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Farinata and Cavalcante

Author(s): Erich Auerbach and W. R. TraskSource: The Kenyon Review, Vol. 14, No. 2, The Dante Number (Spring, 1952), pp. 207-242Published by: Kenyon CollegeStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4333322 .

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Erich Auerbach

FARINATAAND CAVALCANTE'(TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN BY W. R. TRASK)

"O Tosco che per la citta del focovivo ten vai cosi parlandoonesto,

24 piacciatidi restare n questoloco.La tua loquelati fa manifesto

di quella nobil patrianatio27 a la qual forse fui troppomolesto."

Subitamentequesto suono usciod'una de I'arche;perom'accostai,30 temendo,un pocopiiual duca mio.

Ed el mi disse: "Volgiti: che fai?Vedi la Farinatache s'e dritto:33 da la cintola in su tutto '1vedrai."I' avea gia iAmio viso nel suo fitto;

ed el s'ergeacol pettoe con la fronte36 com'avesse 'inferno n grandispitto.E l'animoseman del ducae prontemi pinsertra le sepulturea lui,39 dicendo:"Leparoletue sien conte."Com'ioal pie de la sua tomba fui,guardommiun poco,e poi, quasi sdegnoso,

42 mi dimando: "Chifur Ii maggiortui?"1. This paper is a chapterfrom Mimesis, published at Berne in 1946. It has now beenEnglished by W. R. Trask, and will be published in this country.

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208 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEToch'erad'ubidirdisideroso,

non gliel celai, ma tuttogliel'apersi;45 ond'ei levo le ciglia un pocoin soso.Poi disse: "Fieramente uro avversi

a me e a mici primi e a mia parte,48 si che per due fiate li dispersi.""S'eifur cacciati,ei tornard'oginiparte"

rispuosi ui "l'unae l'altrafiata;51 ma i vostri non appreserben quell'arte."Allor sursea la vistascoperchiata

un' ombra ungo questainfinoal mento:54 credo che s'era n ginacchie evanta.

Dintorno mi guardo,cometalentoavessedi veder s'altriera meco;

57 e poi che il sospecciaru tuttospentopiangendodisse: "Seper questocieco

carcerevai per altezzad'ingegno,6o mio figlio ov'e? perchenon e ei teco?"E io a lui: "Da me stesso non vegno:

colui ch'attendeIa,per qui mi mena,63 Forsecui Guido vestroebbea disdegno."

Le sue parolee '1modo de la penam'aveandi costuigi'a etto il nome;

66 perofu la risposta osi piena.Di subito drizzatogrido: "Come

dicesti? elli ebbe? non viv'elliancora?69 non fiere ii occhisuoi il dolcelome?"Quando s'accorsed'alcunadimora

ch'iofaceadinanzia la risposta72 supin ricadde,e piiunon parve fora.

Ma quell'altromagnanimoa cui postarestatom'era,non muto aspetto,

75 ne mossecollo, ne%iego suacosta;E, "Se",continuandoal primo detto,

"egli han quell'arte",disse, "mal appresa,78 cio mi tormentapiu che questoletto.



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ERICHAUERBACH 209("O Tuscan! who througlh he city of fire goest alive,speakingthus decorously,may it please thee to stop in this place. Thyspeechclearlyshews thee a native of that noble country,whichperhaps vexed too much."Suddenly his sound ssued rom oneof the chests:whereat n fear I drewa little closerto my Guide.And he saidto me: "Turntlhee ound;wlhatart thou doing? lothere Farinata!wlhohiasraisedhimself erect; from the girdleupward lhou halt seelim all."AlreadyI had fixedmy look onhis; and he rose uprightwitlh breastand countenance, s if heentertained reat scorn of Hell; andl he bold and ready handsof my Guide pushed me amongst the sepultures to him, saying:"Let thy wordsbe numbered."WlhenI was at the foot of histomb,he lookedat me a little;andthen,almostcontemptuously,he askedme: "Who were thy ancestors?", being desirous oobey,concealedt not; butopenedthe whole to him: whereuponhe raisedhis browsa little; then he said:"Fiercely dversewerethey to me,andto my progenitors,ndto my party;so that twiceI scatteredhem.""Iftheyweredriven orth, theyreturned romeveryquarter,botlh imes," answeredhim; "butyourshavenotrightlylearnt that art."Then, besidehim, there rose a shadow,visibleto the chin; it hadraised tself,I think, upon its knees.Itlookedaroundme, as if it had a wish to see whethersomeonewerewith me;but when all itsexpectationwasquenched, t said,weeping:"If throughthis blind prisonthou goestby height ofgenius,whereis my son and why is he not with thee?"And Ito him: "Of myselfI comenot: he, thatwaitsyonder, eadsmethroughthis place;whom perhaps hy Guido held in disdain."Alreadyhis words and the mannerof his punishmenthad readhis nameto me: hencemy answerwas so full. Rising instantlyerect,he cried:"How saidst thou: he held? lives he not still?doesnot the sweetlight strikehis eyes?"Whenhe perceivedhatI made somedelay n answering, upinehe fell again,andshewedhimselfno more. But thatother, magnanimous, t whose desireI had stopped,changednot his aspect,nor movedhis neck,nor



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210 FARINATAAND CAVALCANTEbent his side. "And if," continuinghis former words, he said,"theyhave learntthat artbadly, t moretormentsme than thisbed... ." EnglishversionbyDr.1.A. Carlyle;"TempleClassics"edition.)

This episodefrom the Tenth Canto of the Inferno beginswith Virgiland Dantewalking alonga narrowpathwayamongflamingchests whose lids standopen. Virgil explainsthat theyare the tombs of hereticsand atheists,and promisesDante ful-fillmentof his hintedwish to communicatewithoneof thespiritsconfinedthere.Dante is about to replywhen he is taken abackby thesoundof a voice which rises rom one of thechests,begin-ning with the darko-soundsof 0 Tosco.One of the condemnedhas raisedhimself erectin his chest and addresses hemas theypass. Virgil tells Dante his name; it is Farinatadegli Uberti, aFlorentine, Ghibelline artyeaderandcaptain,who diedshortlybeforeDante's birth. Dante stationshimself at the foot of thetomb;a conversation egins, only to be interrupted few lineslater (1.52) as abruptlyas the conversation etweenDante andVirgil hadbeen.This timeagainit is one of thosecondemned othe chestswhointerrupts,ndDanterecognizes im immediately,by his situationand his words:he is Cavalcante e' Cavalacanti,thefatherof Dante'searly riend, hepoetGuidoCavalcanti. hescenewhich now takesplacebetweenCavalcante nd Dante isbrief (only 21 lines). As soon as it comes to an end with Caval-cante'ssinking back into his chest, Farinataresumes he inter-ruptedconversation.

Within the brief spaceof aboutseventy ines we thus have atripleshift in the courseof events;we have fourscenescrowdedtogether,each full of powerand content.None is purelyexposi-tory-not even the first,a comparativelyalm conversation e-tween Danteand Virgil,whichI havenot included n the passagegiven above.Here, it is true,the reader,and Dante too, arebeingacquaintedwith the new settingwhich is openingbeforethem,



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ERICHAUERBACH 211i.e., the SixthCircleof Hell; but the scenealsocontains ts ownindependent heme,the psychological rocess n which the twospeakersare involved.Contrastingmost sharplywith the theo-reticalcalmandpsychological elicacyof this prelude, herefol-lows an exceedinglydramatic econdscene,initiatedby the sud-den sound of Farinata's oiceand the abruptappearancef hisbody raisingitself in its tomb, by Dante's alarmand Virgil'sencouragingwords and gestures.Here-erect and abruptas hisbody-Farinata'smoralstature s developed, arger than life asit were,andunaffected y death and the painsof hell. He is stillthe samemanhe was in his lifetime.It is theTuscanaccents romDante's ips which have made him rise and address he passingfigurewith proudlycourteous ignity.WhenDante turnstowardhim, Farinata first inquires into his ancestry, in order to learnwith whom he is dealing,whetherwith a manof noble descent,whetherwith friend or foe. And when he hears that Dantebelongsto a Guelphfamily,he sayswith sternsatisfactionhathe twicedrove hathatedparty rom thecity.The fateof Florenceand the Ghibellines is still uppermost in his mind. Dante repliesthat the expulsionof the Guelphsdid not profit the Ghibellinesin the long run,thatin the endit wasthe latterwho remainednexile;but he is interrupted y the emergence f Cavalcantewhohas heardDante'swords and recognizedhim. His peeringheadcomes into sight; it is attached o a much slighter body thanFarinata's.He hopesto seehis sonwithDante,butwhen he looksin vain,he breaks nto anxiousquestionswhich showthat he toocontinueso havethesamecharacternd thesamepassions hathehadinhislifetime, hough heyareverydifferentromFarinata's:love of life on earth,faith in the autonomousgrcatnessof thehumanmind,andaboveall loveandadmirationor hissonGuido.As he askshis urgentquestions,he is excited,almostbeseeching,thus differentiatinghimself sharplyfrom Farinata's mposinggreatness ndself-discipline;ndwhen he infers(wrongly)fromDante'swordsthat his sonis no longer alive,he collapses;wherc-



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212 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEuponFarinata, nmovedandwithoutreferenceo theinterveningepisode,repliesto the last remarkDantehad addressedo him,and what he says characterizes im completely: f, as you say,the banishedGhibellineshave not succeededn returningo thecity, thatis a greater orment o me thanthe bedonwhich lie.

