At the end of the 13th century, on the eve of the Italian Renaissance, a great poet was born in Florence. This is dante alighieri Alighieri Dante (1265-1321), who was praised by Engels as
"the last poet in the Middle Ages and the first poet in the new era". Dante was declared a permanent exile at the age of 37, and later died in a foreign land. At the age of nine, she met her eternal lover, Pai Yaliqi, who was later 24 years old and became the source of Dante's future creation. Divine Comedy is Dante's immortal masterpiece.
The Divine Comedy represents the literature of the Middle Ages and the highest achievement. The emergence of such an epoch-making masterpiece is inseparable from the social situation in Italy at that time, the poet's profound knowledge and unique personal experience.
The era in which Dante lived is different from the situation in which European society developed relatively slowly in the early century, industry and commerce were extremely underdeveloped, and Christianity completely monopolized ideology. In the 13th century, Genoa, Venice, Florence, Milan and other places in northern Italy became the richest areas in Europe due to the vigorous development of maritime trade and industry and commerce.
In the early days, the bourgeoisie grew stronger and stronger, and established a city-state and a state, and gained autonomy. Although compared with the whole of Europe and even most other parts of Italy, this is only a small victory for the bourgeoisie, but it has had a profound impact on social reality and the historical process of Europe. Dante's political inclination is consistent with the Italian bourgeoisie.
Italy at that time was not a unified country in today's sense, but a fragmented geographical name, and its economic development was extremely uneven. There are two main forces that dominate Italy politically, one is the holy Roman emperor and the other is the Pope. The so-called "Holy Roman Emperor Car" is a historical name left over from the middle Middle Ages.
In p>962, the Red Emperor appointed Pope John XII as German King Otto I (reigned from 936 to 973) and made him the "Holy Roman Emperor", which owned Italy. Therefore, all the emperors were of Germanic descent. Because of the civil strife in Germany itself, its king is only a feudal Lord with strong or weak power, and the center of rule has always been in Germany, and the control over Italy is also tight and loose. The Pope has always regarded Italy as his sphere of influence, which is full of contradictions with the imperial emperor. The Italian people want national reunification, but the struggle between the Pope and the Emperor and their respective ambitions are obstacles to reunification. They adopted the policy of divide and rule for fear that a unified Italy would pose a threat to their rule. The intricate contradictions make Italy's political life extremely active, and the confrontation between political opponents and the conflicts of interests between different classes are often shown in extremely cruel forms. Dante is one of the witnesses of political persecution.
From the perspective of culture, the tight control of Christianity has been inadequate by the 12th century. In the process of theological discussion, it is often necessary to prove and discuss the existence and attributes of God and explain the relationship between the earth and the other side by means of the concepts and logical argumentation methods of ancient Greek philosophy such as Plato and Tuaristus.
After the 12th century, more and more compilations of ancient Greek and Roman works appeared. The original intention of the church is to find methodology and basis for its own theological theory, but researchers have found another cultural realm completely different from Christian theory. The earliest classical scholars in western Europe appeared in Italy, and Dante was one of the most knowledgeable scholars.
Dante was born in a noble family in Florence, and his father has been in business for a long time because of his family's decline. At that time, there were Kipling Party, which represented the interests of feudal nobles and supported the Pope, and Guelph Party, which supported the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire and represented the interests of the bourgeoisie. Dante's father naturally supported the Guelph Party, and Dante himself later became one of the leaders of the party.
In his early years, Dante studied Latin, rhetoric, poetics and classical literature systematically under the famous scholar Brunetto Latini, and highly praised Virgil, a great Roman poet. In the fields of painting and music, Dante is also accomplished. In addition, Dante studied theology and philosophy carefully, and the thoughts of saint augustinus, the ancient godfather, had a great influence on him.
Dante had an unforgettable love, which left an indelible mark on his literary creation. It was in his boyhood that he attended a friend's party with his father and met a girl named Beatrice. The girl's dignity, chastity and elegance made Dante fall in love with her at first sight, and he can't forget it. It's a pity that Beatrice later married someone else according to her father's orders, and died of illness a few years after marriage. Sad Dante wrote 31 lyric poems to Beatrice in succession over the past few years, and published them in a collection named "New Life" (1292-1293). The poem expresses the poet's deep feelings for the girl, pure love and endless thoughts, and the style is fresh and natural, delicate and euphemistic.
This collection of poems is one of the important works of the "gentle new style" poetry school in Italian literary world at that time, and it is also the first autobiographical poem in the history of western European literature, which reveals one's heart and reveals one's feelings openly and secretly.
