|Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] : 83~143 Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy* Laurence K. P. Wong** Abstract Contrary to the view-current among certain critics-that it is only decorative, the epic simile, starting from Homer and carried on by Virgil and Milton, performs many functions, functions that help to make an epic what it is. In the development of the epic in general and of the epic simile in particular, Homer, Virgil, and Milton, three mainstream epic poets, were linked by a similar tradition and shared close affinities in the way they employed this rhetorical device. While drawing on the Homer-Virgil tradition, using the epic simile as Homer, Virgil, and Milton did, Dante in The Divine Comedy took Homer as a point of departure. This paper discusses what functions Dante’s epic similes perform, how they differ from those of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, and how they scale new heights, heights which are beyond the epic similes of the mainstream epic poets, attaining, as Eliot put it, to “the highest point poetry has ever reached or ever can reach.” Keywords: epic simile, the Iliad, the Odyssey, Paradise Lost, The Divine Comedy, slow-motion sequence, bulk, sublimity, anthropomorphic, ineffable * This is the full version of a paper presented on August 19, 2010 at the XIXth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association held at the Chung-ang University, Seoul, Korea on August 15-21, 2010. I would like to thank the three anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions during the review process. Needless to say, I am responsible for any mistakes that remain. ** Professor of Translation, Department of Translation; Associate Dean (Research), Faculty of Arts; Director, Research Institute for the Humanities; The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, N. T., Hong Kong. [email protected] 84 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] 1. Introduction Before discussing the epic similes in The Divine Comedy in relation to Homer,1) it is first necessary to address a misconception current even among critics of standing from whom students of literature seek initial enlightenment, as can be seen in the following definition of the term epic simile: “An extended simile elaborated in such detail or such length as to eclipse temporarily the main action of a narrative work, forming a decorative digression” (Baldick 1990: 71).2) An epic simile, whether in Homer, Virgil, Milton, or Dante, is “extended,” “elaborated in […] detail”; very often, it also “eclipse[s] temporarily the main action of a narrative work,” and can be regarded as a “digression” in that it may depart from the main story-line for a while; however, the epic similes in the work of the above poets are anything but “decorative.” 2. Epic Similes in the Mainstream Epic Poets: Homer, Virgil, and Milton To illustrate my point, let us look at two similes in a row, both taken from Book 4 of the Iliad, 3)with which the term epic simile is most closely assoicated: 1) Dante’s masterpiece, originally called the Commedia by the author, later had the word Divina added to it; it is often referred to by Dante scholars as the Commedia (when it is discussed in English) or La Divina Commedia, la Divina Commedia, or la Commedia (when it is discussed in Italian). In English, it is called either the Divine Comedy (by T. S. Eliot, for example) or The Divine Comedy (by John D. Sinclair, for example). As this paper is aimed at the general reader, I have adopted the English title, with the definite article the included as an integral part of it. 2) Such a misconception is not found in Cuddon’s definition of the term: “An extended simile, in some cases running to fifteen or twenty lines, in which the comparisons made are elaborated in considerable detail (Cuddon 1992: 293). 3) The Iliad and the Odyssey, the two Greek epics ascribed to Homer, are both great poetry, but they are not great poetry of exactly the same order, with the former often taking precedence over the latter in terms of the critical acclaim they receive. Thus some 18 centuries ago, Longinus already drew readers’ attention to the superiority of the Iliad over the Odyssey: “It was, I imagine, for the same reason that, writing the Iliad in the heyday of his genius he made the whole piece lively with dramatic action, whereas in the |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 85 {Sl *z ÓJz ¦< "Æ(4"8è B@8L0PX^ 6Ø:" 2"8VFF0l ÐD<LJz ¦B"FFbJ,D@< -,NbD@L àB@ 64<ZF"<J@lq B`<Jå :X< J, BDäJ" 6@DbFF,J"4, "LJD §B,4J" PXDFå Õ0(<b:,<@< :,(V8" $DX:,4, •:N *X Jz –6D"l 6LDJÎ< ¦Î< 6@DLN@ØJ"4, •B@BJb,4 *z 8Îl –P<0<q ól J`Jz ¦B"FFbJ,D"4 )"<"ä< 6\<L<J@ NV8"((,l <T8,:XTl B`8,:`<*,q 6X8,L, *¥ @ÍF4< ª6"FJ@l º(,:`<T<q @Ê *z –88@4 •6¬< ÇF"<, @Û*X 6, N"\0l J`FF@< 8"Î< ªB,F2"4 §P@<Jz ¦< FJZ2,F4< "Û*Z<, F4(± *,4*4`J,l F0:V<J@D"lq •:N *¥ BF4 J,bP," B@46\8z §8":B,, J ,Ê:X<@4 ¦FJ4P`T<J@. IDä,l *z, òl Jz Ð^,l B@8LBV:@<@l •<*DÎl ¦< "Û8± Odyssey narrative predominates, the characteristic of old age. So in the Odyssey one may liken Homer to the setting sun; the grandeur remains without the intensity. For no longer does he preserve the sustained energy of the great Iliad lays, the consistent sublimity which never sinks into flatness, the flood of moving incidents in quick succession, the versatile rapidity and actuality, dense with images drawn from real life. It is rather as though the Ocean had retreated into itself and lay quiet within its own confines. Henceforth we see the ebbing tide of Homer’s greatness, as he wanders in the realm of the fabulous and incredible.” (Longinus 1995: 195) (“•BÎ *¥ J−l "ÛJ−l "ÆJ\"l, @É:"4, J−l :¥< z384V*@l (D"N@:X<0l ¦< •6:± B<,b:"J@l Ó8@< JÎ FT:VJ4@< *D":"J46Î< ßB,FJZF"J@ 6" ¦<"(f<4@<, J−l *¥ z?*LFF,\"l JÎ B8X@< *40(0:"J46`<, ÓB,D Ç*4@< (ZDTl. Ó2,< ¦< J± z?*LFF,\‘ B"D,46VF"4 J4l —< 6"J"*L@:X<å JÎ< ~?:0D@< º8\å, @â *\P" J−l FN@*D`J0J@l B"D":X<,4 JÎ :X(,2@l. @Û (D §J4 J@Ãl z384"6@Ãl ¦6,\<@4l B@4Z:"F4< ÇF@< ¦<J"Ø2" Fæ.,4 JÎ< J`<@<, @Û*z ¦>T:"84F:X<" J àR0 6" Ê.Z:"J" :0*":@Ø 8":$V<@<J", @Û*¥ J¬< BD`PLF4< Ò:@\"< Jä< ¦B"88Z8T< B"2ä<, @Û*¥ JÎ •(P\FJD@N@< 6" B@84J46Î< 6" J"Ãl ¦6 J−l •802,\"l N"<J"F\"4l 6"J"B,BL6<T:X<@<, •88z @Í@< ßB@PTD@Ø<J@l ,Æl ©"LJÎ< zS6,"<@Ø 6" B,D J Ç*4" :XJD" º:,D@L:X<@L JÎ 8@4BÎ< N"\<@<J"4 J@Ø :,(X2@Ll •:BfJ4*,l 6•< J@Ãl :L2f*,F4 6" •B\FJ@4l B8V<@l.”) (Longinus 1995: 194) Some 18 centuries later, another critic, E. V. Rieu, whose English translations of the Odyssey and the Iliad were published in the Penguin Classics series in 1946 and 1950 respectively, gave the same verdict: “The Greeks looked on the Iliad as Homer’s major work. It was the Story of Achilles, and not the Wanderings of Odysseus as might have been expected, that Alexander the Great took with him as a bedside book on his adventurous campaigns. I myself used not to accept this verdict, and I felt that many modern readers would agree with me. It was therefore with some trepidation that I bade farewell to the Odyssey and braced myself for the task of translating the Iliad, which I had not read through as a whole for twelve years. I soon began to have very different feelings, and now that I have finished the work I am completely reassured. The Greeks were right.” (Rieu 1950: vii) 86 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] :LD\"4 ©FJZ6"F4< •:,8(`:,<"4 (V8" 8,L6`<, ".0P¥l :,:"6LÃ"4 •6@b@LF"4 ÐB" •D<ä<, ól IDfT< •8"80JÎl •< FJD"JÎ< ,ÛD×< ÏDfD,4q @Û (D BV<JT< μ,< Ò:Îl 2D`@l @Û*z Ç" (−DLl, •88 (8äFFz ¦:X:46J@, B@8b680J@4 *z §F"< –<*D,l. (Iliad, 4. 422-38) As when on a sounding beach the swell of the sea beats, wave after wave, before the driving of the West Wind; out on the deep at the first is it gathered in a crest, but thereafter is broken upon the land and thundereth aloud, and round about the headlands it swelleth and reareth its head, and speweth forth the salt brine: even in such wise on that day did the battalions of the Danaans move, rank after rank, without cease, into battle; and each captain gave charge to his own men, and the rest marched on in silence; thou wouldst not have deemed that they that followed in such multitudes had any voice in their breasts, all silent as they were through fear of their commanders; and on every man flashed the inlaid armour wherewith they went clad. But for the Trojans, even as ewes stand in throngs past counting in the court of a man of much substance to be milked of their white milk, and bleat without ceasing as they hear the voices of their lambs: even so arose the clamour of the Trojans throughout the wide host; for they had not all like speech or one language, but their tongues were mingled, and they were a folk summoned from many lands. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 185)4) The lines describe the Danaans and the Trojans being urged on respectively by Athene and Ares before they engage in fierce battle. The first simile (“As when on a sounding beach […] and on every man flashed the inlaid armour wherewith they went clad”) compares the Danaans to the swell of the sea; the second (“even as ewes stand in throngs […] as they hear the voices of their lambs”) compares the Trojans to ewes waiting to be milked. Both are “extended” similes “elaborated in […] detail,” “eclips[ing] […] temporarily the main action.” But they are certainly not “decorative”; on the contrary, they perform various 4) Long quotations from the original Homer (in the Murray edition) are indicated by book and line numbers; their English translations, by Murray, are indicated by page numbers. