PURGATORIO, Episode 4. Laughter And Loss, The Essence Of Being Human: PURGATORIO, Canto I, Lines 13 - 27
Dante the poet leads us to a slow turn toward the Dante the pilgrim, who is standing on the shores of Purgatory, looking up at the heavens, which hold Venus, four new-to-him stars, and the gorgeous sapphire color of a predawn sky.
Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we begin to move toward the pilgrim and come to see the emotional complexity the poet has learned to encode in even short passages once he has written INFERNO.
This passage of PURGATORIO is packed with interpretive problems. But also with sheer beauty and the wonder of the world around the pilgrim--as well as a little statement of loss, just to put a coda on the whole thing and make it very human.
Here are the segments of this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:
[01:14] My English translation of PURGATORIO, Canto I, Lines 13 - 27. If you'd like to read along or drop a comment, please scroll down this page.
[03:13] Where are we? In a terrestrial poem that yearns for the infinite--with a couple of translation problems right off.
[07:03] We turn to Dante the pilgrim in a moment in which he wonders at the sheer beauty of the sky. (Such a contrast to his responses in INFERNO!)
[08:30] What is the allegory of the sapphire blue? And how do we know our interpretation of that allegory is correct in such an open-ended work of literature?
[13:27] What is the "gorgeous planet"? Venus. But more importantly, its representation of love. And the potential rehabilitation of the morning star from its traditional interpretation by Christian theologians as a reference to Satan before his fall.
[18:07] However, there's a problem: Venus was not the morning star in 1300, the year of the pilgrim's journey across the known universe.
[20:39] The emotional movement in the first nine lines of this passage: from beauty to global peace to internal regeneration to the laughter of the cosmos.
[23:09] The pilgrim Dante's first physical movement: a turn to the right (that is, the south). And a problem in the lines: Who are these "first people"?
[26:53] What are the four stars Dante the pilgrim sees?
[29:41] The last lines of the passage only make sense if you've read Virgil's explanation in INFERNO.
[31:08] The passage ends on a moment of loss, of melancholy. Laughter + loss = human.
[32:47] Rereading PURGATORIO, Canto I, Lines 13 - 27.
And here’s my English translation of Purgatorio, Canto 1, Lines 13 – 27
The sweet color of an Asian sapphire
Infused a peaceful feeling in the air
And stayed pure out to the first circle.
It filled my eyes with desire once more,
The moment I’d gotten out of the dead air
That had sickened both my eyes and my chest.
The gorgeous planet that pushes us to love
Made the whole eastern sky laugh,
Her light even veiling Pisces, who was her escort.
Turning toward my right hand and setting my mental faculties
On the other pole, I saw the four stars
That no one has seen since those first people.
The sky seemed to exult in those glittering lights!
O north locales, indeed widowed spots,
Deprived of a vista like that!