Moreis packedtogether n this passage hanin any of theotherswe haveso far discussedn thisbook;butthere s notonlymore, the material is not only weightierand more dramaticwithin so shorta space; t is also intrinsicallymuchmorevaried.Here we have the relationnot merelyof one eventbut of threedifferentevents, the second of which-the Farinatascene-isinterrupted nd cut in two by the third.There is, then,no unityof action n theordinaryense.Nor is thiscomparable ithwhatwe foundin the scene romHomerdiscussedn our firstchapter,where the reference o Odysseus'car occasioned lengthy,cir-cumstantial, pisodicnarrativewlich carriedus far from theoriginalsubject. n Dante'scasethe subject s changedabruptlyand in quick succession.Farinata'swordsinterruptVirgil'sandDante'sconversationubitamente;he al/orsurseof line 52 cutswithouttransition hroughthe Farinata cene,which is just asprecipitatelyesumedby ma quell'altromagnanimo.The unityof the passage s dependentupon the setting,the physicalandmoralclimateof the circleof hereticsandatheists; ndthequicksuccession f independent pisodesor mutuallyunrelated cenesis a concomitant f the structure f the Comedyas a whole. Itpresents he journeyof an indivilual and his guide throughaworld whoseinhabitants emain n whateverplaceis assigned othem. Despite hisquicksuccession f scenes, here s no questionof any parataxisn Dante'sstyle.Withineveryindividual cenethere is an abundance f syntactic onnectives; nd when-as inthe presentnstance-the scenesarejuxtaposedn sharpcontourswithout transition, he confrontations managed by meansofartistically aried devicesof expressionwhich are rather"com-mnutators"han parataxes.The scenesare not set stifflyside by



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ERICHAUERBACH 213side and in the samekey-we are thinkingof the Latinlegendof Alexis andevenof the Chansonde Roland-they risefromthedepthsasparticularormsof themomentarily revailingonalityand stand n contrapuntal elation o one another.

To makethisclearerwe shallmorecloselyexamine hepointsat which the scenechanges.Farinata nterrupts he conversingpairwith the words:0 Tosco,che perla citt2ael foco tnvotenvai. . . This is an address, vocative ntroducedy 0, withasucceedingrelativeclausewhich, in comparisonwith the voca-tive, is decidedlyweightyand substantial; nd only then comestherequest,which is againweiglhte(down withreservedourtesy.We hear,not,"Tuscan, top!"but "OTuscan!who . . ., may itpleasethee to linger in this place."The construction, O thouwho" is extremely olemn and comesfrom the elevatedstyle ofthe antiqueepic.Dante'sear remembersts cadenceas it remem-bers so manyotherthingsin Virgil,Lucan,andStatius. do notthink the constructionoccursbefore this in any medieval vernacu-lar.But Dante uses it in his own way: with a strongadjuratoryelement-which is present in antiquity at most in prayers-andwith so condensed a content in the relative clause as only he canmanage.Farinata'seeling and attitude owardthe passingpairare so dynamically pitomizedn the threequalifiers,perlacittadel foco ten vai, vivo,coszparlandoonesto,thathad the masterVirgil reallyheardthe words,he might well have been moredismayed hanDantein the poem;his own relativeclausesaftera vocativeareperfectlybeautifulandhiarmonious,o be sure,butneverso conciseand arresting. See for exampleAeneid I, 436:0 fortunatiquibus am moeniasurgunt!or,still moreinterestingbecauseof its full rhetorical well, II, 638:vos o quibusintegeraevi / sanguis, ait, solidaeque suo stant robore vires, / vos agitatefugam.) Note alsohow the antithesis"through he city of fire"and "alive" s expressed ntirely,and therefore he more effec-tively,through hepositionof the word"vivo."

After thesethreelinesof address omesthe tercet n which



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214 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEFarinata dentifieshimself as Dante's fellow countryman, ndonly then, afterhe has finished speaking, he statement:"Sud-denly this sound issued,"etc., a statementwhich one wouldnormally xpect o find introducing surprising vent,but whichhere-where it follows the event-producesa comparativelyuieteffectas a mere explanation f what is occurring.So that, in arecitation f theentirepassage, hese ineswould haveto be readmore softly. There is no question, hen, of any straightforwardparatactic ttachingof the Farinata ceneto the conversation fthe two travelers.On the one handwe mustnot forgetthe factthat Virgil vaguelyannounced t beforehandn the courseof theconversation lines i6 to i8); on the other hand,it is so strong,so violent,so overpoweringn irruption f a different ealm-inthe local, ethical,psychological, ndTsthetic enses-that its con-nectionwith what precedes s no merejuxtaposition ut the vitalrelationship f counterpoint,f the suddenbreakingn of some-thing dimly foreboded.The eventsare not-as we put it in con-nectionwith the Chansonde Rolandand theLegendof Alexis-divided nto littleparcels; heylivetogether,despite heircontrastand actuallybecauseof it.

The secondchangeof sceneis managed hroughthe words"Allorsurse,"n line 52. It seemssimplerand less remarkablethanthe first.What,afterall, is more normalthan to introducea suddennew occurrencewith the words,"Then it befel . . .?But if we ask ourselveswhere in pre-Danteanmedieval vernacularliteraturewe might find a comparable inguistic maneuver,inter-rupting the action in courseby a dramaticallyincisive"then,"weshould, I think, have a long searchbefore us. I for one know ofnone. Allora at the beginning of a sentence is naturally quite fre-quent in Italian literature before Dante. It occurs for instance inthe storiesof the Novellino but with much less force of meaning.Such sharp breaks are in keeping with neither the style nor thetime-sense of pre-Dantean narrative,not even with those of theFrench epics, where ez vos or atant ez vos occurs in a similar



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ERICHAUERBACH 215though much weaker sense (for example,Roland 413). Thateven extremely dramatic turnings of the tide of actionwere handled with stiff circumstantialitymay be observedfor examplein Villehardouinwhen he relatesthe interventionof the Doge of Veniceat the stormingof Constantinople.Whenhis men hesitate o land, the aged and blind Doge orders hemupon painof deathto set him ashore irst,with the flagof SaintMark.This the chronicler ntroduceswith the words:or porrezoir estrangeproece.Which is just as though Dante, insteadofallora,had said,"And then somethingquite extraordinaryap-pened."The OldFrenchez vosmayserve o pointtheway aswetry to find the correctLatin term for this abruptly ntervening"then."For it is not tum or tunc; in many cases t is rathersedoriam.Buttherealequivalent,whichgivesthe full force, s ecce,or still betteret ecce.This is foundlessfrequently n the elevatedstyle than in Plautus, n Cicero's etters,in Apuleius,etc., andespeciallyn the Vulgate.When Abraham akesthe knife to sac-rificehis son Isaac,we read: et ecce AngelusDomini de caeloclamavit,dicens: Abraham,Abraham.I think this linguisticmaneuver,which effects so sharp an interruption,is too harsh tostemfrom the elevated tyleof classicalLatin;but it correspondsperfectlywith the elevatedstyleof the Bible.And furthermore,Danteuses heBiblical t ecceverbatim n another ccasionwherea stateof affairs s interrupted y a sudden, houghnot quitesodramatic,occurrence Purg. XXI, 7: ed ecco, si come ne scriveLuca . . . ci apparve . . after Luke xxiv, I3: et ecce duo exillis . . .). I am not prepared o state as a certainty that Danteintroducedhe linguisticmaneuverof this abruptlynterrupting"then"ntotheelevated tyleand that it was a Biblicalechowithhim. But this muchwould seemto be certain:at the time Dantewrote, the dramatically rresting"then"was by no means asobviousand generally vailable s it is today;andhe used it moreradicallyhan any other medievalwriterbeforehim.

