Wailing as They Fly: Circle Two (The Carnal)

1. Wailing as They Fly: Circle Two (The Carnal) Feraco Myth to Science Fiction 16 November 2011

2. Canto V: Data File • Setting: The Second Circle • Figures: Minos, Paolo, and Francesca • Allusions: Dido, Cleopatra, Semiramis, Helen, Achilles, Paris, Lancelot, Guinevere, Tristan, Isolde • Punishable Sin: Immoderate Passion • Summary: The poets venture into the Second Circle, where they encounter Minos, the Dread Judge of all who pass through Hell. He tries to force them to go back, a la Charon, but Virgil works his magic and they pass. We then see the Lustful, those whose appetites overwhelmed their sensibilities. Dante hears the story of Paolo and Francesca, and he’s so overcome that he faints yet again.

3. Love vs. Lust • The relationship between the two has always been somewhat difficult • Dante juggles “the ennobling power of attraction toward the beauty of a whole person and the destructive force of possessive sexual desire” • It’s striking to see those who abandoned reason so soon after those who lived for its pursuit; the contrast between the first two circles couldn’t be clearer

4. Love vs. Lust (cont’d) • Dante seems to distinguish between those who feel lust and those who act on it; it may be impossible to control our hearts, but it is possible to govern our bodies • He shows that this line is a very fine one indeed; interestingly, his ideas echo Sternberg’s, i.e., that those who tell stories of romance and desire help corrode the sensibilities of those who read them • This is the first place where an unrepentented sin is punished in Hell • Limbo’s not really a place of punishment, whereas the Vestibule lies outside of Hell

5. Love vs. Lust (cont’d) • Its location, however, is appropriately ambiguous • On the one hand, its placement marks it as the “least serious” sin (it’s farthest from Satan, who lies at the center) • On the other hand, it’s the first one we see, and therefore the first thing we associate with serious wrongdoing • If anything, Dante presents this wrongdoing as a war between instinct and learned behavior, a war those who end up in the Second Circle lose; some of the other sins aren’t so “lucky”

6. Minos • Minos, like Charon before him, is a remix – a figure from classical stories who Dante infuses with new detail and characteristics • There were two Minoses in classical literature, both of which ruled over Greece’s Crete, but we only care about the first one • The older Minos, son of Zeus and Europa, was known as the “favorite of the gods” because of his wisdom and commitment to law • Once he died, his reputation earned him the position of supreme judge of the underworld. • His duty was to hear the testimony of new souls, and to make sure their accounts aligned with their destinies • Minos’s long tail, which he wraps around his body a number of times equal to the soul's assigned Circle, is Dante's invention

7. Famous Lovers • The stories of the lustful souls Dante identifies in Canto V share certain elements: romance, beauty, sex, and death. • Passion overwhelms these figures or leads directly to their downfall. • Dido, for example, was the queen of Carthage until her lover – Aeneas – abandoned her in order to continue his mission (establishing a new society in Italy). • She was so grief-stricken that she committed suicide. • Cleopatra, the legendarily beautiful queen of Egypt, committed suicide in order to keep the man (Octavian) who defeated her lover (Antony) from capturing her. • Semiramis, another ancient and powerful queen (of Assyria), was rumored to have been killed by an illegitimate son; as legend has it, she had also legalized incest for her own benefit, which gives a new meaning to “illegitimate” here.

8. Famous Lovers (cont’d) • Helen of Troy, famed as the most beautiful woman alive, played a direct role in the Trojan War’s origins; once she was abducted by Paris and dragged back to Troy, her countrymen came after her, and she betrayed the Trojans by helping the Greeks carry out their attack • Achilles was the most formidable Greek hero among the forces who laid siege to Troy. • Tristan was King Mark’s nephew, and Isolde Mark’s fiancée; the two mistakenly drank a love potion that had been intended for Mark and Isolde, and fell completely in love with one another. Enraged, Mark shot Tristan through with an arrow, and he then clutched his lover so tightly that she died in his arms as well

9. Francesca and Paolo • Raffa: “Francesca da Rimini and Paolo Malatesta are punished together in hell for their adultery: Francesca was married to Paolo's brother, Gianciotto ("Crippled John"). Francesca's shade tells Dante that her husband is destined for punishment in Caina – the infernal realm of familial betrayal named after Cain, who killed his brother Abel – for murdering her and Paolo. Francesca was the aunt of Guido Novello da Polenta, Dante's host in Ravenna during the last years of the poet's life (1318-21). She was married for political reasons to Gianciotto of the powerful Malatesta family, rulers of Rimini. Dante may have actually met Paolo in Florence (where Paolo was capitano del popolo--a political role assigned to citizens of other cities--in 1282), not long before he and Francesca were killed by Gianciotto.”

10. Francesca and Paolo (cont’d) • Raffa: “Francesca, according to Boccaccio, was blatantly tricked into marrying Gianciotto, who was disfigured and uncouth, when the handsome and elegant Paolo was sent in his brother's place to settle the nuptial contract. Angered at finding herself wed the following day to Gianciotto, Francesca made no attempt to restrain her affections for Paolo and the two in fact soon became lovers. Informed of this liaison, Gianciotto one day caught them together in Francesca's bedroom (unaware that Paolo got stuck in his attempt to escape down a ladder, she let Gianciotto in the room); when Gianciotto lunged at Paolo with a sword, Francesca stepped between the two men and was killed instead, much to the dismay of her husband, who then promptly finished off Paolo as well. Francesca and Paolo, Boccaccio concludes, were buried – accompanied by many tears – in a single tomb.”

11. Lancelot and Guinevere • Raffa: “The story of Lancelot and Guinevere, which Francesca identifies as the catalyst for her affair with Paolo, was a French romance popular both in poetry and in a prose version known as Lancelot of the Lake. According to this prose text, it is Queen Guinevere, wife of King Arthur, who kisses Lancelot, the most valiant of Arthur's Knights of the Round Table. Francesca, by giving the romantic initiative to Paolo, reverses the roles from the story. To her mind, the entire book recounting this famous love affair performs a role similar to that of the character Galahad, a friend of Lancelot who helps bring about the adulterous relationship between the queen and her husband's favorite knight.”