Tag: love

The Depiction of Love and Women

Throughout The Divine Comedy by Dante and Il Canzoniere by Petrarca, women and love are portrayed in very similar ways that intrigued me. During this course, I loved reading these particular texts because these authors’ portrayals of love and women were very enlightening and movie-like. They portrayed women as very delicate goddesses, which is my most preferable way to read about women. Growing up, I loved to read fairy tales about princesses falling in love and happily ever after. In these texts by Dante and Petrarca, they brought me back to my younger reading days, and they stuck with me a lot more because of that.

In The Divine Comedy, Dante writes and vividly describes his journey through hell in search to finally reach heaven. In Inferno, the poem about hell, he describes his path through the different circles of hell. He is guided by a Roman poet by the name of Virgil, who was sent to him by his love, Beatrice. Each circle represents a different sin. There was a circle for gluttony, wrath, heretics, and many more. However, before Dante entered the gates of Hell, he was unsure if he should do it or not. It was his love and devotion to see Beatrice that motivated him to take on his journey. Beatrice wanted him to take on this journey, so she along with two other women sent for Virgil. For instance, in Canto 2 of the Inferno, Beatrice states, “O Mantuan Shade, in courtesy complete, whose fame survives on earth, nor less shall grow through all the ages, while the world hath seat; a friend of mine, with fortune for his foe, has met with hindrance on his desert way, and, terror-smitten, can no further go, but turns; and that he is too far astray, and that I rose too late for help, I dread, from what in heaven concerning him they say. Go, with thy speech persuasive him bestead, and with all needful help his guardian prove, That touching him I may be comforted. Know, it is Beatrice seeks thee thus to move. Thence come I where I to return am fain: my coming and my plea are ruled by love. When I shall stand before my Lord again, often to him I will renew thy praise.” This pledge from Beatrice shows how much she truly loves Dante and wants him to get guidance while he goes through hell. She said that she is coming to him out of love for Dante, which was very pure hearted. Dante then states, “When of these words she spoken had the last, she turned aside bright eyes which tears did fill, and I by this was urged to greater haste. And so it was I joined thee by her will. As flowers, by chills nocturnal made to pine and shut themselves, when touched by morning bright upon their stems arise, full-blown and fine; so of my faltering courage changed the plight, and such good cheer ran through my heart, it spurred me to declare, like free-born generous wight: alert in service, hearkening her true word! Thou with thine eloquence my heart has won to keen desire to go, and the intent which first I held I now no longer shun. Therefore proceed; thou art my guide, Lord, Master; thou alone!’ Thus I; and with him, as he forward went, the steep and rugged road I entered on.” Dante’s response was very heartwarming and sweet to read because he knew that it was destined for him to go on this trip because Beatrice wanted him to and because he knew that he had the chance to see her in the end. His love for her as well and Virgil and God made him determined to start and continue his journey. In addition, in Canto 5, Dante enters the Second Circle of Hell, which is for the sin of lust. Dante met a woman named Francesca da Rimini who he felt very sorry for because she gave into lust and desire. He mentioned how him and Beatrice’s love is chaste, which was virtuous and eventually led him closer to God. This was very significant to me because it proved how serious and deep Dante and Beatrice’s connection was, and it contrasted from the sinful love that Francesca gave into.

In continuation, Il Canzionere by Petrarca also had a very evocative depiction of love and women. In this story, the main theme is the many love poems/letters that Petrarca wrote for his love, Laura. In my opinion, his love for Laura was the strongest out of all the texts we have read. He had a very profound passion for Laura and it was very obvious while reading the poems. I was very intrigued and drawn into the poems about Laura because it radiates divine feminine energy. For example, in poem 90 of Il Canzoniere, Petrarca states, “She’d let her gold hair flow free in the breeze that whirled it into thousands of sweet knots, and lovely light would burn beyond all measure in those fair eyes whose light is dinner now. Her face would turn the color pity wears, a pity true or false I do not know, and I with all love’s tinder in my breast; it’s no surprise I quickly caught on fire. The way she walked was not the way of mortals but of angelic forms, and when she spoke more than an earthly voice it was that sang: a godly spirit and a living sun was what I saw, and if she is not now, my wound still bleeds though the bow’s unbent.” This poem is very crucial to the theme of love and it is a very vivid description of the way that Petrarca feels about Laura. When he talks about her eyes and her angelic forms, it makes women seem so delicate and fragile which I really enjoyed reading from a male perspective. During this course, I came to realize that from my experience, the way love was depicted in ancient literature was way deeper and more passionate than the way it is depicted in stories now. This was one of the reasons why I enjoyed continuing to read the texts in this course. All the elements and aspects are much more intense and even though at times it was hard to follow on, the passion from the authors always came through, and especially Petrarca. The Editors of the Encyclopedia Britannica did a summary on Il Canzoniere and made Laura a literary subject in their analysis. The Encyclopedia Britannica states, “The poems treat a variety of moods and subjects but particularly his intense psychological reactions to his beloved. Many of his similes, such as burning like fire and freezing like ice, beautifully stated in the sonnet beginning ‘I find no peace, and all my war is done,’ were to be frequently repeated by sonneteers of Elizabethan England and later became poetic cliches. Some of the poems express the very simple, human wish to be with her and to be treated kindly. After Laura’s death Petrarch’s poems continued on the same themes, expressing his sorrow and describing her to return to him in dreams.” This quote from The Encyclopedia is very important because it explains how captivating Petrarca’s tactics were in the poems he was writing about Laura. The quote even says that his similes were later on used by different poets and eventually his quotes became cliche because of how often they were being used. 