Butwe mustalsoconsider he meaningandthe soundof the



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216 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEwordsurse, which Dante uses in at least one other passagewithtelling effect to describea suddenemergence(Purg. VI, 72-73:e l'ombrauttain se romita sursever ui . . .). The allor urseof line52, then,has hardly ess weightthan the wordsof Farinatawhich bring in the first interruption;his allor is one of thoseparatacticorms which establisha dynamicrelationship etweenthe membersthey connect. The conversationwith Farinata sinterrupted-oncehe has heardpartof it, Cavalcante annotwaitfor it to end, he simplyloses his self-control.And the part heplays-his peering expression,his whining words, and his pre-cipitatedespairwhenhe sinksback-forms a sharpcontrastwithFarinata'sweighty calm when he resumes speaking after thethird shift (11. 3 ff.).

The third shift, ma quell'altromagnanimo, etc., is much lessdramaticthan the first two. It is calm, proud, and weighty.Farinataalone dominates he scene. But the contrastwith whatprecedes s thus only the more striking.Dante calls Farinatamagnanimo,employingan Aristotelian erm which may havecometo life in hisvocabularyhrough tsusebyThomasAquinasor, more probably,by BrunettoLatini and which is applied nan earlierpassage o Virgil.This is doubtless conscious ontrastto Cavalcante costui);and the three dentically onstructed olawhich expressFarinata's loofness non muto aspetto,ne mossecollo, ne piego sua costa) areundoubtedly esignednot only todescribeFarinatahimself but also to contrasthis attitudewithCavalcante's. his is aurally apparent rom the regularlycon-structed lauseswhich cometo the listenerwhile he is still con-sciousof the irregular ndplaintivelyhrongingquestions f theother.(The wordingof thesequestions, 1.58 to 6o and67 to 69,Dante may well have modeledafter Andromache's ppearance,Aeneid III,3IO, that is, aftera woman's amentations.)Abruptly, hen, as these eventssucceedone another, his isno paratacticconstruction.The most vital continuityof movementvibrates hroughthe entirepassage.Dante has at his disposalan



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ERICHAUERBACH 217abundanceof stylisticdeviceswhich no Europeanvernacularbeforehim could equal. And he does not use them singly; heconnects them in an uninterrupted elationship.Virgil's en-couraging words (11. I-33) consistexclusivelyof principalclauseswithout any formal connection by conjunctions.There is a shortimperative, a short question, then another imperative with anobject and an explanatoryrelative, and a future clause of adhor-tative import with an adverbial qualifier. But the quick succes-sion, the concise formulation of the individual parts, and theirmutual balanceexhibit to perfectionthe natural vitality of spokendiscourse: "Turn around! What are you doing? etc." Withalthere are semantic connections of the most subtle kind. There isthe ordinarycausal relation (pero), but in addition to it we havethe connective onde hovering between temporal and causal value,and the hypothetically causal forse che, which some early com-mentators consider to be courteously softening. There are themost varied temporal, comparative, and graduated hypotheticalconnections, supportedby the greatest possibleelasticityof verbalinflectionsand verbal order. Note for instance the easewith whichDante keeps syntacticcontrol of the scene of Cavalcante'sappear-ance so that it runs smoothly on through three tercetsto the endof his first speech (L.6o). The unity of the constructionhere restsupon three verbal pillars, surse, guardo, disse. The first supportsthe subject, the adverbialqualifiers, and in addition, the explan-atory parenthesiscredo che; the second, guardo, carries the firstlines of the second tercet with the as-if clause; while the thirdline of this same tercet points toward the disse and Cavalcante'sdirect discourse,which marksthe climax of the whole movementfrom an initial forte through a decrescendo to a renewed cres-cendo beginning with line 57.

Should this analysis find any readers but little versed inmedieval vernacular literature, they may well be surprisedthatI here emphasize and praise the extraordinarycharacterof syn-tactic constructions which are today used by every half-way



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218 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEtalented literaryman and indeed by many who, though theywrite nothing but letters,have a modicumof literary raining.Butif we start rom his predecessors, ante's anguage s a well-nigh incomprehensiblemiracle.There were great poets amongthem. But, comparedwith theirs, his style is so immeasurablyricher n directness, igor, and subtlety,he knows and uses suchan immeasurably reaterstockof forms, he expresses he mostvariedphenomena nd subjectswith such immeasurablyuperiorassurance nd firmness, hat we come to the conclusion hat thisman used his languageto discover he world anew. Very oftenit is possible o demonstrate r to conjecturewhere he acquiredthis or that deviceof expression; ut his sourcesare so numerous,his earhears hem,his intellectusesthem,soaccurately,o simply,and yet so originally, hatdemonstrationsnd conjectures f thissortcan only serve to increaseour admiration or the power ofhis linguisticgenius. A text suchas the one we are consideringmay be approached t any point,and every point will yield asurprise, omethingunimaginablen the vernaculariteratures tan earlierdate. Let us takesomethingas insignificant-lookingsthe clause,da me stessonon vegno. Is it conceivablehat so shortand yet completea formulation f sucha thought n particular,that so incisivea semanticorganizationn general,anda da usedin this sense,should occurin the work of an earliervernacularauthor?Dante uses da in this sense in severalother passages(Purg. I, 52:da me non venni; alsoPurg.XIX, 143: buonadase;andPar.II, 58: madimmiquelchetuda te ne pensi). The mean-ing "of one's own motion,""of one'sown free will," "by one-self,"would seem to have been a furtherdevelopmentof themeaning"(coming) from."GuidoCavalcantiwritesin the can-zoneDonnamiprega: [Amore]nona vertutemada quellavene.It is of coursenot possible o claim thatDantecreated hisnewsemantic urn,for even if no singlepassageof the sortcouldbefound in earlier exts,that still might meanno more than thatno suchpassagehappens o be extant;and evenif nothingof the



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ERICHAUERBACH 219sort was ever writtenbeforehis time, it still may havebeen cur-rent in spoken anguage. ndeed,the latterpossibility trikesmeas likely, becausea scholarlybackgroundwould more naturallyhavesuggestedper.What is certain,however, s thatin adoptingor creating his shortexpression,Dantegaveit a vigoranddepthpreviouslynconceivable-theeffect, n ourpassage,beingfurtherenhanced by a twofold opposition: on the one hand to per altezzad'ingegnoandon the otherto coluich'attendea',bothrhetoricalcircumlocutionsvoiding herealname,haughtilyn one instanceandrespectfullyn the other.

The da me stessoperhaps tems from the spoken anguage;and elsewhere oo it may be observed hat Danteby no meansscornscolloquialisms. he Volgiti!che fai?, especiallyromVir-gil's mouth and coming immediatelyafterFarinata's olemnlycomposedapostrophe,as the ringof spontaneousndunstylizedspeech,of everyday onversation mong ordinary peakers.Thecase is not verydifferentwith the harshquestionchi fur li mag-gior tui? unadorned s it is with any of the gracesof circumlo-cution,andwith Cavalcante's omedicesti?elli ebbe?etc.Read-ing further hroughthis canto,we come, toward the end, uponthe passagewhereVirgil asks,perchesei tu si smarrito? 1.I25).All thesequotations,detached rom theircontext,could well beimagined n any ordinaryconversation n the familiar evel ofstyle.Beside hem we find formulationsf the highestsublimity,whicharealsostylistically sublime"n the antiquesense.Thereis no doubtthat the stylistic ntent in generalis to achievethesublime. If this were not clear from Dante's explicit statements,we couldsense it directly romeveryline of his work,howevercolloquial t may be. The weightiness,gravitas,of Dante'stoneis maintained o consistentlyhat there can never be any doubtasto what level of stylewe findourselves pon.Nor is it possibleto doubt that it was the poets of antiquity who gave Dante themodelof the elevated tyle-which he was the first to adopt.Hehimselfacknowledgesn many passages, oth in the Comedyand



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220 FARINATAAND CAVALCANTEin theDe vulgarieloquentia, ow much he owesthem in regardto theelevated tyleof thevernacular.t maywell bethathe doesso in the verypassagewe arediscussing, or the much-disputedline aboutVirgil "whomperhaps . . Guido held in disdain"permitsthis interpretation mong many others;almost all theearlycommentatorsook it in an aesthetic ense.Yet there is nodenyingthatDante'sconception f the sublimediffersessentiallyfromthat of lhismodels, n respect o subjectmatterno lessthanto stylistic orm. The themeswhich the Comedy ntroduces ep-resenta mixtureof sublimityand trivialitywhich, measuredbythe standards f antiquity, s monstrous.Of thecharacters hichappearn it, somebelongto the recentpastandevento the con-temporarypresent(despitePar.XVII,136-138), and not all ofthem arefamousorcarefully hosen.Quiteoftentheyare franklyrepresentedn all thehumblerealismof theirspheres f life.Andin general,as everyreader s aware,Danteknows no limits indescribingwith meticulous areand directnesshings which arehumdrum, rotesque, rrepulsive.Themeswhiich annotpossiblybe considered ublimein the antiquesenseturn out to be justthatbyvirtueof hiswayof moldingandorderinghem.His mix-ture of stylistic evelshasalreadybeennoted.One needbut thinkof the line, "and let them scratchwherever hey itch,"whichoccurs n oneof themost solemnpassages f theParadisoXVII,129), in order to appreciate ll the immensedifferencebetweenDanteand let us say Virgil.

