"Those bites of love": Enter Adam

E come a lume acuto si disonna 
per lo spirto visivo che ricorre 
a lo splendor che va di gonna in gonna,  

e lo svegliato ciò che vede aborre, 
sì nescïa è la sùbita vigilia 
fin che la stimativa non soccorre; 

così de li occhi miei ogne quisquilia
fugò Beatrice col raggio d'i suoi,
che rifulgea da più di mille milia:

onde mei che dinanzi vidi poi;
e quasi stupefatto domandai
d'un quarto lume ch'io vidi tra noi. 

And as at some keen light one wakes from sleep
By reason of the visual spirit that runs
Unto the splendour passed from coat to coat,

And he who wakes abhorreth what he sees,
So all unconscious is his sudden waking,
Until the judgment cometh to his aid,

So from before mine eyes did Beatrice
Chase every mote with radiance of her own,
That cast its light a thousand miles and more.

Whence better after than before I saw,
And in a kind of wonderment I asked
About a fourth light that I saw with us.   (Par. 26:73-81)

At the center of Paradiso 26, the canto of love / caritate, Dante's vision returns - he sees "better after than before."

What preceded this moment with its showy simile has been the catachetical Q and A with John, the eagle of Christ, about love. Dante has just spoken of "those bites" - quei morsi - that turned his love towards God. They are some of the most beautiful lines in the Commedia, and speak of the fallen world, its devouring of our being, as a giant Edenic garden whose fronde - leaves - Dante avers he loves:

"quanto da lui a lor di bene è porto.” (66)

"As much as he has granted them of good."

"quanto . . . è porto": Proportion and number proliferate in this canto of love. Somehow caritate and our ability to see even our fallen world as Edenic seem to be bound up with quantity.

"He" of course is the ortolano etterno. The world we have -- our being and time -- has teeth that strangely turn us toward the garden's maker.

Dante's vision (vista) was consunta in trying to see the material body of John. Are we on earth devoured in our mad flight to grasp something we cannot possibly imagine, let alone experience?


Enter Adam

The loss of Eden surely is factored into those morsi. If we stand back a bit, we note that the entire sphere of the stars is bracketed by two moments. In both, Dante looks back upon Earth, upon the entire course of his journey. We've spoken of the first, in canto 22. In another post, we'll compare it with the latter retrospective gaze in 27.

The point now is, between these two moments of closure, of taking "it all" in (each time the "all" is, paradoxically, more) - Dante has this return to vision. He likens it to an awakening from unconsciousness that begins with the terror of total absence of judgment, of stimativa - a word that surely conveys the power of measure, estimation, as well as judgment.

More precisely, can we call it "vision" when we see nothing that our minds can make sense of? Dante is dramatizing a moment that isn't so much vision as a sort of blind seeing - he experiences a sensory datum devoid of any intellectual or cognitive dimension, and it provokes fear.

As Beatrice, with a radiance that shines more than mille milia, clarifies his sight, Dante realizes that the three figures of theological virtue have been joined by a fourth light. Beatrice's words introduce the first man:

E la mia donna: “Dentro da quei rai
vagheggia il suo fattor l'anima prima
che la prima virtù creasse mai.”  (26:82-84)

The primacy of Adam is underscored. Another eye-catching simile likens the pilgrim to a fronda - again a leaf or branch, in any case an offspring of a tree - being bent by wind, that now springs back by its own virtù:

Come la fronda che flette la cima
nel transito del vento, e poi si leva
per la propria virtù che la soblima,

The pilgrim reels, amazed - stupendo - but he gathers himself, burning with questions for Adam, questions he knows he need not ask.

The next simile is itself stupendous. It will be the incipit for the next post.

Paradiso 26 and undemonstrative enigmaticity

Our group meets every other week, but our progress in Paradiso has slowed. The cantos of the theological virtues might seem simpler than some of the earlier, more complexly plotted and allusive work we have already encountered, but no. They are devilishly closely written -- the poet has not lost any steam, or poetic "chops."

A poet who can write a tercet like this is clearly all there:

"Le fronde onde s'infronda tutto l'orto
de l'ortolano etterno, am' io cotanto
quanto da lui a lor di bene è porto.”

Longfellow tries, but is sensible enough to not attempt the intricate echoes:

"The leaves, wherewith embowered is all the garden
Of the Eternal Gardener, do I love
As much as he has granted them of good." (Par. 26:64-66)

It's tempting to see these cantos as somewhat didactic, or pedantically subservient to biblical texts that form the doctrinal elements of the pilgrim's encounters with Peter, James and John. But each canto offers much more than catechetic tedium. The poem, as we've argued here before, never simply states its burden. It acts out its import.