To conclude, The Divine Comedy by Dante and Il Canzoniere by Petrarca portray love and women in very similar and fascinating ways. Both authors have very strong characters and passion for the women they are idolizing and it made their texts way more intriguing to read and analyze. Their portrayal of love was like a fantasy in a fairytale, and the way they depicted women brought out their use of great vocabulary and literary tactics in their writing, which made those connections feel stronger. 

References: 

  • Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Laura”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 2 Apr. 2021, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Laura-literary-subject. Accessed 21 December 2021.
  • Petrarca, Francesco, and Mark Musa. Selections from the Canzoniere (Poem 90) Oxford [Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1999. Print.
  • Dante, Alighieri, and Mark Musa. Dante’s Inferno. Canto ll; Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1971.

Murder in the Decameron: 4.1 & 4.9

Human Heart -Die Frau als Hausarztin 1911

In “The Decameron”, Giovanni Boccaccio writes many tales related to topics that reflect his views. I noticed that death is a recurring theme. He tells us stories involving murder. Various characters murder each other in gruesome and brutal ways. These murders are motivated by either love or social class.

On Day 4, Story 1, Boccaccio tells the story of Tancredi and Ghismunda, a father and daughter. Tancredi was the prince of Salerno. He marries his daughter Ghismunda off to the Duke of Capua. Unfortunately, the duke later died, leaving Ghismunda without a husband. She returns to her father’s house. When Ghismunda returns she has intentions to find herself a husband. Tancredi has no intentions of remarrying her. Ghismunda falls in love with Guiscardo, her father’s valet, and they secretly see each other. One day Tancredi falls asleep in her room and catches Ghismunda and the valet. That night Tancredi tells the guards to capture Guiscardo. He confronts him about his relations with his daughter. Tancredi couldn’t believe that Ghuismunda would sleep with someone that’s in a lower class. Ghismunda said she doesn’t regret loving Guiscardo. She becomes enraged at her father for being upset that she was with someone of a lower social class. She tells her father that if Guiscardo is punished so should she. He tells his guards to strangle Guiscardo and remove his heart. He sends the heart to Ghismunda in a golden goblet. After seeing the heart Guismunda kills herself by pouring poison into the heart and drinking it. This is one example of the brutal murders shown in “The Decameron”. Tancredi acts as if killing another person is nothing. He orders people to strangle him and take his heart. The taking of the heart gives this murder a gruesome feel. Sending the heart to his daughter made Trancedi seem more violent and heartless. Guiscardo’s life was regarded as less than, so Tancredi murdered him as if he were less than. He had no remorse for taking the life of somebody his daughter loved. This demonstrates Boccaccio’s creativity. He used the taking of the heart as a symbol of the love that the characters have for each other.

On day 4, story 9, Boccacio tells of two knights Guillaume de Roussillon and Guillaume de Cabestanh. These knights were friends. Cabestanh falls in love with Roussillion’s wife. Roussilion finds out and kills Cabestanh. He cuts his heart out. Roussillon orders it to be cooked and served to his wife. He tells her what she ate after she finishes. After she throws herself out the window. This shows a murder motivated by betrayal. Roussillon’s wife and friend fell in love with each other so he punished them together. The nature of the love the wife and Cabestanh had was stranger than staying loyal to the title of friend and wife. Cutting out the heart was a common theme in both stories.

Boccacio uses these stories to show the issues of class and the nature of love. These murders emphasize these topics in extreme ways. It makes the reader pay attention to the reason behind this violence. In these stories, women are represented “as the secondary victims of violence unleashed by sexual love” according to “A Rhetoric of the Decameron” by Marilyn Migiel.

Citations:

Migiel, Marilyn. “Domestic Violence in the Decameron.” A Rhetoric of the Decameron. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016. 147–159. Web.

Boccaccio, Giovanni, 1313-1375. The Decameron. London :New York : Penguin Books, 1995.

Canzone 189: The Sea

In the canzoniere, we get to see the state of Petrarch’s mind many times, but there’s one metaphor for his state of mind that stands out to me. Canzone 189 portrays Petrarch’s state of mind as a ship at sea. The ship can be seen as his mind, with the sea and weather representing thoughts, or emotions. As we go on in the canzone, we can see that Petrarch feels a mix of negative emotions, placing the image of a sea in the middle of a storm with the rough waves of the sea. “My ship full of forgetful cargo sails, though rough seas at the midnight of a winter…”.