Many important ritics-and indeedwhole epochsof classi-cistic taste-have felt ill at ease with Dante'scloseness o theactual n the realm of the sublime-that is, as Goetheput it inhis Annals for the year I821, with his "repulsive nd often dis-gusting greatness."This is not surprising.For nowherecouldone find so clearan instanceof the antagonism f the two tradi-tions-that of antiquity,with the principleof the separation fstyles,and thatof the Christian ra,with its minglingof styles-as in Dante'spowerful emperament, hich is conscious f both



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ERICHAUERBACH 221because ts aspiration owardthe traditionof antiquitydoes notimply for it the possibility f abandoning he other;nowheredoesmingling of styles come so close to violation of all style. Duringthe latter phases of antiquitythe educatedsaw in the Bible aviolationof style. And the later Humanistscouldnot but haveprecisely he samereactiono the workof theirgreatestpredeces-sor,the manwhowas thefirstto readthe poetsof antiquity gainfor the sakeof theirart and to assimilate heirtone,themanwhowas the first to conceive he idea of the volgare llustre, he ideaof great poetry in the vernacular, nd to carry t out; no otherreactionwas possible or them, preciselybecauseDante had doneall that. The mixtureof styles n the literaryworks of the earlierMiddle Ages, as for instance in the Christiandrama, seemedpardonable ecauseof theirnaivete;thoseworkscould not layclaim to high poetic dignity; their popularpurposeand popularcharacterustifiedor at any rate excusedtheir being what theywere; they did not reallyenterthe realmof thingsthat needbetaken into accountand judged seriously.With Dante, however,it was impossible o speak of naiveteand the absenceof higherclaims.His numerousexplicit statements,all his references oVirgil as his model, his invocations f the Muses,of Apollo, andof God, his tenselydramaticrelationshipo his own work-soclearlyapparentrommany passages-and finally and aboveall,the verytone of every ine of the poem itself,bearwitnessto thefact that the claimshe makesare of the highestorder.It is notsurprisinghatthe tremendous henomenonwhich the Comedyrepresentshouldhavemade aterHumanists nd men of human-istic training ll at ease.

In his theoretical tterancesDante himselfbetraysa certainindecision n regardto the questionof the stylisticcategory nwhich the Comedymight fall. In his De vulgari eloquentia-atreatiseon the canzone,which would still seem to be whollyuninfluenced y the Comedy-the demandswhich Dante makesuponthe elevatedand tragic style are very different rom those



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222 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEwith which, in the Comedy,he later complies-they are muchnarrower n respect o choice of subjectmatter,and much morepuristicand concernedwith separationof styles in respecttochoice of formsand words.He was then under the influenceofProven~al oetryand of the poetryof the Italian til nuovo-bothexcessively rtificial nd intended or an initiatedelite; and withthesehe connected he antiquedoctrineof the separation f styleswhich the medieval heoristsof the art of rhetoric efused o letdie. Dantenever reedhimselfcompletelyrom theseviews;other-wisehe couldnot have calledhis greatwork a comedy n clearestopposition o the term al/a tragediawhich he applied o Virgil'sAeneid(Inf. XX, 1II). He seems, hen, not to claim the dignityof the elevated ragicstylefor his greatpoem.And here we mustalso consider he justificationhe adduces or his choice of thedesignation omedy n the tenthparagraphf his letterto Can-grande.There he says: Tragedy and comedyare distinguishedfirstlyby the courseof theiraction,which,in tragedy,progressesfrom a nobleand quiet beginningto a terribleconclusion, nd,in comedy, nversely rom a bitterbeginning o a happyconclu-sion;andsecondly a pointof greater mportanceo us) by theirstyle,their modusloquendi:elati et sublimetragedia;comediavero remisseet humiliter;and so, he says,his poem must becalled a comedy,on the one hand becauseof its unhappybegin-ning andhappyconclusion, nd on the otherhandbecauseof itsmodus oquendi:remissus stmoduset humilis,quialocutiovul-garisin qua et muliercule ommunicant.At first one is inclinedto assume hat this is a referenceo hisuse of the Italiananguage.In that casethestylewouldbe low simplybecause he Comedyswritten n Italianandnot in Latin. But it is difficulto attributesuchan assertion o Dante,who defendedthe noble dignityofthe vernacularn his De vulgarieloquentia,who was himself thefounderof the elevatedstylein the vernacularhroughhis can-zoni and who had finishedthe Comedyat the time when hewrote his letterto Cangrande. or these reasons everalmodern



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ERICHAUERBACH 223studentshave taken locutioto mean not languagebut style. InthatcaseDante merelywishedto saythat the styleof his workwas not thatof an elevated talianor-as he himselfdescribedt(De vulg.el. I, 17)-of the vulgare llustre,cardinale, ulicumetcuriale,butof the commoneverydayanguageof the people.

In any event,here too he does not claimfor his work thedignity of an elevated ragic style, it is at best an intermediatestyle;and even this he does not expressvery clearlybut merelyquotes the passage from Horace'sArs poetica (93 ff.) whereHorace ays hatcomedy oosometimesmakesuseof tragic trainsand vice versa.On the whole he classifieshis work as being ofthe low style-although,shortlybefore,he haddiscussedtsmulti-plicityof meanings(which does not agreewith the idea of thelow style); and althoughhe morethan once describeshat por-tionof it which he sends o Cangrandewith his dedicatoryetter,that is, the Paradiso, s cantica ublimis,andqualifies ts materiaas admirabilis. his uncertainty ersistsn the Comedy tself,butherethe consciousnesshat bothsubjectandformmayclaim thehighestpoeticdignitypredominates.Within the poem itself hecontinues o call it a comedy,but we havealreadyhad occasionto enumeratehe variouspointswhich indicate hat he wasfullyconsciousof its stylisticcharacterand rank. Yet althoughhechoosesVirgil as his guide,althoughhe invokesApolloand theMuses,he avoids ever referring o his poem as sublimein theantique ense.To expresstsparticularindof sublimity,he coinsa specialphrase: l poemasacro,al qualeha postomanoe cieloe terra (Par.XXV, 2-3). It is not easyto see how Dante,afterhaving found this formula and after having completedtheComedy,could still have expressedhimself upon its characterwith thepedantry xhibitedn thepassagerom the letter o Can-grandejust referred o. However,so greatwas the prestigeofthe classical radition, bscured s it stillwas by pedantic chem-atization, ostrongwas the predilectionor fixedtheoreticallass-ificationsof a kind which we canbutconsiderabsurd,hatsuch



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224 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEa possibility annotbe gainsaidafterall. The contemporaryrratherimmediately ucceedingcommentatorsikewise took upthequestionof stylein a purelypedanticvein.Therewere,to besure,a few exceptions:Boccaccio or example,whose analysis,however, cannotsatisfyus, since it avoidsfacing the questionsquarely; ndespeciallyheextremely ividBenvenuto a Imola,who, having explained he threefolddivisionof classical tyles(the elevatedtragic,the intermediatepolemico-satiric,he lowcomic), continuesas follows:

Modo est hic attento notandum quod sicut in isto libro est omnispars philosophix ("every division of philosophy"), ut dictum est, ita estomnis pars poetrix. Unde si quis velit subtiliter investigare, hic esttragoedia, satyra et comoedia. Tragoedia quidem, quia describit gestapontificum, principum, regum, baronum, et aliorum magnatum etnobilium, sicut patet in toto libro. Satya, id est reprehensoria; repre-hendit enim mirabiliter et audacter omnia genera viciorum, nec parcitdignitati, potestati vel nobilitati alicuius. Ideo convenientius possetintitulari satyra quam tragoedia vel comoedia. Potest etiam dici quodsit comoedia, nam secundum Isidorum comoedia incipit a tristibus etterminatur ad laeta. Et ita liber iste incipit a tristi materia, scilicet abInferno, et terminatur ad laetam, scilicet ad Paradisum, sive ad divinamessentiam. Sed dices forsan, lector: cur vis mihi baptizare librum denovo, cum autor nominavertit ipsum Comoediam? Dico quod autorvoluit vocare librum Comoediam a styli infimo et vulgari, quia de reiveritate est humilis respectu litteralis (sic), quamvis in genere suo sitsublimis et excellens. . . . (Benvenuti de Rambaldis de Imola Comen-tum super D. A. Comoediam . . . curante Jacobo Philippo Lacaita.Tomus Primus, Florentiae (I887, p. 19).