A clear example is how all is going well in Paradiso 25, until St. John appears. There's a haunting, uncanny moment of cessation of all Paradise -- likened to a ship whose oarsmen suspend their work. The pilgrim turns to Beatrice only to see he has been blinded by John's revelatory brighness. The canto ends with the pilrim's disorientation and fear. The mettle of his soul's hope is being tested.

Before looking at a couple of passages from Paradiso 26 in detail, it might help to spend a few words tracing a pattern that recurs when reading certain non-obvious parts of this poem.

It seems to me that much of the Commedia - certainly the Paradiso - is written "slant," as Dickenson might say. Certain cantos conjoin elements that, prima facie, have no business going together.

To get to the "fruit" (or frui) within the somewhat dry integumentum of these passages, it never seems to hurt to ask childish questions. This is not a task that the poem marks by drawing attention to itself. Unlike the famous appelli ai lettori (addresses to the reader) that direct us to read beneath the versi strani (Inf. 9.63), a canto like Paradiso 26 at first might not seem enigmatic. It takes a while just to notice its several parts don't quite hang together in ways that, from reading the poem, we have come to expect.

In 26, for example, how is it that some derivative platitudes about the Good and love are interspersed with extraordinary similes (a couple of which we'll look at below)? Of all people, what is Adam doing here? Why does Dante encounter him precisely here, after the pilgrim has "passed" his oral exams and experiences renewed, stronger sight? For that matter, what's with all the numbers and quantitative language in this canto? What does caritate - the greatest of the virtues - have to do with Adam, the fall, the length of time he spent on earth, his language and reflections on it, and the duration of his innocence before being sent into exile? Why are there echoes of Cacciaguida in Adam's conversation, and why does our general father open with one of the poem's strangest hapaxes -- parhelion (107-108) -- a double singularity if you will?

Dante was surely doing something other than showing off, or spinning wheels, or filling space before the big finale. When we come across a canto that seems to lose its thread, or veers to an unexpected close, or combines thematic materials from disparate and seemingly unrelated topoi, it's a good idea to ask why. As the imagination works on the question of how these seemingly unrelated elements connect, the result can be a sudden falling into place, acceding to a perspective from which all these disparate elements suddenly swim into signifying focus, often with an unexpected comic "pop."

The "empirical" pattern of such a reading might go something like:

1. naive first reading
2. childish questions
3. noting unusual linguistic features
4. attending to concurrent motifs through the canto

Now if all this is going well, but the text still seems a bit aimless or dispersed, that's pretty much how we felt after spending two entire sessions on 26, without even discussing the last several tercets in any detail. Of course along the way one consults the commentators, who often proffer excellent clarifications and suggestions. But most important is to stick with it:

5. careful re-reading

At some point -- usually thanks to the more unusual (often seemingly gratuitous) passages, images, or motifs -- something we'd not fully taken into account, something not properly weighed, or now seen from a different angle, moves into view. Often it's a connection between a highly leaned theme on one hand, and a very basic human, vernacular reality, common to all. The connection can be epiphanic, uncoiling with the impact of comedic surprise.

To attempt to pin down whether we're dealing with a specific genre, or mode, would take us far afield. Let's give it a simple name for now: Wisdom literature. Writing that draws upon all manner of indirection in order to challenge the reader, to drive us to our own hard-won "eureka moments" would be the sign and pleasure of this mode. It might not sing in epic tones, or seduce with lyric music, but it is always working on something that, when finally reached, yields a potent reward.

We'll look next at some moments in Paradiso 26.

Antigone 141-154: Mathematics and the Dance

ἑπτὰ λοχαγοὶ γὰρ ἐφ᾽ ἑπτὰ πύλαις 
ταχθέντες ἴσοι πρὸς ἴσους ἔλιπον 
Ζηνὶ τροπαίῳ πάγχαλκα τέλη, 
πλὴν τοῖν στυγεροῖν, ὣ πατρὸς ἑνὸς 
145μητρός τε μιᾶς φύντε καθ᾽ αὑτοῖν 
δικρατεῖς λόγχας στήσαντ᾽ ἔχετον 
κοινοῦ θανάτου μέρος ἄμφω.

[141] For the seven captains, equal number stationed against an equal number at the seven gates, left behind their brazen arms in tribute to Zeus the turner of battle—all but the accursed pair who, born of one father and one mother, set against each other their double-slaying spears, both victorious, and who now share in a common death.