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 87 functions. First, through the masterly deployment of visual and auditory images, they enable the reader to see “the battalions of the Danaans” in vivid language. Second, by halting the action for a while, sometimes for quite a long while, they heighten the work’s suspense, and make its impact overwhelming, very much like a thunderclap held in check before it is released with irresistible ferocity. Third, as they slow down the narrative, they have the effect of a slow-motion sequence, which prolongs and intensifies the climactic moment. Today, cinema-goers are all familiar with sequences in which a dagger, a spear, or a bullet travelling at immense speed is slowed down, so that what happens within one-hundredth or one-thousandth of a second is “stretched out,” as it were, for the cinema-goer to gaze at and contemplate, so much so that the climax, the agonizing moment, is artistically magnified. In reading the Iliad and the Odyssey, we can see that, some three thousand years ago, Homer was already a superb master of a cinematic technique before cinematography was invented.5) Once he 5) The two Greek epics are “conjecturally dated c. 850 B. C. (Hornstein et al. 1956: 222). The functions of the epic simile are not, of course, limited to those mentioned above. In his article entitled “Similes and Delay,” David Marshall has identified other functions: “the similes in the Iliad tend to work against the epic narrative itself” (233); “[a]s the Homeric simile unfolds, it acts like a digression; it delays and deviates from the story-line, holding the dramatic action in suspense while it elaborates its own alternate narrative time and space […]” (235); [t]hrough potentially endless substitutions, similes enact a wish to go forward and to stand still at the same time” (236). To heighten the dramatic effect or the narrative, Homer is here using two similes simultaneously for his purpose: one for the Danaans, the other for the Trojans. It can be seen, too, that the two similes are antithetical: the one describing the Danaans is pitted against the one describing the Trojans, just as the Danaan army is pitted again the Trojan army, achieving a kind of triple symmetrical effect: on the one hand, one army and one simile are respectively ranged against another army and another simile; on the other hand, the external, objective macrocosm (two armies ranged against each other) is mirrored by the internal, linguistic microcosm (two similes ranged against each other). At the same time, the similes themselves subtly foreshadow the final outcome of the war: the Danaans, who are compared to something ferocious and mighty (“the swell of the sea”), are destined to defeat the Trojans, who are compared to meek and tame animals (‘ewes” waiting “to be milked”). Structurally, therefore, they are different from two, three, four, or five similes in a row, one following and reinforcing the other. In 3.1-14 of the Iliad, for example, we have two similes in which Homer first compares the clamour and cry of the Trojans to “the clamaour of cranes” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 117) (“68"((¬(,DV<T<”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 116), then “the dense dust-cloud” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 117) to a mist shed by the South Wind: “+ÞJz ÐD,@l 6@DLN±F4 ;`J@l 6"JXP,L,< Ï:\P80<” (“Even as when the South Wind sheddeth a mist over the peaks of 88 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] switches to “+ÞJz…ól –D"…” (Iliad, 3.10-13) (“Even as…even in such wise…”), “òl J,…ól…” (Iliad, 3.23-27) (“then even as…even so…”), “{Sl *z ÓJz…ól J`Jz…” (Iliad, 4.422-27) (“As when...even in such wise...”), “ñl *z…ól J`Jz…” (Iliad, 5.499-502) (“And even as…even so now…”), “?Ë0 *z…J@Ã@l” (Iliad, 5.864-866) (“Even as…even in such wise…”), “@Í@l *z…ól…” (Iliad, 11.62-64) (“Even as…even so”),6) which are formulas for the epic simile, the reader immediately knows that the narrative has gone into the slow-motion mode. In going through Homer’s epics, particularly the Iliad, one is amazed at the variety of the poet’s narrative speed. When he chooses to impart momentum to the story, he can make his story hurtle across the page. Take the opening of the Iliad, for example: 9−<4< –,4*,, 2,V, A080^V*,T z!P48−@l @Û8@:X<0<, ¼ :LD\z z!P"4@Ãl –8(,z §206,, B@88l *z ÆN2\:@Ll RLPl }!^*4 BD@Ä"R,< ºDfT<, "ÛJ@×l *¥ ©8fD4" J,ØP, 6b<,FF4< @ÆT<@ÃF\ J, BF4, )4Îl *z ¦J,8,\,J@ $@L8Z, ¦> @â *¬ J BDäJ" *4"FJZJ0< ¦D\F"<J, z!JD,Ä*0l J, –<"> •<*Dä< 6" *Ã@l z!P488,bl. (Iliad, 1.1-7) The wrath do thou sing, O goddess, of Peleus’ son, Achilles, that baneful wrath which brought countless woes upon the Achaeans, and sent forth to Hades many valiant souls of warriors, and made themselves to be a spoil for dogs and all manner of birds; and thus the will of Zeus was being brought to fulfilment;-sing thou thereof from the time when at the first there parted in strife Atreus’ son, king of men, and goodly Achilles. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 3) Employing the rhetorical device of medias res, Homer plunges the reader a mountain”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 116, 117). The focus of the camera shifts from one point to another, in this case from the cry of the Trojans to “the dense dust-cloud,” but the effect is cumulative, as is the case with 2.455-483 of the Iliad, which will be discussed later in this paper. 6) The English translations of the formulas for the epic similes are Murray’s. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 89 into the very middle of the story the moment the poems begins; there is no beating about the bush, no circumlocution; the weighty theme of the epic is matched by its direct opening and a swiftness of tempo suggestive of a “frontal attack.” Immediately after the opening, the story unfolds: Agamemnon had taken the daughter of Chryses; when Chryses bore with him ransom to beg for her release, he failed to move Agamemnon and was dishonoured by him; desperate, Chryses prayed to Apollo for help; in fury, Apollo descended from Olympus to rouse an evil pestilence among the Greeks. … In just about some forty lines, the story has already come to a head, and the reader can feel the acceleration of the narrative tempo: Sl §N"Jz ,ÛP`:,<@l, J@Ø *z §68L, M@Ã$@l z!B`88T<, $− *¥ 6"Jz ?Û8b:B@4@ 6"DZ<T< PT`:,<@l 6−D, J`>z ê:@4F4< §PT< •:N0D,NX" J, N"DXJD0<. §68"(>"< *z –Dz Ï^FJ@ ¦Bz ê:T< PT@:X<@4@, "ÛJ@Ø 64<02X<J@l. Ò *z ³^, <L6J ¦@46fl. ª.,Jz §B,4Jz •BV<,L2, <,ä<, :,J *z ÆÎ< ª06,q *,4<¬ *¥ 68"((¬ (X<,Jz •D(LDX@4@ $4@Ã@. @ÛD−"l :¥< BDäJ@< ¦BæP,J@ 6" 6b<"l •D(@bl, "ÛJD §B,4Jz "ÛJ@ÃF4 $X8@l ¦P,B,L6¥l ¦N4,Âl $V88zq "Æ, *¥ BLD" <,6bT< 6"\@<J@ 2":,4"\. (Iliad, 1.43-52) So he spake in prayer, and Phoebus Apollo heard him. Down from the peaks of Olympus he strode, wroth at heart, bearing on his shoulders his bow and covered quiver. The arrows rattled on the shoulders of the angry god, as he moved; and his coming was like the night. Then he sate him down apart from the ships and let fly a shaft: terrible was the twang of the silver bow. The mules he assailed first and the swift dogs, but thereafter on the men themselves he let fly his stinging arrows, and smote; and ever did the pyres of the dead burn thick. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 7) The narrative proceeds, in the words used by Coleridge of Macbeth, with “a crowded and breathless rapidity” (Jump 1970: 30).7) Right from the very 7) The words were used when Coleridge, after discussing Hamlet’s character, contrasted 90 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] beginning, the reader is already gripped by suspense; by the time he reaches the clause “and his coming was like the night” (“Ò *z ³^, <L6J ¦@46fl”), he feels “oppressed” by the almost palpable weightiness of the half line, and is swept along by the narrative onslaught. When Homer slows down, switching to epic similes, he always has clear goals to achieve, not because he has little or nothing to say, so that he is compelled to resort to padding. Working together with passages like the above, epic similes, by putting the narrative in slow-motion, play an important role in modifying and giving variety to the speed of the poem. The fourth function of the epic simile has to do with its “extendedness”: by means of extended similes, the poet is able to add weight to the epic, without which the poem would lose much of its “bulk.” In a poem which is literally of epic proportions, such elaborate similes are not only justified, but necessary, for an epic is not a vignette, but a Michelangelo fresco in the Sistine Chapel; as such, it needs the right amount of epic detail, which can only be supplied by epic similes.8) The weightiness of the epic’s narrative arising from the use of epic similes is most impressive in 2.455-83 of the Iliad, where several similes in a row are presented. As Agamemnon “[s]traightway […] bade the clear-voiced heralds summon to battle the long-haired Achaeans” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 83) (“"ÛJ\6" 60Db6,FF4 84(LN2`((@4F4 6X8,LF, / 60DbFF,4< B`8,:`<*, 6VD0 6@:`T<J"lz!P"4@bl”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 82), and as Athene “sped dazzling throughout the host of the Achaeans, urging them to go forth” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 85) (“F×< J± B"4NVFF@LF" *4XFFLJ@ 8"Î< z!P"4ä< / ÏJDb<@LFz ÆX<"4”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol., 1, 84), the soldiers the tragedy named after the hero with the tragedy of Macbeth: “Hamlet is brave and careless of death; but he vacillates from sensibility, and procrastinates from thought, and loses the power of action in the energy of resolve. Thus it is that this tragedy presents a direct contrast to that of Macbeth; the one proceeds with the utmost slowness, the other with a crowded and breathless rapidity” (Jump 1970: 30). 