"Nowhere t mustbecarefullynotedthatjustas in thisbookthere s everydivisionof philosophy, s we said, so there s everydivisionof poetry.So that,if one look narrowly,here is tragedy,satire,and comedy.Tragedyfirst,becauset describes he deedsof pontiffs,princes,kings,barons,and othermagnatesandgreat



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ERICHAUERBACH 225lords,as appears hroughout he whole book. Satire, hatis repre-hension; or it admirably nd boldlyreprehends ll kindsof vice,without sparing anyone'sdignity, power,or nobility.Hence itcould be more properlyentitled satire than tragedyor comedy.But it can also be said to be a comedy,for according o Isidorecomedybegins with sad things and ends with joyousones. Andthus this book beginswith a sad subject, hat is with Hell, andends with a joyousone, thatis withParadise, r theDivineBeing.Butperhaps, eader,youwill say: Why do youwant to rebaptizethe book for me, when the autlhoralledit a comedy?I say thatthe author wished to call it a comedybecauseof its low andvernaculartyle,andin fact, speaking iterally, t is low in style,but in its kind it is sublimeand exalted. .."

Benvenuto'semperament uts right throughthe thicketofdidactic heory: hisbook,he says,contains verykindof writingjustas it doeseverykind of knowledge;and if its authorcalledit a comedybecausets styleis low and popular,he was right ina literalsense,but in its way it is a sublimeandgreat style.The abundance f subjectsreated n the Comedysufficesnitself to posethe problemof the elevatedstylein a wholly newway.For the Provensals nd the poetsof the "new style," herewas but one greattheme:courtly ove. It is truethat in his DcvulgarieloquentiaDante enumerateshreethemes(salus, venus,virtus, .e.,deedsof valor, ove,andvirtue), yet in almostall the

greatcanzoni the two others are subordinatedo the theme oflove or areclothedin an allegoryof love. Even in the Comedythis pattern s preserved hroughthe figureof Beatriceand theroleassigned o her, yetherethe patternhas a tremendous cope.The Comedy,amongotherthings, s a didacticpoem of encyclo-pedic dimensions,n which the physico-cosmological,he ethical,andthehistorico-politicalrderof the universes collectively re-sented;it is, further,a literarywork which imitatesreality andin whichall imaginable pheres f realityappear: astand present,sublimegrandeurand vile vulgarity,history and legend, tragic



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226 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEand comic occurrences,manand nature; inally, t is the storyofDante's-i.e., one singleindividual's-life and salvation, nd thusa figureof the storyof mankind's alvationn general. ts dramatispersona'ncludefigures rom antiquemythology,often (but notalways)in the guise of fantasticdemons; allegoricalpersonifica-tions and symbolicanimalsstemming rom Late Antiquityandthe Middle Ages; bearersof specificsignifications hosenfromamongthe angels,the saints,andthe blessed n the hierarchy fChristianity;Apollo, Lucifer, and Christ, Fortuna and LadyPoverty,Medusaas an emblemof the deepercirclesof hell, andCato of Uticaas the guardianof Purgatory.Yet, in respect o anattemptat the elevated tyle,all these things arenot so new andproblematics areDante'sundisguisedncursionsnto the realmof a real ife neitherselectednorpreordained y aesthetic riteria.And indeed, t is this contactwith real life which is responsiblefor all the verbal orms whose directness nd rigor-almost un-known in the elevatedstyle-offendedclassicistic aste.Further-more,all thisrealism s not displayedwithin a siigle action,butinstead an abundanceof actionsin the most diversetonalitiesfollow one another n quicksuccession.

And yet the unityof the poemis convincing. t is due to itsall-inclusiveubject,which is the statusanimarumpostmortem.ReflectingGod'sdefinitive udgment, his statusmustneedsrep-resent a perfectlyharmoniouswhole, consideredboth as a the-oreticalsystemand as a practical ealityand hence also as anaesthetic ntity;indeedit must needsexpress he unityof God'suniversalorderin a purerand more immediate orm than thisearthly sphereor anythingthat takesplace within it, for thebeyond-even thoughit fail of perfectionuntil JudgmentDay-is not,at leastnot to the sameextentas theearthly phere, volu-tion, potentiality, nd provisionality,ut God'sdesignin activefulfillment.The unifiedorderof thebeyond,as Dantepresentsttous,canbemost mmediatelyrasped s a moral ystemn its dis-tributionof soulsamongthe threerealmsand theirsubdivisions.



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ERICHAUERBACH 227On the whole the systemfollows Aristotelian-Thomistthics. Itgroupsthe sinners n Hell first according o the degree of theirill will, and within those categoriesaccording o the gravityoftheir misdeeds; he penitents n Purgatory ccording o the evilimpulsesof which they mustpurify themselves;and the blessedin Paradise ccordingo the measure f theirparticipationn thevision of God. This ethical system s, however, nterwovenwithotherhierarchicalystemsof a physico-cosmologicalr historico.politicalorder.The locationof the Inferno,of the Mountof Pur-gatory,and of thecirclesof Paradise onstitutes physicalaswellas an ethicalpictureof the universe.The doctrineof soulswhichunderlies he ethical order s at once a physiological nd a psy-chologicalanthropology; nd therearemanyotherways n whichthe ethicaland physicalordersarebasically onnected.The sameholds truefor thehistorico-politicalrder.The communityof theblessedn the white roseof the Empyreans at the sametime alsothe goal of the historicalprocessof salvation,which is both theguiding principle for all historico-politicalheories and thestandardof judgmentby which all historico-politicalventsaremeasured.n the courseof the poem this is constantly xpressed,at times most circumstantiallyas for instance n the symbolicoccurrences n the summitof Purgatory,he EarthlyParadise);so thatthe threesystemsof order-the ethical, he physical,andthe historico-political-always resentand always demonstrable,appearas one single entity.

In orderto show how the unityof the transcendental rderoperates s a unityof the elevated tyle,we return o our quotedtext.Farinata's nd Cavalcante'siveson earthareover;the vicis-situdesof their destinieshaveceased; heirstateis definitiveandimmutableexceptthat it will be affectedby one single change,theirultimaterecovery f theirphysicalbodiesat the Resurrectionon theLastDay.As we fin(dhemhere, hen,theyaresoulspartedfromtheirbodies.Dantedoes,however,givethema sortof phan-tom body,so that they can be seen and can communicate nd



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228 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEsuffer (cf., in this connection, Purg. III, 3I Lf.). Their only linkto life on earth is memory. In addition they have-as Danteexplains in the very canto with which we are concerned-ameasureof knowledge of past and future which goes beyond theearthly norm. Their vision is hyperoptic: they clearly see earthlyevents of the somewhat distant pastor future, and hence can fore-tell the future, but they are blind to the earthly present. (Thisexplains Dante's hesitation when Cavalcante asks him whetherhis son is still alive; Cavalcante'signorance surprises him, themore so becauseother souls had prophesiedfuture events to him.)Their own earthly lives, then, they still possess completely,through their memories, although those lives are ended. Andalthough they are in a situation which differs from any imaginablesituationon earth not only in practical terms (they lie in flamingtombs) but also in principle by virtueof their temporal and spatialimmutability, the impression they produce is not that they aredead-though that is what they are-but alive.

Here we face the astounding paradoxof what is called Dante'srealism. Imitation of reality is imitation of the sensory experienceof life on earth-among the most essentialcharacteristics f whichwould seem to be its possessinga history,its changing and develop-ing. Whatever degree of freedom the imitating artist may begranted in his work, he cannot be allowed to deprive reality ofthischaracteristic,which is its veryessence.ButDante'sinhabitantsof the three realms lead a "changelessexistence." (Hegel uses theexpression n his lectureson aesthetics n one of the most beautifulpassagesever written on Dante.) Yet into this changeless existenceDante "plunges the living world of human action and enduranceand more especiallyof individual deeds and destinies."Consider-ing our text again, we ask how this may come about.

The existence of the two tomb-dwellersand the scene of itare certainlyfinal and eternal,but they are not devoid of history.This Hell has been visited by Aeneas and Paul and even byChrist; now Dante and Virgil are traveling through it; it has



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ERICHAUERBACH 229landscapes,and its landscapesare peopledby infernal spirits;occurrences,vents,and even transformationso on beforeourvery eyes. In their phantombodies the soulsof the damned, ntheir eternal abodes,have plhenomenalppearance,reedomtospeakandgestureandevento moveaboutwithinlimits,andthus,within their changelessness, limited freedom of change.Wehave left the earthlyspherebehind; we are in an eternalplace,and yet we encounterappearance nd concreteoccurrence here.Thisdiffers romwhatappearsndoccurs nearth,yetisevidentlyconnectedwith it in a necessary ndstrictlydetermined elation.