In bold are the specific numerical terms as well as some that involve a mathematical operation like adding or averaging. The language is markedly formal, a spectacle of mirroring symmetries - seven against seven, of course, but also the idea of one generating two who fight and share one death. So there are symmetries of space as well, we could say, of time, (and unity of plot): beginning (1), middle (2), end (1). Common to both the seven and the pair of brothers is the moment of mutual-annihilation -- a fateful act that first showed itself when Cadmus, sowing the dragon's teeth, witnessed the symmetric mutual destruction of all but five of the spartoi.

Mathematical symmetry (equality, ἰσότης) is the root of ratio that allows for laws, alliances, and the balances of nature, Jocasta tells her sons in Euripides' Phoenician Women:

Equality . . . always joins friend to friend, city to city, allies to allies; for Equality is naturally lasting among men; but the less is always in opposition to the greater, [540] and begins the dawn of hatred. For it is Equality that has set up for man measures and divisions of weights, and has determined numbers. Night's sightless eye, and radiant sun proceed upon their yearly course on equal terms, [545] and neither of them is envious when it has to yield.

Even as Jocasta says these lines, her sons are preparing to kill one another. Equality at Thebes seems doomed to yield mutual annihilation.

After this militant display of numbers, the first Ode of the Antigone concludes with the chorus of elders turning to Bacchus and to forgetting:

ἀλλὰ γὰρ ἁ μεγαλώνυμος ἦλθε Νίκα 
τᾷ πολυαρμάτῳ ἀντιχαρεῖσα Θήβᾳ, 
150ἐκ μὲν δὴ πολέμων 
τῶν νῦν θέσθαι λησμοσύναν, 
θεῶν δὲ ναοὺς χοροῖς 
παννυχίοις πάντας ἐπέλθωμεν, ὁ Θήβας δ᾽ ἐλελίχθων 
Βάκχιος ἄρχοι.

[148] But since Victory whose name is glory has come to us, smiling in joy equal to the joy of chariot-rich Thebes, let us make for ourselves forgetfulness (λησμοσύναν) after the recent wars, and visit all the temples of the gods with night-long dance and song. And may Bacchus, who shakes the earth of Thebes, rule our dancing! 

The earth shaking -- ἐλελίχθων -- of Bacchus comes from ἐλελίζω - to whirl round, to cause to vibrate, to turn.  Dionysus here stands counterposed to Ζηνὶ τροπαίῳ -- Zeus turner of battle -- in the preceding strophe.

Where Zeus's tropism powered a decisive victory for Thebes against the Argives, the city-shattering power of Bacchus is bound up with music and rhythm, which the god is said to lead. There is no equality here, just the power of the ruling god, leading mortals to forget the strife of wars, ambition and mathematics as they turn in the dance.

Antigone 127-140: Big noisy tongues

[127] For Zeus hates exceedingly the boasts of a big tongue. And when he saw them advancing in a swollen flood, presumptuous in the clang of gold, he hurled down with brandished fire one already starting the victory cry upon our highest battlements. 

[134] Staggered, he fell to the earth with a crash, torch in hand, a man inspired by the Bacchic frenzy [βακχεύων] of the mad attack, who just now was raging against us with the blasts of his tempestuous hate. But his threats did not fare as he had hoped, and to the other enemies mighty Ares dispensed each their own dooms with hard blows, Ares, our mighty ally at the turning-point.

Ζεὺς γὰρ μεγάλης γλώσσης κόμπους 
ὑπερεχθαίρει, καὶ σφας ἐσιδὼν 
πολλῷ ῥεύματι προσνισσομένους 
130χρυσοῦ καναχῆς ὑπεροπλίαις, 
παλτῷ ῥιπτεῖ πυρὶ βαλβίδων 
ἐπ᾽ ἄκρων ἤδη 
νίκην ὁρμῶντ᾽ ἀλαλάξαι.

ἀντιτύπᾳ δ᾽ ἐπὶ γᾷ πέσε τανταλωθεὶς 
135πυρφόρος, ὃς τότε μαινομένᾳ ξὺν ὁρμᾷ 
βακχεύων ἐπέπνει 
ῥιπαῖς ἐχθίστων ἀνέμων. 
εἶχε δ᾽ ἄλλᾳ τὰ μέν, 
ἄλλα δ᾽ ἐπ᾽ ἄλλοις ἐπενώμα στυφελίζων μέγας Ἄρης 
140δεξιόσειρος.