8) In this regard, Aristotle had the following to say in his Poetics more than 23 centuries ago: “In epic, because of its length, the sections take on an apt magnitude […]” (Aristotle 1995: 93) (“¦6,à :¥< (D *4 JÎ :−6@l 8:$V<,4 J :XD0 JÎ BDXB@< :X(,2@l […]” (Aristotle 1995: 92, 94). The Greek word :X(,2@l means “greatness, magnitude” (Liddell and Scott 1940: 1089); “magnitude, bulk, size” (Liddell and Scott 1989: 429); it signifies one of the most important characteristics of epic. And Aristotle’s adjective for “:X(,2@l” is “BDXB@<” (“apt”), which shows that “magnitude” or “bulk” is what is expected of epic. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 91 are first compared to “a consuming fire” (Murray 1924:The Iliad, Vol. 1, 85) (“BØD •Ä*08@<”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 84), then to “the many tribes of winged fowl” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 85) (“ÏD<\2T< B,J,0<ä< §2<," B@88V”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 84), and to “the many tribes of swarming flies” (Murrary 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 85) (“:L4VT< *4<VT< §2<," B@88”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 84); the marshalling of the soldiers by their leaders is compared to “the wide-scattered flocks of goats” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 87) (“"ÆB`84" B8"JXz "Æ(ä<”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 86) being separated by goatherds; Agamemnon, the lord of all, is compared to “a bull among the herd” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 87) (“$@Øl •(X80N4”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 86). Altogether, there are five epic similes, constituting what Mueller calls “[t]he most elaborate simile cluster in the Iliad” (1986: 219).9) By using this simile cluster, Homer has increased tremendously the weightiness of his narrative, which results not only from each simile alone, but also from the cumulative effect of the whole cluster. Sometimes, the cumulative technique can be used to heighten the very grisly. One of the most blood-curdling examples is found in the Odyssey, when Homer describes how Odysseus takes revenge on man-eating Polyphemos: @Ê :¥< :@P8Î< ©8`<J,l ¦8V4<@<, Ï>×< ¦Bz –6Då, ÏN2"8:è ¦<XD,4F"<q ¦(ã *z ¦NbB,D2,< ¦D,4F2,Âl *\<,@<, ñl ÓJ, J4l JDLBè *`DL <Z4@< •<¬D JDLBV<å, @Ê *X Jz §<,D2,< ßB@FF,\@LF4< Ê:V<J4 RV:,<@4 ©6VJ,D2,, JÎ *¥ JDXP,4 ¦::,<¥l "Æ,\. ól J@Ø ¦< ÏN2"8:è BLD4Z6," :@P8Î< ©8`<J,l *4<X@:,<, JÎ< *z "Í:" B,D\DD,, 2,D:Î< ¦`<J". BV<J" *X @Ê $8XN"Dz •:N 6" ÏNDb"l ,âF,< •LJ:¬ (8Z<0l 6"4@:X<0l, FN"D"(,Ø<J@ *X @Ê BLD Õ\."4. ñl *z ÓJz •<¬D P"8P,×l BX8,6L< :X("< ²¥ F6XB"D<@< 9) The following less complex similes in the quotation are not included in the cluster: “:LD\@4, ÓFF" J, Nb88" 6" –<2," (\(<,J"4 òD®”) (2.468) (“numberless, as are the leaves and the flowers in their season”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 85); “}Ð::"J" 6" 6,N"8¬< Ç6,8@l )4 J,DB46,D"b<å, / }!D,^ *¥ .f<0< FJXD<@< *¥ A@F,4*VT<4” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 86) (“his eyes and head like unto Zeus that hurleth the thunderbolt, his waist like unto Ares, and his breast unto Poseidon”) (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 87). They should be regarded as simple, ordinary similes, not epic similes. 92 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] ,Æ< à*"J4 RLPDè $VBJ® :,(V8" ÆVP@<J" N"D:VFFT<q JÎ (D "ÞJ, F4*ZD@L (, 6DVJ@l ¦FJ\< ól J@Ø F\.z ÏN2"8:Îl ¦8"^<Xå B,D :@P8è. (Odyssey, 9.382-94) They took the stake of olive-wood, sharp at the point, and thrust it into his eye, while I, throwing my weight upon it from above, whirled it round, as when a man bores a ship’s timber with a drill, while those below keep it spinning with the thong, which they lay hold of by either end, and the drill runs around unceasingly. Even so we took the fiery-pointed stake and whirled it around in his eye, and the blood flowed around the heated thing. And his eyelids wholly and his brows round about did the flame singe as the eyeball burned, and its roots crackled in the fire. And as when a smith dips a great axe or an adze in cold water amid loud hissing to temper it – for therefrom comes the strength of iron – even so did his eye hiss round the stake of olive-wood. (Murrary 1919: The Odyssey, Vol. 1, 331) Sure to be banned on the stage or in films, the piercing of the Cyclops’ eye, its burning, and its blood flowing are depicted with the most graphic details, details that will fill every reader with horror. As though one graphic simile is not enough, Homer hurls one after another before the reader’s eyes: “as when a man bores a ship’s timber with a drill” (“ñl ÓJ, J4l JDLBè *`DL <Z4@< •<¬D / JDLBV<å”), “And as when a smith dips a great axe or an adze in cold water…” (“ñl *z ÓJz •<¬D P"8P,×l BX8,6L< :X("< ²¥ F6XB"D<@< / ,Æ< à*"J4 RLPDè $VBJ®…”). These details, presented in epic similes, are visual, auditory, and tactile at the same time, and are essential to the narrative; after reading them in the right context, no reader will say that they are “decorative.”10) Closely related to the fourth function is the fifth, performed also particuarly by simile clusters: to achieve a kind of symphonic effect, enabling the listener to hear the theme played by more than one instrument. 10) In commenting on this passage, Hornstein et al. (1956: 227) have made a salient point about Homer’s similes: “The similes are never merely decorative but are used to emphasize an action the poet wishes to make unusually impressive. Sometimes two or more are presented together, as in the episode of Polyphemus where the whirling of the burning tree trunk in the giant’s eye is compared to the turning of an auger in a beam, and the hissing of the eyeball from the heat is likened to the sound of red-hot iron plunged into water.” This point, going against the view of Baldick (1990: 71), quoted earlier, is echoed by later ciritcs, some of whom will be mentioned later in this paper. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 93 In trying to show that “the digressions of the Iliad are not haphazard accretions,” not “merely ornamental decorations subject to the whims of poet or his audience,” Austin (1986: 152), in his article entitled “The Functions of Digressions in the ‘Iliad’,” has made some pertinent remarks that can shed more light on the functions of the epic simile: For it is a surprising fact in Homer that where the drama is most intense the digressions are the longest and the details the fullest. […] The more urgent the situation, the more expansive the speech and its illustrative paradigm. The two longest digressions, the story of Meleager in Book 9 and Nestor’s story of the Pylians and Eleians in Book 11, mark the two most desperate stages in the deteriorating situations. ………. […] The mere mention of an object often has a dramatic force, and the expanded description of the object lends an even greater emphasis. Expansions are not ornaments but an essential part of the drama. ………. Thus we must recognize that behind the apparent parataxis of Homeric style is a scrupulous dramatic sense which calls attention to a particular situation or person by the multiplicity of peripheral details. […] The effect of this style is to put time into slow motion and to create a ritual out of the moment. (Austin 1986: 158-59)11) Although Austin is discussing digressions in general, not epic similes in particular, the argument goes far towards showing how digressions, whether as epic similes or as other stylistic devices, form an organic and functional part of Homer’s fresco and are subordinate to the poet’s overall artistic design. In the next great epic poet, Virgil, one can see the lineage of the epic simile effectively carried on. Though there are subtle differences between the epic 11) In his article entitled “The Simile,” Martin Mueller (1986: 217), after quoting Austin, reiterates the same point: “Its [Homeric narrative’s] seeming digressions and endless descriptions are, like still shots or slow-motion sequences, moments of heightened suspense. When Pandaros prepares to shoot Menelaos, half a dozen lines are given over to an account of how he made his bow (4.106-11). The description underscores the gravity of the broken truce. The elaborate account of Agamemnon’s arming (11.16-45) signals the opening of the Great Battle. The description of Achilles’ arms, including 130 lines about the shield, pushes the principle to its extreme.” 