Ships in the stormy sea with gigantic waves Horrible storms - YouTube

As the poem goes on, Petrarch portrays his emotions by describing the weather in greater detail. “… the sail, by wet eternal winds of sighs, of hopes and of desires blowing breaks;”. Here we see that he feels lost and stuck with the sail breaking, as the sails are what help move the ship (Petrarch’s mind). At the end, he confirms this feeling of being lost, describing his lack of reasoning, and skill to move the ship. “… and I despair of ever reaching port.”. He feels he can’t overcome these negative emotions, and is doomed to be stuck in this storm.

Why does this stand out to me? To start, I love the imagery that Petrarch uses to describe his mind. I could easily imagine the rough seas, and cruel weather reading the poem, and relate to this negative blend of emotions creating a storm. Along with this, it stands out to me because it makes me think of Dante entering purgatory. Comparing the two, it creates an interesting juxtaposition. While in this canzone there’s a rough storm representing Petrarch’s unstable state of mind; Dante uses imagery of a ship in clear skies, with “The sweet color of eastern sapphire…” (Canto 1, line 13) of the ocean, showing a state of clarity after the inferno. This was something that stood to me and was interested in, as these were both very different states of mind, and the complete opposite of one another.


Canzoniere 319: Shackled

Throughout Il Canzoniere, Petrarca professes his love for Laura in several ways. When he talks about the weight of her death in this sonnet, for example, it gives us, as the readers, an understanding of the admiration that he has for her. Love is seemingly the main theme of a handful of his poems, including this one, however he does not always portray it as a constant beautiful feeling. For instance, this sonnet explores the complexities of love and how it can be constricting.

In the first stanza, Petrarca writes “My days, swifter than any fawn, have fled like shadows” which explicitly reveals that he has lost all sense of time. This is awfully common for people who aren’t experiencing any excitement in their life, or have no hope for their future. He also compares the duration of all the good things in his life to a wink, which effectively shows how fast these moments come and go. Lastly, when he talks about his calmest hours, which he says are few and far between, he uses the word “bittersweet” to describe them, because his mind is truly never at ease. Even when things seem to be going better for him, he constantly thinks about how much happier he would be if he and Laura were together.

The Triumph of Death, from a 1503 edition of Petrarch. Depicts Laura’s death from the Black Plague. Source: FineArtAmerica

In the next stanza, Petrarca lets out all his anger and frustration with the world. He describes it as “wretched” and “arrogant” because of the broken condition that he was left in after Laura’s death. He also condemns any man that puts their trust into the world, even calling them “blind,” because at one point he was that same man that put his hope out there in the world. He believes that he was given false hope, as he is now unhappy because the person who owns his heart is merely dust, not a person in the flesh. Even though he is fully aware that Laura is not with us, he continues to express his love for her in the third stanza, where he says that her soul (“her best form”) continues living in the Heavens and keeps him more in love.

In the final stanza, Petrarca reintroduces the idea of time passing him by. He mentions that as he gets older and his hair grays, the only thing that he can think of is Laura and what she is like. This, once again, only reinforces the sentiment that he is chained to this love for eternity.

Canzoniere 159: Goddess

In poem 159, there were very vivid descriptions of Laura. In the first stanza, Pertrarca questioned where in heaven nature took the model to obtain her lovely face and show her power down here with the rest of us. This description made the person who was being talked about seem respectable and of very high power. The way Pertracra made these words come together created a perfect visualization for me about what this woman looks like. After reading this stanza, I knew the theme was love and I wanted to analyze it because of that. I love the way love is depicted in this poem, particularly the preface. The next stanza starts to include words that have overall positive definitions. For instance, the word nymph. This word was used in Greek mythology to categorize any of a large class of inferior female divinities. Nymphs were associated with fertile, growing things, including water or trees. The usage of this word provided a wholesome and superior model of the woman. Also, the word virtues was used. The second stanza states “How did a heart collect so many virtues the sum of which is guilty of my death.” I love this line of the poem because it is a play on words. A virtue is a morally good trait or quality, and it is used in the poem as something that caused death which is not something virtues are morally capable of. However, he makes it seem that her qualities were so good, that they are capable of death. 

The next stanzas really depict the depth of Laura’s beauty and the way Petrarcra felt about her. He states that ‘if a man has not yet looked upon her eyes and seen how tenderly she makes them move.’ Before he proceeds to the next stanza, this stanza proves how strongly he feels towards Laura’s eyes, which is extremely significant. Before that, he also states that ‘who seeks for divine beauty seeks in vain.’ The usage of the word vain in this instance shows that even though someone might have a high opinion on her appearance, it should not affect their perspective towards her. To summarize, the last stanza states that this man does not know how love can heal as well as kill, if he did not know the sweetness of Laura’s speech, sighs, and smile. This final stanza really drew me to this poem because of how sweet but deep the message is. Petrarca describes Laura as a perfect goddess, but he also adds these undertones of death and guilt that added a different level of emotion to his feelings about her. As I read the poem, the love was so deep it kind of reminded me of Dante and Beatrice a little bit. I really enjoyed reading about the love that was depicted in The Divine Comedy and it is interesting to see the similarities and differences in that theme with Pertrarca.