The realityof the appearances arinataand Cavalcante sperceivedn the situation n which they are placedand in theirutterances.n theirpositionas inhabitantsof flaming tombs isexpressedGod'sjudgmentupon the entirecategoryof sinners owhichtheybelong,upon hereticsandinfidels.But in theirutter-ances,theirindividualcharacters manifest n all its force.Thisis especially trikingwith Farinataand Cavalcante ecause heyaresinnersof the samecategory nd hencefind themselvesn thesame situation.Yet as individualsof differentpersonalities, fdifferent ots in their former ives, and of different nclinations,they are most sharplycontrasted.Their eternaland changelessfate is the same;but only in the sensethat they have to sufferthe samepunishment, nly in an objective ense.For theyaccepttheirfate in very differentways. Farinatawholly disregards issituation;Cavalcante,n his blindprison,mourns or the beautyof light; and each,in gestureand word,completelyreveals henatureproper o each,whichcan be and is noneother thanthatwhicheachpossessedn his life uponearth.And still more:fromthe fact that earthly ife has ceasedso that it cannotchangeorgrow, whereasthe passionsand inclinationswhich animated tstill persistwithouteverbeingreleasedn action, hereresultsasit were a tremendous oncentration.We behold an intensifiedimage of the essenceof their being, fixed for all eternity ingiganticdimensions, ehold t in a purityanddistinctnesswhich



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230 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEcouldnever or onemomenthavebeen possibleduring heir ivesupon earth.

There canbe no doubtthat this too is part of the judgmentwhich God has pronouncedupon them; God has not onlygrouped he souls in categories nddistributedhemaccordinglyamongthevariousdivisions f the threerealms;He has alsogiveneach soul a specificeternal situation,in that He has neverdestroyedan individual orm but on the contraryhas fixed itin his eternal udgment-nay more,not until He has pronouncedthat judgmenthas He fully perfected t and wholly revealedtto sight. Here in Hell Farinata is greater, stronger, and noblerthan ever, for never in his life on earth had he had such anopportunity to prove his stout heart; and if his thoughts anddesires center unchanged upon Florence and the Ghibellines,upon the successes and failures of his former endeavors, therecan be no doubt that this persistenceof his earthly being in allits grandeur and hopeless futility is part of the judgment Godhas pronouncedupon him. The same hopeless futility in the con-tinuance of his earthlybeing is displayedby Cavalcante;it is notlikely that in the course of his earthly existence he ever felt hisfaith in the spirit of man, his love for the sweetness of light andfor his son so profoundly, or expressedit so arrestingly,as now,when it is all in vain. We must also consider that, for the soulsof the dead, Dante's journey representstheir only chance in alleternity to speak to one from among the living. This is an aspectof the situation which impels many to express themselves withthe utmost intensity and which brings into the changelessnessoftheir eternal fate a moment of dramatic historicity.Anidfinally,one more distinguishing characteristicof the situation in whichthe dwellers in Hell find themselves is their strangely restrictedand expandedrange of knowledge. They have forfeitedthe visionof God participatedin to various degrees by all beings on earth,in Purgatory,and in Paradise;and with it they have lost all hope;they know the past and the future in the passingof time on earth



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ERICHAUERBACH 231and hence the hopeless utility of their personal xistence,wlhichthey have retainedwitlhout he prospect f its finallyflowing ntothe divine community;and they are passionatelynterestedn thepresent state of things on earth,which is hidden from them.(A strikingcase in point is, with Cavalcante nd severalothers,the figure of Guido da Montefeltron CantoXXVII.Speakingwith difficulty hrough he flameswhich shoot from his head,heimploresVirgil to stop and speakto him, in a long adjuration,permeatedwith memoriesandgrief,whichreaches ts climax inthewordsof line 28: dimmi se i Romagnuoli anpaceo guerra!)

Dante,then, took over earthlyhistoricitynto hisbeyond;hisdead arecut off from theearthlypresentand its vicissitudes, utmemory and the most intense interest n it stirs them so pro-foundlythat the atmosphere f the beyondis chargedwith it.This is less pronounced n the Mountof Purgatory nd in Para-dise,because herethe souls do not look backupon life on earth,as they do in Hell, but forwardand up; as a result,the fartherwe ascend he moreclearly s earthlyexistence eentogetherwithits divine goal. But earthlyexistenceremainsalways manifest,for it is alwaysthe basis of God's judgment and hence of theeternal onditionof thesoul;and this conditions everywhere otonly a matterof being assigned o a specificsubdivision f thepenitentor blessedbut is a consciouspresentment f the soul'spreviousife on earthand of the specificplace it duly occupies nthe designof God'sorder.For it is precisely he absolute ealiza-tion of a particular arthly personalityn the place definitelyassignedo it, which constituteshe Divine Judgment.And every-where the souls of the dead have sufficient reedomto manifesttheir individual and particular nature-at times, it is true, onlywith considerable ifficulty,or often their punislhment r theirpenitenceor even the clearlight of theirbliss makes t hard forthem to appearand to express hemselves; ut then, overcomingthe obstacle, elf-expressionreaksout only the more effectively.

These ideasarefound'in he passage rom Hegel referred o



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232 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEabove.Overtwenty yearsago I usedthem as thebasisof a studyof Dante'srealism(Dante als DichterderirdischenWelt,1929).Since thenI havebeen concernedwith the questionof whatcon-ceptionof thestructuref events, n otherwordswhatconceptionof history,is the foundationfor Dante's realism,this realismprojected nto changeless ternity.It has been my hope that inthe process might learnsomcthingurtherand moreexactaboutthe basisof Dante'selevatedstyle,for his elevatedstyleconsistspreciselyn integratingwhat is clharacteristicallyndividualandat timeshorrible,ugly,grotesque, ndvulgarwith the dignityofGod's judgment-a dignity which transcendsthe ultimate limitsof ourearthlyconception f the sublime.ObviouslyDante'scon-ceptionof what happens,of history, s not identicalwith thatcommonlyaccepted n our modern world. Indeedhe does notview it merelyas an eartlhly rocess,a patternof earthlyevents,but in constantconnectionwith God'splan, towardthe goal ofwhich all earthlyhappeningsend.This is to be understood otonly in the senseof hiuman ocietyas a whole approachingheendof theworldandtheadventof the millennium n a constantforwardmotion(with all history,hen,directedhorizontally,ntothe future); but also in the sensethat everyearthlyevent andeveryearthlyplhenomenons at all times-independentlyof allforwardmotion-directlyconnectedwitlhGod'splan; so that amultiplicityof vertical inks establishan immediaterelationbe-tween everyearthlyphenomenonandtlheplanof salvation on-ceivedby Providence. or all of creations a constant eduplica-tion and emanationof the activelove of God (non e se nonsplen(dori quellaideache partoriscemando l nostroSire,Par.XIII,53-4),andthisactive oveis timelessanclaffectsallphenom-ena at all seasons.The goalof the processof salvationi,he whiterosein the Empyrean, he communityof the elect in God'snolongerveiledpresence,s not only a certainhope for the futurebut is from all eternityperfect n God and prefigured or men,as is Christ n Adam.It is timelesslyor at all timesthatChrist's



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ERICHAUERBACH 233triumphand Mary's oronation akeplace nParadise; t all timesthe soul whose love has not been drawntowarda falsegoalgoesunto Christ, its beloved, who wcddecl it with his blood.

In the Comedy there arenumerousearthlyphenomenawhosetheoretical relation to the divine plan of salvation is set forth indetail. From the point of view of modern readers the mostastounding instance, and in political anid historical terms at thesame time the most important one, is the universal Roman mon-archy. It is in Dante's vicw the concrete, earthly anticipation ofthe Kingdom of God. Aeneas' journey to the underworld isgranted as a special grace in view of Rome's eartlhlyand spiritualvictory (If. II, 13 ff.); from the beginning, Rome is destined torule the world. Christ appears when the time is fulfilled, that is,when the inhabited world rests in peace in Augustus' hands.Brutus and Cassius,the mur(lerersof Cxsar, suffer beside Judasin the jaws of Lucifer. The third Cxsar,Tiberius, is the legitimatejudge of Christ incarnateand as such the avenger of original sin.Titus is the legitimate executor of the vengeance upon the Jews.The Roman eagle is the bird of God, and in one passage Paradiseis called quella Roma onde Cristo e Romano (cf. Par. VI; Purg.XXI, 82 ff.; Inf. XXXIV, 6I f.; Purg. XXXII, I02; etc., alsonumerous passagesin the Monarclhia).Furtlhermore,Virgil's rolein the poem can only be understood on this premise. We are re-minded of the figure of the earthly and heavenly Jerusalem, andindeed the whole concept is an example of figural tlhinking. Justas the Jewish-Christian metho(d of interlpretation,consistentlyapplied to the Old Testament by Paul an(dthe Church Fathers,conceives of Adam as a figure of Christ,of Eve as a figure of theChurch,just as generallyspeakingevery event and everyphenom-enon referred to in the Old Testament is conceived as a figurewhich only the phenomena and events of Christ'sincarnation cancompletely realize or "fulfill" (to use the conventional expres-sion), so the universal Roman Empire hiereappearsas an earthlyfigure of heavenly fulfillment in the Kingdom of God.