94 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] similes of Homer’s Iliad and those of Virgil’s Aeneid, respectively a “primary” and a “secondary” epic in Lewis’s words, 12) the line of descent from the Greek master to the Roman poet is unmistakable. Take one of the most famous epic similes in the Aeneid: Nec minus Aeneas, quamquam tardata sagitta interdum genua impediunt cursumque recusant, insequitur trepidique pedem pede fervidus urget: inclusum veluti si quando flumine nactus cervum aut puniceae saeptum formidine pennae venator cursu canis et latratibus instat; ille autem insidiis et ripa territus alta mille fugit refugitque vias, at vividus Umber haeret hians, iam iamque tenet similisque tenenti increpuit malis morsuque elusus inani est; tum vero exoritur clamor ripaeque lacusque responsant circa et caelum tonat omne tumultu. (Aeneid, 12.746-57) No less Aeneas, though at times his knees, slowed by the arrow wound, impede him and deny their speed, pursues and hotly presses, foot to foot, upon his panting foe; as when a hunter hound has caught a stag, pent in by a stream or hedged about by the terror of crimson feathers, and, running and barking, presses him close; the stag, in terror of the snares and high bank, flees to and fro in a thousand ways, but the keen Umbrian stays close with jaws agape; he almost seizes him, and snaps his jaws as if he had seized him, and baffled, bites on empty air. Then indeed a din breaks out; the banks and pools around make answer, and all heaven thunders with the tumult. (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 1, 353)13) 12) The words “primary” and “secondary” do not imply any “judgements of value,” as has been pointed out by Lewis himself, “The older critics divided Epic into Primitive and Artificial, which is unsatisfactory, because no surviving ancient poetry is really primitive and all poetry is in some sense artificial. I prefer to divide it into Primary Epic and Secondary Epic-the adjectives being purely chronological and implying no judgements of value. The secondary here means not ‘the second rate’, but what comes after, and grows out of, the primary” (Lewis 1960: 13). 13) Long quotations from the Aeneid (the Fariclough edition) are indicated by book and line numbers; their English translations, by Fairclough, are indicated by page numbers. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 95 For those who are familiar with the Iliad, the hunter-hunted image in the quotation will immediately ring a bell, as it does with Mueller (1986: 221), who, in discussing the “content of similes” in the Iliad, has the following words to say: By far the largest group is made up of hunter-hunted similes. Here we may further distinguish between a smaller group in which the hunter is human and a much larger group in which he is an animal. The latter category is dominated by lion images but also includes birds of prey, dogs, wolves and, on one occastion, dolphins (21.22). The most interesting of the hunted animals is the boar because it allows the poet to represent a strong and aggressive animal in a posture of defence or counter-attack (11.324, 414, 12.146, 13.471). In the passage from the Aeneid quoted above, Virgil, taking over Homer’s hunter-hunted image, compares Aeneas to “a hunter hound,” and Turnus to “a stag,” a comparison that harks back to the following epic simile from the Iliad, in which Odysseus is compared to a boar being pressed by the Trojans: ñl *z ÓJ, 6VBD4@< •:N 6b<,l 2"8,D@\ Jz "Æ.0@ F,bT<J"4, Ò *X Jz ,ÉF4 $"2,\0l ¦6 >L8`P@4@ 2Z(T< 8,L6Î< Ï*`<J" :,J (<":BJ±F4 (X<LFF4<, •:N *X Jz •ÄFF@<J"4, ßB" *X J, 6`:B@l Ï*`<JT< (\(<,J"4, @Ê *¥ :X<@LF4< –N"D *,4<`< B,D ¦`<J"q òl Õ" J`Jz •:Nz z?*LF−" )4Å N\8@< ¦FF,b@<J@ IDä,lq (Iliad, 11.414-20) And even as hounds and lusty youths press upon a boar on this side and on that, and he cometh forth from the deep thicket, whetting his white tusks in his curving jaws, and they charge upon him on either side, and thereat ariseth the sound of the gnashing of tusks; but forthwith they abide his onset, how dread soever he be; even so then around Odysseus, dear to Zeus, did the Trojans press. (Murray 1924: The Ilidad, Vol. 1, 512-13) 96 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] Of all the Homeric similes relating to the hunter-hunted theme, perhaps the one from which Virgil’s has the most direct descent is found in Book 22 of the Iliad, where Achilles is pursuing Hector, “not for beast of sacrifice or for bull’s hide” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 467) (“@ÛP Ê,DZ^@< @Û*¥ $@,\0<”) (Iliad, 22.159), but “for the life of horse-taming Hector” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 467) (“•88 B,D RLP−l 2X@< ~+6J@D@l ÊBB@*V:@4@”) (Iliad, 22.161), and where Homer first compares Achilles to “a falcon in the mountains, swiftest of winged things” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 465) (“6\D6@l ÐD,FN4<, ¦8"ND`J"J@l B,J,0<ä<”) (Iliad, 22.139), and Hector to “a trembling dove” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 465) (“JDZDT<" BX8,4"<”) (Iliad, 22.140); then both to “single-hooved horses” (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 467) (“:f<LP,l ËBB@4”) (Iliad, 22.162) before the climactic simile pounces upon the reader: ~+6J@D" *z •FB,DP¥l 68@<XT< §N,Bz é6×l z!P488,bl ñl *z ÓJ, <,$DÎ< ÐD,FN4 6bT< ¦8VN@4@ *\0J"4, ÐDF"l ¦> ,Û<−l, *4V Jz –(6," 6" *4 $ZFF"lq JÎ< *z ,Ç BXD J, 8V2®F4 6"J"BJZ>"l ßBÎ 2V:<å, •88V Jz •<4P<,bT< 2X,4 §:B,*@<, ÐND" 6,< ,àD®q ól ~+6JTD @Û 8−2, B@*f6," A08,ÄT<". (Iliad, 22.188-93) But hard upon Hector pressed swift Achilles in ceaseless pursuit. And as when on the mountains a hound rouseth from his covert the fawn of a deer and chaseth him through glens and glades, and though he escape for a time, cowering beneath a thicket, yet doth the hound track him out and run ever on until he find him; even so Hector escaped not the swift-footed son of Peleus. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 469) Though with distinctively Virgilian touches, the Aeneid simile’s conception, content, and structure are similar to those of the Iliad one. Like Homer’s epic simile, Virgil’s also has a defamiliarizing effect; nor is the “digression” for its own sake; Aeneas’ pursuit of Turnus is made more vivid and dramatic by the Aeneid simile to the same degree as Achilles’ pursuit of Hector is made more vivid and dramatic by the Iliad figure. After reading the above Homeric and Virgilian similes, any critic who thinks that they are decorative must be appreciating epics not as epics, but as something else. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 97 Well versed in Greek and Latin literature,14) Milton is a worthy pupil of both Homer and Virgil. In reading Paradise Lost, one can see everywhere evidence of the deep influence of Homer and Virgil on the English poet. Let us first look at the following lines from Paradise Lost, which describe God’s chariot: Forth rushed with whirlwind sound The chariot of Paternal Deity, Flashing thick flames, wheel within wheel, undrawn, Itself instinct with spirit, but convoyed By four Cherubic shapes. Four faces each Had wondrous; as with stars, their bodies all And wings were set with eyes; with eyes the wheels Of beryl, and careering fires between: Over their heads a crystal firmament, Whereon a sapphire throne, inlaid with pure Amber, and colors of the show’ry arch. He in celestial panoply all armed Of radiant Urim, work divinely wrought, Ascended; at his right hand Victory Sat eagle-winged, beside him hung his bow And quiver with three-bolted thunder stored, And from about him fierce effusion rolled Of smoke and bickering flame, and sparkles dire. 14) It is common knowledge that Milton himself had written Greek and Latin verse. However, his Greek is not comparable to his Latin. Thus Douglas Bush reports: “When faced with the portrait of himself which was to be the frontispiece of his Poems of 1645, and which had been done by William Marshall, the most popular engraver of the day, the handsome Milton, with good reason, did not relish it. He wrote this quatrain which the Greekless Marshall duly inscribed below the portrait. Nemesis in time brought some censure of Milton’s Greek and also the complaint that the point of the epigram seems to be rather blunted than sharpened by the last two lines” (Milton 1966: 172). The quatrain in question, entiled “In Effigiei Eius Sculptorem” (“On the Engraver of His Portrait”), and its English translation are as follows: “z!:"2,à (,(DVN2"4 P,4D JZ<*, :¥< ,Æ6`<" / M"\0l JVPz –<, BDÎl ,É*@l "ÛJ@NL¥l $8,BT<q / IÎ< *z ¦6JLBTJÎ< @Û6 ¦B4(<`<J,l, N\8@4, / ',8J, N"b8@L *LF:\:0:" .T(DVN@L” (“Looking at the original, you would perhaps say that this likeness was made by an unskilled hand. Since, friends, you cannot recognize the person represented, laugh at the poor reproduction of a bad artist.”) (Milton 1966: 172). 98 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] (Paradise Lost, 6.749-66)15) The lines remind one very much of a similar description in the Iliad: º :¥< ¦B@4P@:X<0 PDLFV:BL6"l §<JL,< ËBB@Ll ~/D0, BDXF$" 2,V, 2L(VJ0D :,(V8@4@ 5D`<@4@. ~/$0 *z •:Nz ÏPX,FF4 2@äl $V8, 6":Bb8" 6b68", PV86," Ï6JV6<0:", F4*0DXå –>@<4 •:N\l. Jä< μ J@4 PDLFX0 ÇJLl –N24J@l, "LJD àB,D2, PV86,z ¦B\FFTJD" BD@F"D0D`J", 2"Ø:" Æ*XF2"4q B8−:<"4 *z •D(bD@L ,ÆF B,D\*D@:@4 ":N@JXDT2,<q *\ND@l *¥ PDLFX@4F4 6" •D(LDX@4F4< Ê:F4< ¦<JXJ"J"4, *@4" *¥ B,D\*D@:@4 –<JL(Xl ,ÆF4. J@Ø *z ¦> •D(bD,@l ÕL:Îl BX8,<q "ÛJD ¦Bz –6Då *−F, PDbF,4@< 6"8Î< .L(`<, ¦< *¥ 8XB"*<" 6V8z §$"8, PDbF,4zq ßBÎ *¥ .L(Î< ³("(,< ~/D0 ËBB@Ll é6bB@*"l :,:"LÃz§D4*@l 6" •dJ−l. (Iliad, 5.720-32) Then Hera, the queenly goddess, daughter of great Cronos, went to and fro harnessing the horses of golden frontlets, and Hebe quickly put to the car on either side the curved wheels of bronze, eight-spoked, about the iron axle-tree. Of these the felloe verily is of gold imperishable, and thereover are tires of bronze fitted, a marvel to behold; and the naves are of silver, revolving on this side and on that; and the body is plaited tight with gold and silver thongs, and two rims there are that run about it. From the body stood forth the pole of silver, and on the end thereof she bound the fair golden yoke, and cast thereon the fair golden breast-straps; and Hera led beneath the yoke the swift-footed horses, and was eager for strife and the war-cry. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 248-49) In 5.741 of the Iliad, Athene’s aegis is described as decorated with “Rout” (“M`$@l”), “Strife” (“}+D4l”), “Valour” (“z!86Z”), “Onset” (“z3T6Z”), and 15) Quotations from Paradise Lost are based on Douglas Bush’s edition of Milton’s Poetical Works and indicated by book and line numbers. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 99 “the head of the dread monster, the Gorgon” (“'@D(,\0 6,N"8¬ *,4<@Ã@ B,8fD@L”) (Murray, The Iliad, Vol. 1, 249). From a religious point of view, the Greek description is different from the English one: while Homer’s is pagan, drawing on Greek mythology, Milton’s is Christian, drawing on Christian concepts and allusions: “Paternal Deity,” “four Cherubic shapes,” “Urim.” In artistic terms, however, they have similar stylistic features: in both of them, the elaborate details serve to inspire awe and transport the imagination of the reader from the mortal world to supernatural realms of experiene. Reading the above descriptions from the Iliad and Paradise Lost, one can easily trace Milton’s lineage to Homer, either directly from the Greek poet (since Milton could read classical Greek) or indirectly through Virgil.16) Thus, as observed by Douglas Bush, starting from 1.374 of Paradise Lost, Milton follows “the patristic and later tradition that the fallen angels became the gods of the heathen religions” (Milton 1966: 221), and enumerates the leaders in Hell, which is a “roll-call of leaders” “akin to that of Aen[eid]. 7.641 f., where the Italian followers of Turnus who band together against Aeneas are opposing the will of Providence” (Milton 1966: 221). A brief comparison of the relevant passages will bear out Bush’s point: Then were they known to men by various names, And various idols through the heathen world. Say, Muse, their names then known, who first, who last, Roused from the slumber on that fiery couch, At their great emperor’s call, as next in worth Came singly where he stood on the bare strand, While the promiscuous crowd stood yet aloof. ………. First Moloch, horrid king besmeared with blood Of human sacrifice, and parents’ tears… ………. Next Chemos, th’ óbscene dread of Moab’s sons, From Aroer to Nebo, and the wild Of southmost Abarim… (Paradise Lost, 1.374-408) 16) Milton’s lineage will be explained in greater detail in the next footnote. 100 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] Pandite nunc Helicona, deae, cantusque movete, qui bello exciti reges, quae quemque secutae complerint campos acies, quibus Itala iam tum floruerit terra alma viris, quibus arserit armis; et meministis enim, divae, et memorare potestis; ad nos vix tenuis famae perlabitur aura. Primus init bellum Tyrrhenis asper ab oris contemptor divum Mezentius agminaque armat. filius huic iuxta Lausus, quo pulchrior alter non fuit excepto Laurentis corpore Turni; Lausus, equum domitor debellatorque ferarum, ducit Agyllina nequiquam ex urbe secutos mille viros, dignus patriis qui laetior esset imperiis et cui pater haud Mezentius esset. Post hos insignem palma per gramina currum victoresque ostentat equos satus Hercule pulchro pulcher Aventinus…(Aeneid, 7.641-57) Now fling Helicon wide open, goddess, and set on foot poetic strains, telling what kings were roused to war; what embattled hosts followed each one, filling the plain; with what manhood even then did kindly Italy bloom; what armed forces kindled her to flame. For you, divine sisters, have both remembrance and power to relate, while to us is scarce wafted some scant breath of fame. First into the war comes the ferocious king from Tuscan coasts, Mezentius, scorner of the gods, and arrays his bands. At his side stands his son Lausus, whom none surpassed in beauty of physique save Laurentine Turnus. Lausus, tamer of horses, vanquisher of beasts, leads from Agylla’s town a thousand men, that followed him in vain, a son worthy to be happier in a father’s rule, a father other than Mezentius! After these, Aventinus, handsome son of handsome Hercules… (Fairclough 2000: The Aeneid, VII-XII, 47, 49) When it comes to epic similes, the Homer-Virgil-Milton lineage is even more unmistakable.17) Take Paradise Lost, 1.767-777, for example: 17) The phrase “Homer-Virgil-Milton” needs a little explanation, since it seems to indicate |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 101 As bees In springtime, when the sun with Taurus rides, Pour forth their populous youth about the hive In clusters; they among fresh dews and flowers Fly to and fro, or on the smoothèd plank, The suburb of their straw-built citadel, New rubbed with balm, expatiate and confer Their state affairs: so thick the airy crowd Swarmed and were straitened; till the signal giv’n, Behold a wonder! The simile, comparing the multitude of fallen angels at Pandemonium to bees, can be traced directly to Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid: ²ÙJ, §2<," ,ÉF4 :,84FFVT< *4<VT<, BXJD0l ¦6 (8"NLD−l "Æ, <X@< ¦DP@:,<VT<q $@JDL*Î< *¥ BXJ@<J"4 ¦Bz –<2,F4< ,Æ"D4<@ÃF4<q "Ê :X< Jz §<2" 84l B,B@JZ"J"4, "Ê *X J, §<2"q ól Jä< §2<," B@88 <,ä< –B@ 6" 684F4VT< ²^`<@l BD@BVD@42, $"2,\0l ¦FJ4P`T<J@ Æ8"*Î< ,Æl •(@DZ<q (Iliad, 2.87-93) Even as the tribes of thronging bees go forth from some hollow rock, ever coming on afresh, and in clusters over the flowers of spring fly in throngs, that Milton learned from Homer only through Virgil. While it is true that Milton did learn from Homer through Virgil, very often, he also directly learned from Homer; the Homer-Virgil-Milton order, therefore, only signifies a historical sequence in the mainstream tradition of the epic simile. As far as “genealogy” is concerned, a more accurate representation of Milton’s apprenticeship in the epic simile would move simultaneously in three different directions: “Homer-Milton,” “Virgil-Milton,” and “Homer-Virgil-Milton.” The influence-influenced relationship is further complicated if our focus shifts from the epic simile and moves to poetry in general, for Milton was also influenced by Dante, as can be seen in his prose piece “An Apology for Smectymnuus,” in which he says: “I […] above them all [meaning Ovid and other love-poets] preferred the two famous renowners of Beatrice and Laura [meaning Dante and Petrarch] …” (Milton 1966: xxx). In his Italian poems (Milton 1966: 79-81), especially in the sonnets, the way he wrties about love reminds one very much the Vita Nuova and The Divine Comedy. 102 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] some here, some there; even so from the ships and huts before the sea-beach marched forth in companies their many tribes to the place of gathering. (Murray 2000: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 57) qualis apes aestate nova per florea rura exercet sub sole labor, cum gentis adultos educunt fetus, aut cum liquentia mella stipant et dulci distendunt nectare cellas, aut onera accipiunt venientum, aut agmine facto ignavum fucos pecus a praesepibus arcent; fervet opus redolentque thymo fragrantia mella. (Aeneid, 1.430-36) Even as bees in early summer, amid flowery fields, ply their task in sunshine, when they lead forth the full-grown young to their race, or pack the fluid honey and strain their cells to bursting with sweet nectar, or receive the burdens of incomers, or in martial array drive from their folds the drones, a lazy herd; all aglow is the work and the fragrant honey is sweet with thyme. (Fairclough 2000: Eclogues. Georgics. Aeneid I-VI, 293) The beehive, the bees, and their activities are compared to the fallen angels holding a meeting (Paradise Lost), to Greek tribes (the Iliad), and to the Tyrians building a city (the Aeneid); the images as well the technique used are similar. Going through the epics of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, which constitute what I would call the mainstream European epic tradition, one can see that the functions of epic similes, apart from the overall stylistic effect and narrative purposes mentioned earlier, can be divided roughly into six categories: (1) those that describe scenes before, during, or after a battle; (2) those that describe the size, number, movement, appearance, etc. of opposing armies; (3) those that describe the appearance, spirit, psychology, etc. of individual soldiers before, during, and after a battle; (4) those that describe the size, imposing appearance, etc. of weapons, whether at rest or in motion; (5) those that describe the environment relating to war (the battlefield, the atmosphere, the scenery, etc.); (6) those that describe the actual fight. In constructing these similes, the epic poets can draw on nature, animals, or inanimate objects. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 103 3. Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy and Their Debt to Homer and Virgil If Homer, Virgil, and Milton started, carried on, or further developed the mainstream tradition of the epic simile, then Dante took Homer as a point of departure and moved in a direction of his own, putting the epic simile to a larger variety of uses.18) In The Divine Comedy, which is not an epic in the strict sense of the word but an epic of a personal journey to the Beatific Vision,19) the poet 18) Other epic poets, like Ariosto, may also use similes, but they use or construct them in a way that differs from that of both the Homer-Virgil-Milton and the Dante school. Going through Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso, one sees practically no epic similes in either the Homer-Virgil-Milton or the Dante style. Take Stanzas 68 and 69 of Canto 9, for example, which describe how the Cavalier Anglante skewers six warriors on one lance, leaving them dying, and then compare the action to the skewering of frogs: “Il cavallier d’Anglante, ove più spesse / vide le genti e l’arme, abbassò l’asta; / ed uno in quella e poscia un altro messe, / e un altro e un altro, che sembrar di pasta; / e fin a sei ve n’infilzò, e li resse / tutti una lancia: e perch’ella non basta / a più capir, lasciò il settimo fuore / ferito sì, che di quel colpo muore. [Stanza 68] / Non altrimente ne l’estrema arena / veggiàn le rane de canali e fosse / dal cauto arcier nei fianchi e ne la schiena, / l’una vicina all’altra, esser percosse; / né da la freccia, fin che tutta piena / non sia da un capo all’altro, esser rimosse. / La grave lancia Orlando da sé scaglia, / e con la spada entrò ne la battaglia. [Stanza 69]” (Ariosto 1974: Vol. 1, 207-208) (“The Cavalier Anglante, where the row / Of soldiery is thickest, drives his lance. / As if they one and all are made of dough, / In one and then another he implants / His weapon, till he’s skewered at one go / No less than six; a seventh, too, he wants / To add, but, as no space for him is found, / He has to leave him, dying, on the ground. [Stanza 68] / Just so the skilful archer strings a line / Of frogs which hide in ditches and canals, / Shooting them through the haunches and the spine, / Until from notch to tip with animals / His arrow is replete; the paladin, / Whose expertise such archery recalls, / His fully-burdened lance now flings away / And plunges, sword in hand, into the fray. [Stanza 69]” (Reynolds 1975: Vol. 1, 305) The way the simile is constructed is no longer similar to the way the similes of Homer, Virgil, Milton, and Dante are constructed; the vehicle is more loose, more dispersed, less closely linked to the tenor; the suspense and tension made possible by such formulas as “Just as…so…”, “As…so…”, which hold the epic simile tight, keeping the reader expectant, are no longer there. Perhaps apart from Ariosto’s own conception of the epic, the ottava rima he employs also explains why the epic simile in the style of Homer, Virgil, Milton, or Dante is no longer possible; rhyming abababcc, the ottava rima limits the flexibility of the verse, so that the poet is no longer able to achieve the sweep of the epic simile in the true sense of the term. 104 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] does draw on the tradition started by Homer and carried on by Virgil.20) In the Inferno, we can see how he borrowed heavily from the Aeneid – from Book 6 of the Latin epic in particular – to say nothing of Virgil as Dante’s guide through Inferno and Purgatory. Take 6.13-18 of the Inferno, for example, which describe Cerberus: Cerbero, fiera crudele e diversa, con tre gole caninamente latra sopra la gente che quivi è sommersa. Li occhi ha vermigli, la barba unta e atra, e ’l ventre largo, e unghiate le mani; graffia li spiriti, scuoia e disquatra. (Inferno, 6.13-18) Cerberus, a beast fierce and hideous, with three throats barks like a dog over the people that are immersed there; he has red eyes, a beard greasy and black, a great belly, and clawed hands, and he scars and flays and rends the spirits. (Sinclair, Inferno, 87) 21) The conception of the beast as well as its description is heavily indebted to 6.417-23 of the Aeneid: Cerberus haec ingens latratu regna trifauci personat, adverso recubans immanis in antro. cui vates, horrere videns iam colla colubris, melle soporatam et medicatis frugibus offam obicit. ille fame rabida tria guttura pandens 19) As Cuddon (1992: 288) has pointed out, “The Divina Commedia is a ‘personal’ epic, a kind of autobiographical and spiritual Aeneid.” 20) As Dante could not read Greek, he could not, of course, have directly taken Homer as his point of departure. But since the epic simile originated from Homer, the lineage of Dante’s epic similes can be traced ultimately to the first European epic poet through Virgil, whom Dante could read in the original, and by whom he was deeply influenced. For this reason, therefore, one is justified to say that Dante took Homer as a point of departure. 21) Long quotations from La Divina Commedia (the Società Dantesca Italiana edition, Le opere di Dante, ed. Barbi et al.) are indicated by canto and line numbers; their English translations, by Sinclair, are indicated by page numbers. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 105 corripit obiectam, atque immania terga resolvit fusus humi totoque ingens extenditur antro. (Fairclough 2000: Vol.1, 560, 562) These realms huge Cerberus makes ring with his triple-throated baying, his monstrous bulk crouching in a cavern opposite. To him, seeing the snakes now bristling on his necks, the seer flung a morsel drowsy with honey and drugged meal. He, opening his triple throat in ravenous hunger, catches it when thrown and, with monstrous frame relaxed, sinks to earth and stretches his bulk over all the den. (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 1, 561, 63)22) In the following lines: L’acqua era buia assai più che persa; e noi, in compagnia de l’onde bige, entrammo giù per una via diversa. In la palude va c’ha nome Stige questo tristo ruscel, quand’è disceso al piè de le maligne piagge grige [,] (Inferno, 7.103-108) […] the water of the blackest purple, and following its murky waves we entered the place below by a rough track. This gloomy stream, when it has reached the foot of the malign grey slopes, enters the marsh which is called the Styx […] (Sinclair, Inferno, 103, 105) Dante is alluding to Homer’s Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid: 6" JÎ 6"J,4$`:,<@< GJL(Îl à*TD, Ól J, :X(4FJ@l ~@D6@l *,4<`J"J`l J, BX8,4 :"6VD,FF4 2,@ÃF4…. (Odyssey, 5.185-86) 22) It must be pointed out that, even at this stage, Dante is not being passively influenced by Virgil, but shows his originality in two respects: first, instead of making Cerberus the guard of the whole of Hell, as Virgil does, he assigns it only the task of guarding one circle of Inferno; second, Dante has introduced graphic details which make the beast more hideous. 106 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] and the down-flowing water of Styx, which is the greatest and most dread oath for the blessed gods… (Murray 1919: Odyssey, Vol. 1, 183) olli sic breviter fata est longaeva sacerdos: “Anchisa generate, deum certissima proles, Cocyti stagna alta vides Stygiamque paludem, di cuius iurare timent et fallere numen.” (Aeneid, 6.321-24) To him thus briefly spoke the aged priestess: “Anchises’ son, true offspring of gods, you are looking at the deep pools of Cocytus and the Stygian marsh, by whose power the gods fear to swear falsely. 23) (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 1, 555) Again, in Canto 3, lines 88-93 of the Inferno: «E tu che se’ costì, anima viva, partiti da cotesti che son morti». Ma poi che vide ch’io non mi partiva, disse: «Per altra via, per altri porti verrai a piaggia, non qui, per passare: più lieve legno convien che ti porti»[,] (Inferno, 3.88-93) ‘and thou there that art a living soul, take thyself apart from these that are dead.’ But when he saw that I did not go, he said: ‘By another way, by other ports, not here, thou shalt come to the shore and pass. A lighter vessel must carry thee [,]’ (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 51) Dante is modelling his Charon on the same character depicted in the Aeneid: 23) Going through the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid, and the Inferno, one can also see that the conception and design of Dante’s Inferno are directly borrowed from Homer and Virgil, though when it comes to Purgatory and Paradise, Dante is completely on his own, moving beyond the cosmos of either Homer or Virgil. In this sense, then, the entire Divine Comedy can be regarded as a work that takes Homer, or, more precisely, Homer’s hell, as a point of departure, from which Dante moves on to create Purgatory, and, in particular, Paradise, a level beyond Homer and Virgil. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 107 “quisquis es, armatus qui nostra ad flumina tendis, fare age, quid venia, iam istinc, et comprime gressum. umbrarum hic locus est, Somni Noctisque soporae; corpora viva nefas Stygia vectare carina.” (Aeneid, 6.388-91) “Whoever you are who come to our river in arms, tell me, even from there, why you come, and check your step. This is the land of Shadows, of Sleep and drowsy Night; living bodies I may not carry in the Stygian boat.” (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 1, 559, 561)24) Dante’s debt to Virgil is even more obvious in his narration of Odysseus’ voyage in Canto 26 of the Inferno: «Noi ci allegrammo, e tosto tornò in pianto; chè de la nova terra un turbo nacque, e percosse del legno il primo canto. Tre volte il fè girar con tutte l’acque; a la quarta levar la poppa in suso e la prora ire in giù, com’altrui piacque, infin che ’l mar fu sopra noi richiuso». (Inferno, 26.136-42) ‘We were filled with gladness, and soon it turned to lamentation, for from the new land a storm rose and struck the forepart of the ship. Three times it whirled her round with all the waters, the fourth time lifted the poop aloft and plunged the prow below, as One willed, until the sea closed again over us.’ (Sinclair 1971: Inferno, 327) In the above passage, Ulysses describes how, overwhelmed by a storm on his voyage to “gain experience of the world and of the vices and the worth of men” (Sinclair 1971: Inferno, 325) (“a divenir del mondo esperto, / e de li vizi umani e del valore”) (Inferno, 26.98-99), he was buried in the waves. Lucid and vigorous, the narrative is almost a direct borrowing from the Aeneid: Talia iactanti stridens Aquilone procella velum adversa ferit, fluctusque ad sidera tollit; 24) In borrowing from Virgil, though, Dante has added details of his own. While Virgil’s Charon says, “living bodies I may not carry in the Stygian boat,” Dante’s Charon gives details as to what kind of boat living bodies should travel in: “A lighter vessel must carry thee.” 108 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] franguntur remi; tum prora avertit et undis dat latus; insequitur cumulo praeruptus aquae mons. hi summo in fluctu pendent; his unda dehiscens terram inter fluctus aperit; furit aestus harenis. tris Notus abreptas in saxa latentia torquet (saxa vocant Itali, mediis quae in fluctibus, Aras, dorsum immane mari summo), tris Eurus ab alto in brevia et syrtis urget (miserabile visu) inliditque vadis atque aggere cingit harenae. unam, quae Lycios fidumque vehebat Oronten, ipsius ante oculos ingens a vertice pontus in puppim ferit; excutitur pronusque magister volvitur in caput; ast illam ter fluctus ibidem torquet agens circum et rapidus vorat aequore vertex. (Aeneid, 1.102-117) As he flings forth such words, a gust, shrieking from the North, strikes full on his sail and lifts the waves to heaven. The oars snap, then the prow swings round and gives the broadside to the waves; down in a heap comes a sheer mountain of water. Some of the seamen hang upon the billow’s crest; to others the yawning sea shows ground beneath the waves; the surges seethe with sand. Three ships the South Wind catches and hurls on hidden rocks – rocks the Italians call the Altars, rising amidst the waves, a huge ridge toppling the sea. Three the East forces from the deep into shallows and sandbanks, a piteous sight, dashes on shoals and girds with a mound of sand. One, which bore the Lycians and loyal Orontes, before the eyes of Aeneas a mighty toppling wave strikes astern. The helmsman is dashed out and hurled head foremost, but the ship is thrice on the same spot whirled round and round by the wave and engulfed in the sea’s devouring eddy. (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 1, 269, 271) The passage describes how a storm, summoned by Juno through Aeolus, rises and strikes the ships of Aeneas and his comrades when they, after the Trojans’ defeat by the Danaans, were travelling at sea to found Italy. The details are vivid, enabling the reader to see the shape and ferocity of the waves as well |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 109 the way Aeneas’ comrades are tossed about; it is altogether a more gripping scene than Dante’s; nevertheless, the debt of Dante’s passage to the Aeneid is unmistakable. 4. Affinities between Dante’s Epic Similes and Those of Homer, Virgil, and Milton In constructing his epic similes, Dante generally follows in the footsteps of Homer and Virgil. Like his predecessors, he also draws on natural scenery when he describes how the spirits in Inferno fall to the ground before they are ferried over the Acheron by Charon: Come d’autunno si levan le foglie l’una appresso de l’altra, fin che ’l ramo vede a la terra tutte le sue spoglie, similemente il mal seme d’Adamo: gittansi di quel lito ad una ad una per cenni come augel per suo richiamo. (Inferno, 3.112-17) As in autumn the leaves drop off one after the other till the branch sees all its spoils on the ground, so the wicked seed of Adam fling themselves from that shore one by one at the signal, as a falcon at its recall. (Sinclair 1971: Inferno, 53) As Bush (Milton: 219) has pointed out, the simile shares a tradition with 2.468 and 2.800 of the Iliad, with 6.309-10 of the Aeneid, and with 1.299-313 of Paradise Lost: §FJ"< *z ¦< 8,4:ä<4 E6":"<*D\å •<2,:`,<J4 :LD\@4, ÓFF" J, Nb88" 6" –<2," (\(<,J"4 òD®. (Iliad, 2.467-68) So they took their stand in the flowery mead of Scamander, numberless, as are the leaves and the flowers in their season. (Murray 1925: The Iliad, Vol. 2, 85) 110 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] 8\0< (D Nb88@4F4< ¦@46`J,l ´ R":V2@4F4< §DP@<J"4 B,*\@4@ :"P0F`:,<@4 BD@J –FJL. (Iliad, 2.800-801) for most like to the leaves or the sands are they, as they march over the plain to fight against the city. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 109) “@Ë0 B,D Nb88T< (,<,Z, J@\0 *¥ 6" "<*Dä<. Nb88" J :X< Jz –<,:@l P":V*4l PX,4, –88" *X 2zà80 J08,2`TF" Nb,4, §"D@l *z ¦B4(\(<,J"4 òD0q ól •<*Dä< (,<,¬ º :¥< Nb,4 º *z •B@8Z(,4.” (Iliad, 6.146-49) “Even as are the generations of leaves, such are those also of men. As for the leaves, the wind scattereth some upon the earth, but the forest, as it burgeons, putteth forth others when the season of spring is come.” (Murrary 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 273) huc omnis turba ad ripas effusa ruebat, matres atque viri, defunctaque corpora vita magnanimum heroum, pueri innuptaeque puellae impositique rogis iuvenes ante ora parentum: quam multa in silvis autumni frigore primo lapsa cadunt folia, aut ad terram gurgite ab alto quam multae glomerantur aves, ubi frigidus annus trans pontum fugat et terris immittit apricis. (Aeneid, 6.305-312) Hither rushed all the throng, streaming to the banks; mothers and men and bodies of high-souled heroes, their life now done, boys and unwedded girls, and sons placed on the pyre before their fathers’ eyes; thick as the leaves of the forest that at autumn’s first frost drop and fall, and thick as the birds that from the seething deep flock shoreward, when the chill of the year drives them overseas and sends them into sunny lands. (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 1, 555) His legions, angel forms, who lay entranced, Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks In Vallombrosa, where th’ Etrurian shades High over-arched embow’r; or scattered sedge |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 111 Afloat, when with fierce winds Orion armed Hath vexed the Red Sea coast, whose waves o’erthrew Busiris and his Memphian chivalry, While with perfidious hatred they pursued The sojourners of Goshen, who beheld From the safe shore their floating carcasses And broken chariot wheels; so thick bestrown, Abject and lost lay these, covering the flood, Under amazement of their hideous change. (Paradise Lost, 1.301-313) 25) Structurally, too, Dante’s epic similes share affinities with those of Homer and Virgil, using the famous epic-simile formulas “Quali…cotali…” (“As…so…”),26) “Sì come…così…” (“Just as…so…”),27) “Quali…tali…” (“As…such…”),28) 25) To some critics, Milton at times surpasses his masters, as is the case with F. Falconer, whose affirmation of Milton’s superiority over Homer and Virgil is supported by Ricks: “But Milton’s Comparison is by far the exactest; for it not only expresses a Multitude, as the above of Homer and Virgil, but also the Posture and Situation of the Angels. Their lying confusedly in Heaps, covered with the Lake, is finely represented by this Image of the Leaves in the Brooks. Moreover, the falling of a Shower of Leaves from the Trees, in a Storm of Wind, very well represents the Dejection of the Angels from their former Celestial Mansions; and their faded Splendor wan [IV. 870], is finely expressed by the paleness and witheredness of the Leaves” (cited by Ricks 1963: 123-24). 26) “Quali colombe dal disio chiamate, / con l’ali alzate e ferme al dolce nido / vegnon per l’aere dal voler portate; / cotali uscir de la schiera ov’è Dido, / a noi venendo per l’aere maligno, / sì forte fu l’affettuoso grido.” (Inferno, 5.82-87) (“As doves, summoned by desire, come with wings poised and motionless to the sweet nest, borne by their will through the air, so these left the troop where Dido is, coming to us through the malignant air; such force had my loving call.” (Sinclair: 1971: Inferno, 77) 27) “Sì come i peregrin pensosi fanno, / giugnendo per cammin gente non nota, / che si volgono ad essa e non restanno, / così di retro a noi, più tosto mota, / venendo e trapassando ci ammirava / d’anime turba tacita e devota.” (Purgatorio, 23.16-21) (“Just as travellers absorbed in thought, when they overtake strangers on the road, turn to them without stopping, so, coming behind us with more speed and passing on, a crowd of souls, silent and devout, gazed at us with wonder.” (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 297). 28) “Quali per vetri trasparenti e tersi, / o ver per acque nitide e tranquille, / non sì profonde che i fondi sien persi, / tornan di nostril visi le postille / debili sì, che perla in bianca fronte / non vien men tosto a le nostre pupille; / tali vid’io più facce a parlar pronte: / per ch’io dentro a l’error contrario corsi / a quel ch’accese amor tra l’omo e ’l fonte.” (Paradiso, 3.10-18) (“As through smooth and transparent glass, or through limpid and 112 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] “Quando…Tal…” (“When…Such…”)29) …which are equivalent to Homer’s “{Ss…ól…” (“As…even in such wise…”), “z/ÙJ,…ól…”(“Even as...even so…”)… Virgil’s “velut…similes…” (“so…similarly…), “veluti…non aliter…” (“as…just so…”), “veluti…sic…” (“as…just so…”), “ac velut…sic…” (“And as… so…”), “qualis…talis…” (“As…just so…”) 30), Milton’s “As…so…”31) in constructing still water not so deep that the bottom is lost, the outlines of our faces return so faint that a pearl on a white brow does not come less quickly to our eyes, many such faces I saw, eager to speak; at which I ran into the opposite error to that which kindled love between the man and the spring.” (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 49). 