As early as his youth, Dante joined the Guelph Party with passionate political enthusiasm, devoted himself to the struggle against the feudal aristocracy, and took part in the battle to crush the Kipling Party. After the Guelph Party came to power in Florence, Dante was elected as the city's administrator. The party was later split into black and white parties. Dante belonged to the white party and opposed the Pope's interference in Florence. The Pope, together with the French army, supported the Black Party to defeat the White Party in 132, seized power and began to purge the members of the White Party. Dante was confiscated of all his possessions and sentenced to life in exile. He never returned to his hometown until the guest died in Ravenna.
Some scholars once compared Dante with Qu Yuan in China, saying that Qu Yuan was banished to write Li Sao, and Dante was exiled to write The Divine Comedy. This comparison makes sense if the spiritual realm of the two poets keeps rising in the process of being displaced, and they are worried about the country and the people. Twenty years of exile made Dante have a deeper understanding of the reality of Italian society, and gradually integrated his destiny into deep thinking about the future of the nation.
In the early years of exile, Dante wrote two books, Banquet (134-137) and On Common sayings. The former hoped to eliminate the feud and attack between the city-states and the factions within the city-states with morality and knowledge. The latter refutes the tendency to emphasize Latin only and despise Italian. This not only shows that Dante transcends narrow partisanship and thinks about national reality and future with rational consciousness, but also shows that he attaches importance to national language and culture, which is of far-reaching significance to the development of Italian literature.
Dante has the tenderness and passion of a poet, as well as the sharpness and wisdom of a scholar. He was one of the most outstanding linguists at that time and a politician surfing in the torrent of the times, which was the basis for the publication of the profound Divine Comedy.
The Divine Comedy (137-1321) is a long poem written by Dante during his fourteen years in exile, originally named "comedy". In the middle ages, people's interpretation of "comedy" was different from that of today, which meant a story with a happy ending. After 1555, people added the modifier "sacred" before the original title, which not only showed respect for the poet, but also implied the solemn and profound theme and lofty artistic conception of the poem. In China, the title of the book is translated into "Divine Comedy".
The Divine Comedy is 14,233 lines long and consists of three parts: Hell, Purgatory and Paradise, which is a magical description of Dante's fantasy tour of the three realms. The poet told himself in the spring of 13 in the holy year of Amnesty, just in the middle of his 35-year-old life. On April 8, 28, the poet was lost in a dark forest. Just as he was trying to climb the mountain peak, the only exit was blocked by the female leopard, the male lion and the female wolf, which symbolized lust, rape and greed. The poet was in a panic and was in a dilemma. At this critical juncture, Virgil, a great Roman poet, suddenly appeared. He was entrusted by Dante's spiritual lover Beatrice, who had become an angel, to save Dante from danger and travel to hell and purgatory. Under Virgil's leadership, Dante first entered hell, but when he saw the evil wind howling and the evil waves surging, his feelings were terrible and his scenery was shocking. Hell is divided into nine layers, shaped like a funnel, and gets smaller as it goes down. People who live here are all people who committed serious crimes before their death. Their souls are arranged in different levels to be punished forever according to the severity of their sins. There are corrupt officials, hypocrites, evil popes, hierophant traders, thieves, prostitutes, false accusers, usurers, and cultists who are greedy, greedy and irritable. Poets hate traitors and traitors most, and put them on the ninth floor, frozen in an icy lake and tortured.
From the bottom of the glacial lake through the center of the earth, you come to purgatory. Purgatory is an isolated mountain in the sea, and it is also divided into nine floors. This is a place where guilty souls wash their sins, and after their sins are purified, they are still expected to enter heaven. Criminals who repent late are not allowed in, but wait outside the mountain gate for a long time. In each floor of purgatory, the souls of those who are less guilty of the "seven sins" of Christianity, such as arrogance, jealousy, anger, laziness, greed, food and lust, live respectively. Dante traveled layer by layer, and finally came to the paradise on the top floor, and Virgil left immediately. It turned out that he was eligible to enter heaven, and he could only wait in the "waiting room". At this time, the sky is full of colorful clouds and auspicious clouds. In the colorful rain, Beatrice, wearing an olive leaf laurel, a raccoon red dress and a white gauze, slowly descended. Beatrice gently rebuked the poet for being lost in the forest symbolizing evil, and guided him to enjoy the scenic spots everywhere. Under her guidance, Dante entered "Forgetting Sichuan", feeling refreshed and forgetting the pain of the past, and then Beatrice took him to heaven.
Heaven * * * has nine heavens, namely, the moon, mercury, Venus, sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, stars and crystal. Angels live here, and those who can enter heaven are righteous and wise monarchs and scholars. Only saints and devout priests in the world can enjoy eternal happiness here. The weather in heaven is grand and solemn, full of brilliance, love and joy. On the eighth day, Dante was asked by three saints about the theological virtues of "faith, hope and love", and he was overwhelmed with ecstasy. He followed the saint Penado into the mysterious and bright sky to get a glimpse of the profound significance of the "Trinity", but when he saw the golden light, his fantasy and the whole poem came to an abrupt end in a blissful atmosphere.