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234 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEIn an essay on figures (Figura, Archiv. Roman. XXII, 436)I lhave shown-convincingly, I hope-that the Comedy is basedon a figural view of things. In the case of three of its most im-portant characters-Cato of Utica, Virgil, and Beatrice-I have

attempted to demonstratethat their appearance n the other worldis a fulfillment of their appearanceon earth, their earthly appear-ance a figure of their appearance n the other world. I stressedthefact that a figural schema permits both its poles-the figure andits fulfillment-to retain the characteristicsof concrete historicalreality, in contradistinction to what obtains with svmbolic orallegorical personifications, so that figure and fulfillment-although the one "signifies" he other-have a significancewhichis not incompatible with their being real. An event taken as afigure preservesits literal and historical meaning. It remains anevent, doesnot becomea meresign. The ChurchFathers,especiallyTertullian, Jerome, and Augustine, had successfully defendedfigural realism, that is, the maintenance of the basic historicalreality of figures, against all attempts at spiritually allegorical in-terpretation. Such attempts, which as it were undermine th'ereality of history and see in it only extra-historical igns and sig-nifications, survived from Late Antiquity and passed into theMiddle Ages. Medieval symbolism and allegorism is often, as weknow, excessivelyabstract,and many tracesof this are to be foundin the Comedy itself. But far more prevalent in the Christianlifeof the High Middle Ages is the figural realism which can beobserved in full bloom in sermons, the plastic arts, and mysteryplays; and it is this figural realism which dominates Dante'sview.

The world beyond-as we put it earlier-is God's design inactive fulfillment. In relation to it, earthly phenomena are on thewhole merely figural; they are potential and lack fulfillment.This also applies to the individual souls of the dead: it is onlyhere, in the beyond, that they attain fulfillment and the true real-ity of their being. Their career on earth was only the figure ofthis fulfillinent. In the fulfillment of their being they find punish-



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ERICHAUERBACH 235ment, penance, or reward. That man's existence on earth is provisional and must be complemented in the world beyond, is aconcept in keeping with Thomist anthropology, if E. Gilson'sobservationson the subject are valid. He writes (Le thomisme,3rd ed., Paris I927, p. 300): une sortede marge nous tient quepeu en deqade notre propre definition; aucun de nous ne realiseplenierement l'essence humaine ni mcme la notion complete desa propre individualite. It is precisely this notion complete deleur propre individualite which the souls attain in Dante's worldbeyond by virtue of God's judgment; and specifically,they attainit as an actual reality, which is in keeping with the figural viewand the Aristotelian-Thomist concept of form. The relation offigure fulfilled, which the dead in Dante representin reference totheir own past on earth, is most readily demonstrable in thosecases in which not only characterand essential being, but also asignification apparent in the earthly figure, are fulfilled: as forinstance in the case of Cato of Utica, whose merely figural roleas the guardianof earthly political freedom is fulfilled in the rolehe plays at the foot of the Mount of Purgatoryas the guardianofthe eternal freedom of the elect (Purg. I, 71 f.: liberta va cer-cando; cf. also Archiv. Roman. XXII, 478-8I). In this instancethefigural approach can explain the riddle of Cato's appearanceina place where we are astonishedto find a pagan. Such a demon-stration is not often possible. Yet the cases where it is possiblesuffice to let us see Dante's basic conception of the individual inthis world and in the world beyond. The characterand the func-tion of a human being have a specified place in God's idea oforder, as it is figured on earth and fulfilled in the world beyond.

Both figure and fulfillment possess-as we have said-thecharacterof actual historical events and phenomena. The fulfill-ment possessesit in greater and more intense measure, for it is,compared with the figure, forma perfectior. This explains theoverwhelming realism of Dante's beyond. When we say, "Thisexplains . . . ," we do not of course overlook the genius of the



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236 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEpoet who was capableof such a creation.To put it in the wordsof the ol0(commentators, ho distinguish etweencausaefficiens,materialis, ormalis,and finalis of the poem: Causaefficiens nhoc opere, velut in domo faciendaaedificator, st Dantes Alle-gherii de Florentia,gloriosus theologus, philosophuset poeta(Pietro Alighieri; n a similarvein also Jacopodella Lana). Butthe particularway in which his realisticgenius achieved orm,we explainthrouglhhe figuralpointof view. This enablesus tounderstandhatthe beyond s eternaland yet phenomenal; hatit is changelessand of all time and yet full of history.It alsoenablesus to show in what way this realism n the beyond isdistinguishedlrom every type of purely earthlyrealism.In thebeyondman is no longerinvolved n any earthlyactionor en-tanglement,as in any purely earthly representationf humanevents.Rather,he is involvedin an eternalsituationwhich isthe sum and the result of all his actions and which at thesametime tells him whatwere the decisiveaspects f his life andhis character. hushismemory s ledalonga pathwhich,thoughfor the inhabitants f Hell it is drearand barren,s yet alwaysthe right path,the pathwhich revealswhat was decisive n theindividual'sife. In this condition he deadpresent hemselves othe living Dante. The suspensenherentin the yet unrevealedfuture-an essentialelement in all earthlyconcernsand theirartisticmitation, specially f a dramatic,erious ndproblematickind-h1asceased.In the Comedyonly Dante can feel this sus-pense.The many played-outdramasare combined n one greatplay, involvinghis own fate and that of all mankind;they arebutexemplaof thewinningorlosingof eternalbliss.Butpassions,torments,andjoyshavesurvived; heyfind expressionn the sit-uations,gestures, ndutterances f the dead.With Danteas spec-tator,all the dramasareplayedoveragainin tremendouslyon-centrated orm-sometimesin a few lines,as in the case of Piade' Tolomei (Purg. V, 130). And in them, seeminglyscatteredand fragmented,yet actuallyalwaysas partswithin a general



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ERICHAUERBACH 237plan,the historyof Florence,of Italy,of the world, unfolds.Sus-penseand development,hedistinguishingharacteristicf earthlyphenomena,areno more. Yet the wavesof historydo reachtheshoresof the world beyond:partly as memoriesof the earthlypast; partlyas interest n the earthlypresent;partlyas concernfor the earthly uture; n all casesas a temporalityigurallypre-served n timelesseternity.Each of the dead interprets is condi-tionin the beyondas the last act,foreverbeing playedout,of hisearthlydrama.

In the first cantoof the poemDante saysto Virgil: "Thoualone art hieto whom I owe the beautiful style which has doneme honor." This is doubtless correct-and even more in respectto the Comedy han to his earlierworks and canzoni.The motifof a journeyto the underworld,a large numberof individualmotifs,manystylistic urns-for all thesehe is indebted oVirgil.Eventhechange n histheoryof stylefrom the timeof his treatiseDe vulgari loquentia-achangewhich tookhim from themerelylyrico-philosophicalo the great epic and hence to full-dimen-sionalrepresentationf human events-cannotbe accounted orby anythingbutthe influence f classicalmodelsandin particularof Virgil.Of thewriterswe know,he was the firstto havedirectaccesso thepoetVirgil.Virgil,much morethanmedieval heory,developedhis feelingof styleand his conceptionof the sublime.Throughhim he learned o breakthe all too narrowpatternofthe Provencaland contemporarytalian"suprema onstructio."Yet as he approachedhe problemof his greatwork,which wasto comeintobeingunderthe sign of Virgil,it was the other,themoreimmediately resent,he more ivingtraditionswhich over-whelmedhim. His greatwork provedto be in the mixed styleandfigural,and indeed n the mixedstyleasa resultof the figuralapproach.t proved obea comedy; t proved o be-also in termsof style-Christian.After all that we have said on the sub ect inthecourseof these nterpretations,herecan be no needfor againexplainingthat (and why) conceiving all earthly occurrences