Capaneus is singled out for specific attention in the first choral ode of the Antigone. He also stands out in Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes. In that play, the Messenger describes him:

Capaneus is stationed at the Electran gates, another giant of a man, greater than the one described before. [425] But his boast is too proud for a mere human, and he makes terrifying threats against our battlements—which, I hope, chance (τύχη) will not fulfill! 

For he says he will utterly destroy the city with god's will or without it, and that not even conflict with Zeus, though it should fall before him in the plain, will stand in his way. The god's lightning and thunderbolts he compares to midday heat. 

For his sign (σῆμα) he has a man without armor (γυμνὸν - naked) bearing fire, and the torch, his weapon, blazes in his hands; in gold are letters that speak: “I will burn the city.” 

Καπανεὺς δ᾽ ἐπ᾽ Ἠλέκτραισιν εἴληχεν πύλαις, 
γίγας ὅδ᾽ ἄλλος τοῦ πάρος λελεγμένου 
425μείζων, ὁ κόμπος δ᾽ οὐ κατ᾽ ἄνθρωπον φρονεῖ, 
πύργοις δ᾽ ἀπειλεῖ δείν᾽, ἃ μὴ κραίνοι τύχη: 
θεοῦ τε γὰρ θέλοντος ἐκπέρσειν πόλιν 
καὶ μὴ θέλοντός φησιν, οὐδὲ τὴν Διὸς 
ἔριν πέδοι σκήψασαν ἐμποδὼν σχεθεῖν. 
430τὰς δ᾽ ἀστραπάς τε καὶ κεραυνίους βολὰς 
μεσημβρινοῖσι θάλπεσιν προσῄκασεν: 
ἔχει δὲ σῆμα γυμνὸν ἄνδρα πυρφόρον, 
φλέγει δὲ λαμπὰς διὰ χερῶν ὡπλισμένη: 
χρυσοῖς δὲ φωνεῖ γράμμασιν ‘πρήσω πόλιν.’ 

There is much in the language of these passages - both Sophocles' and Aeschylus' - that could keep us busy for quite some time. For example, Sophocles' elders describe the real Capaneus as having a torch in hand - in Aeschylus, the torch is part of the image on his shield. And the golden letters on the shield speak a loud prediction, a promise and intention, which some translators are tempted to turn into actual armaments:

• With presumptuous in the clang of gold, Jebb leaves open the unspecified cause of the clang. 
• Wyckoff, similarly: insolent clangor of gold.
• Grene materializes it: insolent in the clang of golden armor.
• Fitts-Fitzgerald in keeping with their freer approach introduce head covering: Their swagger of golden helms (108). 

If we ask whether the clang is from the armor, or from the hubris a reader hears in the meaning of the letters, our translators offer different accounts. There is a hypothetical material source of a sound in battle, and the immaterial sense of an inscription. Which "in fact" is resonant? Hard to say.

It's in Aeschylus that we learn what the golden letters insolently say. Writing, gold, presumption and weaponry come together in:

χρυσοῖς δὲ φωνεῖ γράμμασιν ‘πρήσω πόλιν.’  

in gold are letters that speak: “I will burn the city.” 

One more curious materialization too tempting to ignore: in Aeschylus, the conflict with Zeus -- that the Messenger poses as a possible, contingent event that could befall Capaneus -- is expressed as a literal falling to the ground:

Διὸς ἔριν πέδοι σκήψασαν ἐμποδὼν 

 though it should fall before him in the plain

Capaneus

The idea is that Capaneus, whose sign is an unarmed (naked) man, has no fear -- even if the Eris of a struggle with Zeus were to fall to the ground at his feet. A fall is of course precisely what happens, not to Eris, however, but to Capaneus, struck by a bolt, swinging as if balanced (τανταλωθεὶς) in space, in the act of stepping from the top of his ladder to the city's tantalizingly near battlement, before crashing in flames to earth. ἀντιτύπᾳ, Sophocles' elders say, "counter-struck."

As noted earlier, the poetics of the odes - both Sophocles' and Aeschylus' - involve a complex play of grammatical number and of rhetorical figure: of γλῶσσα as material tongue and as language, of signs and meanings, sound and sense, logos and matter.

What mustn't get lost in the interstices of close reading is a larger point, made at the beginning of the Ode: Zeus really hates big noisy tongues. Now the city of Thebes, spared from doom, is about to be addressed by Creon, who is going to decree, backed by the full power and authority of his office, a distinction between two brothers, sons of Oedipus and Jocasta, siblings of Ismene and Antigone.

In Creon's mind, there is an absolute difference between Eteocles and Polyneices. Antigone's heart feels none. The Antigone turns on this difference about difference: whether in reality these are two, or one.