When readers read The Divine Comedy today, they often feel that its content is complicated, its plot is bizarre and its meaning is obscure, which is because they are not familiar with the medieval cultural background of this book. In fact, The Divine Comedy has a rigorous structure, and the plot obeys the theme of the poem, in which the characters and scenes all refer to something. Here we only talk about the relevant issues from a big perspective. Dante hated Pope Benifa west eight I and some late heinous popes at that time, and held a clear negative attitude towards religious ignorance, but he did not deny Christian belief. Written in 139, the last chapter of the third volume of The Theory of Imperialism is a key to understanding the Divine Comedy. Dante believes that there are two kinds of happiness in life: "the happiness in this life lies in personal doing good;" The happiness of eternal life lies in receiving god's grace. " "The happiness of this life is symbolized by the heaven on earth, and the happiness of eternal life is symbolized by the kingdom in heaven. Happiness in this life must be achieved through the practice of morality and knowledge under the guidance of philosophy (including all human knowledge). The happiness of eternal life must be achieved through the practice of theological virtues (faith, hope and love) under the guidance of enlightenment. " This is actually a replica of the "heaven on earth" and "heaven kingdom" proposed by Augustine in "The City of God". In The Divine Comedy, Dante carefully arranged two characters as his mentor, one is Virgil, who symbolizes rationality and knowledge, and the other is Beatrice, who symbolizes faith and piety. As we have said before, Christianity believes that everyone is a sinner. Therefore, the prisoners in hell and purgatory are all guilty souls. The only difference is that the nature of sin is different and the severity of sin is different. They are all manifestations of people of all colors in real society. People in heaven are souls who have lived their sins through purgatory and can share the glory with God. Before Dante entered purgatory, Heaven used a sharp knife to carve seven words "P" symbolizing sin (the first letter of the word "sin" in Italian) on his forehead. Every time the poet climbed a layer in purgatory, an angel erased one word, and when he walked out of the mountain of purgatory, all seven words "P" were erased, indicating that sin had been cleared and he could go to heaven. Hell, purgatory and heaven correspond to "heaven on earth" and "kingdom in heaven" respectively. Virgil, who symbolizes rationality, can only act as a guide for the poet in the "heaven on earth", and Beatrice, who symbolizes faith, is qualified to lead the poet into the "heaven kingdom". This clearly shows that Dante put faith above reason. The theme of Divine Comedy is intended to explore the future fate of the poet himself, the Italian nation and even mankind. Dante's conclusion is that the Italian nation and the whole mankind must be inspired by faith, rationally regulate their behavior, and constantly surpass their moral perfection and spiritual realm in order to be integrated with the highest truth and gain a bright future. The structure of heaven's cloud nine in Dante's works is based on Ptolemy's celestial theory accepted by the church. The so-called "permanent roulette wheel" in the poem is a portrayal of Ptolemy's theory that the universe is a spherical body composed of cloud nine on the same axis.
As a poet in the transitional period between the old and the new, it is impossible for Dante not to accept the baptism of medieval culture, but the profound critical spirit and the germination of new ideas in The Divine Comedy make the poet a prophet of the coming Renaissance. Dante sincerely praised the sages of ancient Greece and Rome, such as Plato, Aristotle, Homer, Virgil and others, affirmed the representatives of these splendid cultures in the pagan period, affirmed the knowledge and rational spirit, and objectively criticized the cultural absolutism and obscurantism in the Middle Ages. Although as a Christian, Dante could not arrange them directly in heaven, he put these "noble" pagans in a beautiful and quiet place in hell without suffering. Dante also sympathized with Paul and France, who were killed for love and suffered in hell, and criticized the church's asceticism. In many places, long poems reveal a strong desire to end party disputes and realize national unity, and the love for the motherland often makes the poet unable to help himself. In the sixth song of "Hell", the divided Italy aroused Dante's infinite regret:
Alas, slave-like Italy, your sad journey, your lonely boat without a helmsman in the storm, you are no longer a housewife in various provinces, but a brothel! ..... Your sick people live in you, not a day goes by without a war, but people surrounded by a city wall and a moat kill each other. You poor bastard! Look around at the coast of your country, and then look at your hinterland. Is there a land that enjoys peace and happiness? Lamenting the reality of the national homeland, the brigade turns into anger against those who bring disaster to the country and people. Dante revealed that some popes interfered in secular politics and were greedy for power, which was the chief culprit in the dispute between nations and polis. Encountering the soul of Pope Nicholas III in hell, the poet denounced: "Because your greed plunged the world into misery, ravaged the good and promoted the wicked". Pope Boniface VIII thought it was fashionable on earth, but the poet found a place for him in prison and fell into a stone cave and was punished by the fire. Dante also attacked the corrupt church forces and compared the bishops who were greedy for money and failed in virtue with the goods of the apostle Peter.