
justice,
but it seems like overall Dante

1:10:52.213 --> 1:10:55.283
is the judge and executioner
here.

1:10:55.279 --> 1:11:01.099
Given that the whole--how
sincerely does Dante believe in

1:11:01.095 --> 1:11:02.545
this divide?

1:11:02.550 --> 1:11:04.750
Does he think he's--
Prof: In this--

1:11:04.750 --> 1:11:08.020
Student:  In the divide
between himself as this narrator

1:11:08.020 --> 1:11:10.080
who can feel pity for the
different--

1:11:10.078 --> 1:11:14.708
for the people trapped in
different areas of Hell versus

1:11:14.708 --> 1:11:17.768
Dante as sort of the--
I mean, in some sense,

1:11:17.774 --> 1:11:19.344
he's the creator of all of
this.

1:11:19.340 --> 1:11:20.230
Prof: Absolutely.

1:11:20.229 --> 1:11:22.849
Student:  He has
assigned everyone to each level

1:11:22.845 --> 1:11:24.775
of Hell--I know this is a broad
thing but

1:11:24.783 --> 1:11:26.193
>

1:11:26.189 --> 1:11:27.829
Prof: It is.

1:11:27.828 --> 1:11:29.148
Student:
>

1:11:29.149 --> 1:11:30.889
I kind of wanted to see some
comment on that divide.

1:11:30.890 --> 1:11:33.600
How sincerely is this a vision
to him?

1:11:33.600 --> 1:11:37.560
Prof: The question is,
since Dante's--Dante,

1:11:37.560 --> 1:11:41.780
the pilgrim,
has different responses to the

1:11:41.783 --> 1:11:46.673
figures whom he has created,
sometimes he's tender and

1:11:46.672 --> 1:11:49.072
sympathetic,
sometimes he just kicks them,

1:11:49.067 --> 1:11:51.477
if that's the scene that you
are referring to,

1:11:51.479 --> 1:11:56.159
and they're all his creations,
how sincere is he in his

1:11:56.158 --> 1:11:56.938
vision?

1:11:56.939 --> 1:12:01.269
The response is that I would
formulate it a little bit

1:12:01.268 --> 1:12:03.798
differently, but that's fine.

1:12:03.800 --> 1:12:08.850
We agree that Dante has--is not
the indifferent spectator to all

1:12:08.845 --> 1:12:13.725
of them and I think that what
matters to him most is to show a

1:12:13.733 --> 1:12:18.703
degree of passionate involvement
with whoever they may be.

1:12:18.698 --> 1:12:22.038
He's not going to be
sentimentalizing about all of

1:12:22.043 --> 1:12:24.163
them for a number of reasons.

1:12:24.158 --> 1:12:26.018
He's very sentimental with his
teacher.

1:12:26.020 --> 1:12:30.680
I think he's really very
sarcastic with Pier della Vigna

1:12:30.680 --> 1:12:32.010
whom,
you remember,

1:12:32.010 --> 1:12:35.470
he mocks at language of his,
the contrived--I thought he

1:12:35.466 --> 1:12:37.056
thought, I thought...

1:12:37.060 --> 1:12:39.820
That's not Dante's language,
that's really Pier della

1:12:39.819 --> 1:12:42.209
Vigna's own poetry that Dante's
picking up.

1:12:42.210 --> 1:12:46.410
I think that he is very--he has
a sense of pathos,

1:12:46.412 --> 1:12:49.642
and maybe he's also seduced by
Francesca.

1:12:49.640 --> 1:12:53.910
Francesca, you can't put this
past her, that she's trying to

1:12:53.909 --> 1:12:57.379
seduce him as well as she
seduces, or lets Paolo,

1:12:57.384 --> 1:12:58.474
seduce her.

1:12:58.470 --> 1:13:03.960
When he comes further down,
the relationship is no longer a

1:13:03.956 --> 1:13:09.436
relationship of this tenderness,
of forms--now there's this

1:13:09.443 --> 1:13:10.393
anger.

1:13:10.390 --> 1:13:11.840
Anger at what?

1:13:11.840 --> 1:13:16.020
At the extraordinary horror of
what human beings can do,

1:13:16.015 --> 1:13:20.415
and there's nothing--Dante
calls fraud, the sin peculiar to

1:13:20.421 --> 1:13:24.401
man, to human beings;
the sin peculiar to human

1:13:24.396 --> 1:13:29.376
beings because they are--they
have a reason that becomes part

1:13:29.384 --> 1:13:33.794
of their premeditations,
part of their machinations of

1:13:33.787 --> 1:13:34.617
evil.

