Chances are that you didn’t make it through high school and/or college without reading at least part of Dante’s Inferno. The different circles of Hell filled with sinners suffering horribly ironic punishments, the description of Satan eternally devouring Judas, Brutus, and Cassius—they’re strange but compelling images that have worked their way into popular culture. But how many of us have read past the lurid Inferno and Purgatorio to read Dante’s account of Heaven in the Paradiso? (Not me!)
At Slate, Robert Baird talks about why people find Dante’s account of Hell so much more compelling than his vision of Heaven. Setting aside some minor complaints about Dante’s writing style, Baird says the real problem that readers today have with the Paradiso is
the idea of heaven itself. T.S. Eliot noted almost 80 years ago that “we have (whether we know it or not) a prejudice against beatitude as material for poetry.” As the quote suggests, our trouble with heaven is less a problem of belief than it is a problem of imagination. From the opening lines of Anna Karenina on down, all our best literature teaches us that narrative thrives on adversity, and so heaven presents itself as little more than a blank screen of beatific blandness, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind.
Baird goes on to argue that it is well worth your time to read through the third part of Dante’s epic, and that Heaven isn’t nearly as boring as you might think. Anybody care to comment? Is good (as portrayed in literature, at least) forever doomed to be more bland than evil?
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December 27, 2007 at 21:26
Perhaps it’s easier to relate to Dante’s hell because we can relate to the idea that greed, lying, lust, etc. yield punishment. I think most of us tend to rank sins more readily than we do acts of goodness. I recently watched a group of teens going online to take a quiz to find out which level of hell they’d land in. They found this really entertaining. http://www.4degreez.com/misc/dante-inferno-test.mv
I also think Baird is right that Beatrice’s lectures at each sphere are pretty dry while the irony of the souls in hell is much more entertaining. I also found the spheres sort of tedious.
I’m not sure goodness more boring than evil as that goodness is less relatable. None of us have lived with the complete absence of evil that heaven promises while most of us have experienced (and probably helped create) an environment in which good was, if not absent, not powerfully evident.
December 28, 2007 at 00:14
I blogged recently on this misconception that heaven is a boring place. “What amusement does heaven contain? In a world that defines entertainment in conflict, it’s sometimes hard to fathom pleasure in a world without pain.” In my post I came to the conclusion that its discovery and not conflict which holds our interest. Heaven, life with our Creator, offers continuous discovery. Hell, in contrast, is the abscense of discovery. Its a place where the questions nag but are never quite answered. If you would like to read the full post you can find it @ http://logosmadeflesh.blogspot.com/search?q=thrill+of+heaven
December 28, 2007 at 10:15
I suspect that one of many reasons for the neglect of the later two books is their clearly Catholic nature. Protestants and non-Christians are unlikely to “get” Purgatorio and Paradiso as easily. Gruesome torture in hell, sure—but the Beatific Vision and the Mystic Rose? That isn’t our style.
But yeah, my favorite of the books is actually Purgatorio. Whereas Inferno is sometimes little better than a revenge fantasy, Purgatorio actually describes poignantly the Christian’s quest to find practical redemption in daily life. It’s about developing good character by following good examples.
But it isn’t quite as lively.
December 28, 2007 at 10:41
I’d submit the main reason the other two books aren’t taught (I’m thinking high school here) is that the Inferno itself is a bit long-winded. unfortunately, you can only keep some student’s attention for so long.
In reference to Andy’s question: For a story or poem to click with a reader it needs some sort of conflict (or as Matt mentioned: discovery). Oftentimes, good characters are portrayed as already complete. In other words, their journey is done. They have arrived and there’s nothing left for them to do but exist as an unchanging character. For example, Aslan is a good character, but he’s not yet done with his work in the Chronicles of Narnia, he still has things to do. The interest in Aslan is “What’s he going to do next?”
December 28, 2007 at 14:03
Mo,
I think your post on this is absolutely on target and insightful.
December 31, 2007 at 14:38
I haven’t read Dante’s work, unfortunately, but I find it interesting to think that nowadays our culture can identify a hell, but not a proper paradise (unless you’re a Marxist maybe
). I know a Christian kid who asked me if there will be PlayStation 2s in heaven (You can tell that was two years ago). It was part of a dorm discussion and there were other questions, but that was the only one I remember. My point was that heaven is not about merely amusing ourselves, it’s about God. On another camp with another group of kids, we got to discussing whether we’d get bored singing God’s praises. My only thought in that case was that on earth we can analyse music and we can make deeper arrangements of different tunes, even do remixes and things, but there is a limit. I imagine that in heaven there will be no end to how good and deep God’s praises will be.
Finally, from what I understand about Dante’s works, it was supposed to be satire, mocking the celebrities of the day and outing the corrupt practices of the rich and powerful. So maybe there are cases where we just don’t get it because we are not of Dante’s culture.