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238 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEthroughthe mediumof a mixedstyle-without aesthetic estric-tion in either subject matter or form-as an entity sublimelyfigural, s Christian n spiritand Christian n origin.Hence toothe unityof the whole poem, in which a wealth of themesandactions s organized n a single universal atternwhich embracesboth heavenand earth:il poema sacro,al quale ha posto manoe cielo e terra.And, on the otherhand,it was againDante whofirst felt andrealized he gravitasproper o the antiqueelevatedstyle, and even surpassedt. Let him say what he will; let it beas vulgar,grotesque,horrible,or sneeringas may be: the toneremains hatof the elevated tyle.It is impossibleo imagine hatthe realismof the Comedycould ever sink to the level of farceand servethe purposesof popularentertainment, s the realismof the Christiandrama so often does. Dante'slevel of tone isunthinkable n medievalepicsbefore his time; and he learnedit, as can be shown by many examples, from antique models.BeforeDante,vernaculariterature-especiallyhat of Christianinspiration-is on the whole rathernaiveso far as questionsofstyle areconcerned,and that despitethe influenceof scholasticrhetoric-an influencewhich of late has been ratherheavilyemphasized.ButDante,althoughhe takeshis materialromthemost living and sometimes rom the humblestvernacular, aslost this naivequality.He subdueseveryturn of expressionothe gravityof his tone,and when he singsof the divineorderofthings,he solveshis problemby using periodicarticulations nddevicesof sentence tructurewhichcommandgiganticmassesofthoughtand concatenationsf events;since Antiquitynothingcomparablead existed n literatureone examplemaystand ormany:Inf. II, 13-36).Is Dante'sstyle still a sermo remissus thumilis,as he calls it himself and as Christian tyle should beeven in the sphereof the sublime?The questioncouldperhapsbe answered n the affirmative;he Fathers hemselvesdid notscornthe conscious mploymentof the artof rhetoric,not evenAugustine.The crux of the matter is what purposeand what



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ERICHAUERBACH 239attitude he artisticdevicesserve.In our passage, wo of the damnedare introduced n theelevatedstyle.Their earthlycharacter s preservedn full forcein theirplaces n the beyond.Farinata s as greatand proudasever, and Cavalcanteoves the light of the world and his sonGuidonot less,but in his despair till morepassionately,han hedid on earth.So God had willed; and so thesethings standinthe figuralrealismof Christian radition.Yet never beforehasthis realismbeen carriedso far; neverbefore-scarcelyeven inAntiquity-has so much art and so much expressive owerbeenemployed o producean almostpainfully mmediate mpressionof theearthlyrealityof humanbeings.It waspreciselyhe Chris-tian ideaof the indestructibilityf the entirehuman individualwhich made thispossible or Dante. And it waspreciselyby pro-ducinghis effect with suchpowerand so much realism hat heopenedthe way for thataspirationtowardautonomywhich pos-sessesall earthlyexistence. n the veryheart of the otherworld,he createda world of earthlybeings and passionsso powerfulthat it breaksbounds and proclaims ts independence.Figuresurpassesulfillment,or moreproperly: he fulfillmentserves obringout the figure n stillmore mpressiveelief.We cannotbutadmireFarinata ndweepwith Cavalcante.Whatactuallymovesus is not thatGodhasdamned hem,butthattheoneis unbrokenand the other mourns so heart-rendinglyor his son and thesweetness f the light.Theirhorrible ituation,heirdoom,servesonly,asit were,as a meansof heighteningheeffectof thesecom-pletelyearthlyemotions.Yet it seems to me thatthe problem snot conceivedbroadlyenough if, as has frequentlybeendone,itis formulated xclusivelyn termsof Dante'sadmiration r sym-pathy or a number f individualsncounterednHell.Theessenceof thematter,whatwe have n mind,is notrestrictedo Hell nor,onthe otherhand, oDante'sadmirationrsympathy.All throughthe poem thereare instances n which the effect of the earthlyfigureanditsearthlydestiny urpassesris subservedy theeffect



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240 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEproduced y its eternal ituation.Certainly,henoblesoulsamongthe damned,Francesca a Rimini, Farinata,BrunettoLatini,orPierdellaVigna,arealso good examplesn supportof my view;but it seems o me thatthe emphasiss not where t belongs f onlysuch instancesare adduced, or a doctrineof salvationn whichthe eternaldestiny dependsupon grace and repentance an nomoredispensewith such figures n Hell thanit canwithvirtuouspagans n Limbo.Butas soon as we askwhy Dante wasthe firstwhosostrongly eltthetragicquality n such iguresandexpressedit with all the overwhelming owerof genius, hefield of specula-tion immediately roadens. or all earthly hingsof which he laidhold, Dantehandleswith the samepower.Cavalcantes not great,and figures ike Ciacco he glutton or the insantly rate FilippoArgenti he treats now with sympathetic ontempt,now withdisgust.Yet thatdoes not prevent he portrayal f earthlypassionsin these nstances rom far surpassing,n theirwholly individualfulfillmentin the beyond, the portrayal f a collectivepunish-ment,nor the latter romfrequentlyonly heightening he effectof theformer.Thisholdstrueeven of theelect in Purgatory ndParadise.Casella ingingone of Dante'scanzoniand thosewholistento him (Purg. II), Buonconte ellingof his deathand whatbecameof hisbody (Purg. V), Statiuskneelingbeforehis masterVirgil (Purg. XXI), theyoung Kingof Hungary,CarloMartelloof Anjou, who so charmingly xpresses is friendship or Dante(Par. IX), Dante's ancestorCacciaguida, roud,old-fashioned,and full of the civic historyof Florence(Par.XV-XVII), eventhe ApostlePeter (Par. XXVII), and how many others, openbeforeus a world of earthly-historicalife, of earthlydeeds, en-deavors, eelings,andpassions, he likeof which the earthly ceneitselfcanhardlyproducen such abundance ndpower.Certainlytheyareall setfastin God'sorder, ertainly greatChristian oethasthe rightto preserve arthlyhumanityn the beyond, o pre-servethe figurein its fulfillmentand to perfect he one and theotherto the best of his capabilities. utDante'sgreatartcarries



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ERICHAUERBACH 241the matterso far that the effectbecomesearthly,and the listeneris all too occupiedby the figurein the fulfillment.The beyondbecomesa stagefor humanbeingsand humanpassions.Thinkof the earlier iguralforms of art-of the mysteries, f religioussculpture-whichneveror at best most timidlyventuredbeyondthe immediatedata suppliedby the Bible,which embarked ponthe imitationof realityand the individualonly for the sakeof alivelier dramatization f Biblical themes-think of these andcontrasthemwith Dantewho,withinthe figuralpattern,bringsto life the whole historicalworld and, within that,every singlehumanbeing who crosseshlispath!To be sure,this is only whatwas demanded romthe firstby the Jewish-Christiannterpreta-tion of the plhenomenal; hat interpretation laims universalvalidity. But the fullnessof life which Dante incorporatesntothat interpretations so rich and so strongthat its manifestationsforce their way into the listener's soul, indepen(lently of any in-terpretation.When we hiearCavalcante'sutburst:non fiere liocchi suoi il (lolce lome? or read the beautiful,gentle,and en-chantinglyfeminine line which Pia de' Tolomei utters beforesheasksDanteto remember er on earth(e riposatode la lungavia, Purg.V, 131), we experience n emotionwhichis concernedwith human beings and not directlywith the divine order inwhich they have found their fulfillment.Theireternalpositionin the divineorder s somethingof whichwe areonly consciousas a settingwhose irrevocabilityan but serve to heighten theeffect of their humanity,preservedor us in all its force. Theresult s a directexperience f life whichoverwhelms verythingelse, a comprehensionof human realitieswhich spreadsaswidely and variouslyas it goes profoundly o the very rootsofour emotions,an illuminationof man's impulsesand passionswhich leads us to share n them withoutrestraint nd indeedtoadmire heirvarietyandtheirgreatness.

And by virtueof this immediateand admiringsympathywith man, the principle,rooted in the divine order,of the in-



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242 FARINATA ND CAVALCANTEdestructibility f the whole, historical, nd individualmanturnsagainst that order; makes it subservient to its own purposes,andobscurest. The imageof man eclipses he image of God.Dante'sworkmade man'sChristian-figuraleing a reality,anddestroyedit in the veryprocessof realizing t. The tremendous atternwasbrokenby theoverwhelming owerof the imagery t had to con-tain. The coarsedisorderlinesswhich resultedduring the laterMiddle Ages from the farcicalrealism of the mysteryplays isfraughtwith farlessdanger o thefigural-Christianiew of thingsthan the elevated tyleof such a poet,in whoseworkmen learnto see and know themselves. n this fulfillment,the figure be-comesindependent: ven in Hell there aregreat souls, and cer-tainsouls n Purgatoryanfora moment orgetthepathof puri-fication or the sweetness f a poem,the workof humanfrailty.And becauseof the specialconditions f man'sself-fulfillmentnthe beyond,his humanrealityasserts tself even morestrongly,concretely, nd specificallyhan it does,for example, n antiqueliterature.For this self-fulfillment,which comprisesthe in-dividual's ntirepast-objectivelyaswell as in memory-involvesontogenetic istory, hehistoryof an individual'sersonal rowth;theresultant f thatgrowth, t is true, iesbeforeus asa finishedproduct;but in manycaseswe aregiven a detailedportrayal fits severalphases;it is neverentirelywithheld from us. Moreaccuratelyhanantique iteraturewas everable to present t, weare given to see, in the realm of timelessbeing, the historyofman's innerlife and growth.

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