1:13:34.618 --> 1:13:40.578
And I find that repulsion he
has, I find that

1:13:40.576 --> 1:13:46.936
very--dramatically speaking,
very convincing.

1:13:46.939 --> 1:13:52.339
It's still part of a judgment
that he is making and it's not

1:13:52.344 --> 1:13:56.104
an attenuation at all of that
judgment.

1:13:56.100 --> 1:13:59.790
The anger with which he attacks
Pisa,

1:13:59.788 --> 1:14:02.288
that the idea that he speaks
prophetically there,

1:14:02.288 --> 1:14:04.898
why isn't this whole place,
disappearing,

1:14:04.899 --> 1:14:08.429
this is--I think that--to me
is--you could say it's sincere.

1:14:08.430 --> 1:14:10.970
I wouldn't be using that
language but I think that's it

1:14:10.972 --> 1:14:12.342
dramatically very powerful.

1:14:12.340 --> 1:14:17.210
And I don't know if you would
agree that that's probably the

1:14:17.207 --> 1:14:21.407
best way of referring to this
term--to describe this

1:14:21.413 --> 1:14:22.573
situation.

1:14:22.569 --> 1:14:24.369
Would you agree?

1:14:24.369 --> 1:14:25.439
Student:  Yeah.

1:14:25.439 --> 1:14:28.939
Prof: I find it
dramatically very apt.

1:14:28.939 --> 1:14:33.419
It's--because it's a
consequence of the genuine

1:14:33.417 --> 1:14:35.947
horror--can you imagine?

1:14:35.948 --> 1:14:39.768
I mean you had the
earlier--even the diviners with

1:14:39.774 --> 1:14:42.354
a shape--a human shape twisted.

1:14:42.350 --> 1:14:43.580
The head turned around.

1:14:43.578 --> 1:14:50.318
Then the alchemists,
also represented in a kind of

1:14:50.324 --> 1:14:52.394
twisted form.

1:14:52.390 --> 1:14:58.040
It's this twisting of the human
image and this--and the reality

1:14:58.042 --> 1:15:03.332
of what human beings can do and
ongoing and this hatred has

1:15:03.332 --> 1:15:04.702
taken over.

1:15:04.698 --> 1:15:07.578
I think that he's approaching
them too.

1:15:07.578 --> 1:15:14.298
There is a way in which I was
saying he echoes Ugolino when

1:15:14.296 --> 1:15:18.086
Ugolino says,
'oh earth, why didn't--wasn't

1:15:18.087 --> 1:15:21.897
there an earthquake and which
would swallow everything.'

1:15:21.899 --> 1:15:25.119
I mean, the language of the
eater, the cannibal,

1:15:25.119 --> 1:15:26.079
so to speak.

1:15:26.078 --> 1:15:32.468
And then Dante just says:
why isn't there some kind of

1:15:32.471 --> 1:15:35.971
great drowning of all this?

1:15:35.970 --> 1:15:39.760
Why aren't the islands just
moving and be a barrier,

1:15:39.755 --> 1:15:42.645
so that the whole town will go
under?

1:15:42.649 --> 1:15:46.679
I think that there is a way in
which he's almost doing the same

1:15:46.680 --> 1:15:47.200
thing.

1:15:47.198 --> 1:15:53.758
That's it, almost,
re-enacting the kind of sense

1:15:53.755 --> 1:16:00.305
of nothingness that Ugolino had
shown to him.

1:16:00.310 --> 1:16:03.830
Obviously, he does not agree
with Ugolino.

1:16:03.828 --> 1:16:09.928
It's not that there is a kind
of complete identification with

1:16:09.930 --> 1:16:10.540
him.

1:16:10.538 --> 1:16:13.278
And how do we know that this is
not going to be the case?

1:16:13.279 --> 1:16:16.269
He's writing, Ugolino isn't.

1:16:16.270 --> 1:16:21.820
The poem is what rescues Dante
from yielding to the temptation

1:16:21.823 --> 1:16:26.833
of absolute despair and
therefore distinguishes him--

1:16:26.828 --> 1:16:31.108
distinguishes his own temporary
impulse for nihilism,

1:16:31.109 --> 1:16:34.529
with the nihilism that
distinguishes,

1:16:34.529 --> 1:16:37.159
characterizes all the sinners
and above all,

1:16:37.159 --> 1:16:38.609
the treacherous souls.

1:16:38.609 --> 1:16:44.229
Maybe we should stop here;
we're going to talk about

1:16:44.234 --> 1:16:47.144
something so much more serene,
Purgatory,

1:16:47.136 --> 1:16:47.936
next time.

1:16:47.939 --> 1:16:53.999