29) “Quando si parte il gioco de la zara / colui che perde si riman dolente, / repetendo le volte, e tristo impara: / con l’altro se ne va tutta la gente; / qual va dinanzi, e qual di dietro il prende, / e qual da lato li si reca a mente: / el non s’arresta, e questo e quello intende; / a cui porge la man, più non fa pressa; / e così da la calca si difende. / Tal era io in quella turba spessa, / volgendo a loro, e qua e là, la faccia, / e promettendo mi sciogliea da essa.” (Purgatorio, 6.1-12) (“When the game of hazard breaks up the loser is left disconsolate, going over his throws again, and sadly learns his lesson; with the other all the people go off; one goes in front, one seizes him from behind, another at his side recalls himself to his memory; he does not stop, but listens to this one and that one; each to whom he reaches his hand presses on him no longer and so he saves himself from the throng. Such was I in that dense crowd, turning my face to them this way and that, and by promsing I got free from them.” (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 81) 30) Sometimes the bipartite formula may have only one part, as is the case with the following passage from the Aeneid, 11.624-30, which has only the first half, “qualis” (“as”), not the second half, “talis” (“just so”): “qualis ubi alterno procurrens gurgite pontus / nunc ruit ad terram scopulosque superiacit unda / spumeus extremamque sinu perfundit harenam, / nunc rapidus retro atque aestu revoluta resorbens / saxa fugit litusque vado labente relinquit: / bis Tusci Rutulos egere ad moenia versos, / bis reiecti armis respectant terga tegentes.” (“as when the ocean, advancing with alternate flood, now rushes shoreward, dashes over the cliffs in a wave of foam, and drenches the furthest sands with its swelling curve; now flees in fast retreat and in its wash sucks back rolling stones, leaving the sands dry as the shallows retreat. Twice the Tuscans drove the routed Rutulians to the city; twice, repulsed, they glance backwards, as they sling behind them their protecting shields.” (Fairclough 2000: Vol. 2, 279, 281) 31) “As when a vulture on Imaus bred, / Whose snowy ridge the roving Tartar bounds, / Dislodging from a region scarce of prey / To gorge the flesh of lambs or yeanling kids / On hills where flocks are fed, flies toward the springs / Of Ganges or Hydaspes, Indian streams, / But in his way lights on the barren plains / Of Sericana, where Chineses drive / With sails and wind their cany wagons light: / So on this windy sea of land, the Fiend / Walked up and down alone bent on his prey, / Alone, for other creature in this place, / Living or lifeless, to be found was none, / None yet; but store hereafter from the earth / Up hither like aërial vapors flew / Of all things transitory and vain, when sin / With vanity |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 113 his similes.32) Like the epic similes of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, Dante’s can also produce had filled the works of men: / Both all things vain, and all who in vain things / Built their fond hopes of glory or lasting fame, / Or happiness in this or th’ other life; / All who have their reward on earth, the fruits / Of painful superstition and blind zeal, / Naught seeking but the praise of men, here find / Fit retribution, empty as their deeds; / All th’ unaccomplished works of Nature’s hand, / Abortive, monstrous, or unkindly mixed, / Dissolved on earth, fleet hither, and in vain, / Till final dissolution, wander here, / Not in the neighboring moon, as some have dreamed; / Those argent fields more likely habitants, / Translated saints, or middle Spirits hold / Betwixt th’ angelical and human kind.” (Paradise Lost, 3.431-462). 32) Through Dante, these epic-simile formulas were later transplanted into Spanish poetry through Garcilaso de la Vega. A cursory examination of the Spanish poet’s “Égloga primera” (“The First Eclogue”), for example, will suffice to show how Dante’s epic similes have influenced Garcilaso’s in structural and stylistic terms. The following elaborate simile from the Spanish poem bears an unmistakable Dantesque stamp: “Cual suele’l ruiseñor con triste canto / quejarse, entre las hojas escondito, / del duro labrador que cautamente / le despojó su caro y dulce nido / de los tiernos hijuelos entretanto / que del amado ramo estaba ausente, / y aquel dolor que siente, / con diferencia tanta / por la dulce garganta, / despide, que a su canto el aire suena, / y la callada noche no refrena / su lamentable oficio y sus querellas, / trayendo de su pena / el cielo por testigo y las estrellas, / desta manera suelto yo la rienda / a mi dolor y ansR me quejo en vano / de la dureza de la muerte airada […]” (Garcilaso de la Vega 2001: 141-42) (“As the nightingale, hidden among the leaves, is wont to complain with sad song of the harsh countryman who has cunningly despoiled her dear, sweet nest of its tender fledglings whilst she was away from her favourite branch; and as she, in so changed a plight, expresses the grief she feels with her sweet voice; and as the air resounds with her song, and the silent night does not hold back her doleful dirge and her complaints, but calls on the skies and the stars to witness her sorrow; even so do I give full rein to my grief, and thus lament in vain the sternness of proud death.” (Cohen 1956: 168). The suspense after “Cual” (“As”), made possible by Spanish syntax, which is very similar to Italian syntax, and the elaborate working out of details are descended directly from Dante. It is also worth noting that, before this simile, there is another simile, almost as long, preceding: “Como al partir del sol la sombra crece […] tal es la tenebrosa / noche de tu partir […]” (Garcilaso 2001: 141) (“As when the sun departs the shadows grow […] even so is the dark night of your departure […]”) (Cohen 1956: 168). However, it must be pointed out that Garcilaso’s similes, though structurally and stylistically descended from Dante and, through Dante, echoing Homer and Virgil, should not be called epic similes in the strict sense of the term, since they are no longer similes used for epical purposes. In other words, taking Dante as his point of departure, Garcilaso moved away from the Dante tradition and put the epic simile to non-epical use, employing it in an eclogue in the case under discussion. 114 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] the stylistic effects expected of epic similes of the mainstream tradition: they can create suspense, heighten the climactic moment, put the narrative into slow motion. … In the Homeric, Virgilian, and Miltonic epics, we have similes that depict speed, grandeur, and awe; in The Divine Comedy, we have similar figures, some of which can perform several functions at the same time, as is the case in the following passage: Ed ecco qual, sul presso del mattino, per li grossi vapor Marte rosseggia giù nel ponente sovra ’l suol marino, cotal m’apparve, s’ io ancor lo veggia, un lume per lo mar venir sì ratto, che ’l mover suo nessun volar pareggia. (Purgatorio, 2.13-18) and lo, as on the approach of morning Mars glows ruddy through the thick vapours low in the west over the ocean floor, so appeared to me – may I see it again! – a light coming so swiftly over the sea that no flight could match its speed; from which when I had taken my eyes for a moment to question my Leader I saw it again, grown brighter and larger. (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 33) In the Homeric, Virgilian, and Miltonic epic similes, we have sublimity; in The Divine Comedy – especially in the Paradiso – sublimity is everywhere: in plain descriptions as well as in similes, as can be seen in the following lines: Quale per li seren tranquilli e puri discorre ad ora ad ora subito foco, movendo li occhi che stavan sicuri, e pare stella che tramuti loco, se non che da la parte ond’el s’accende nulla sen perde, ed esso dura poco; tale dal corno che ’n destro si stende a piè di quella croce corse un astro de la costellazion che lì resplende. Né si partì la gemma dal suo nastro, ma per la lista radial trascorse, |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 115 che parve foco dietro ad alabastro. (Paradiso, 15.13-24) As through the still and cloudless evening sky runs at times a sudden fire, catching the eyes that were unheeding, and seems a star changing its place but that from the part where it kindles none is missing and it lasts but a moment; so from the horn that extends on the right ran to the foot of that cross a star of the resplendent constellation that is there. And the gem did not leave its ribbon, but ran across by the radial strip and seemed fire behind alabaster. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 215) The passage describes in gripping terms the appearance of Cacciaguida. At the end of the “Quale…tale…” structure, the simile flows on into plain description,33) which does not peter out but fully sustains and, indeed, reinforces the sublimity of the preceding lines.34) If sublimity is the hallmark of mainstream epics like the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid, and Paradise Lost, such a hallmark is equally, if not more, evident in The Divine Comedy. But apart from this hallmark, the epic similes in The Divine Comedy have qualities which are rarely, if ever, found in the similes of the former, and it is these qualities that mark Dante’s point of departure and beyond. Like the mainstream epics, The Divine Comedy also compares one object or objects (a thing, an animal, a person, a scene, etc. or things, animals, persons, scenes, etc.) to another object or objects, etc., enabling the reader to shift his point of view, more than once if necessary, to look at the tenor: 35) 33) Judged by the standards of epic similes, the lines “Né si partì la gemma dal suo nastro, / ma per la lista radial trascorse, / che parve foco dietro ad alabastro” can be regarded as plain description. Upon closer analysis, however, it will be seen that it is a metaphor combined with a quasi-simile, in which the function of the vehicles for the tenor (Cacciaguida) in the preceding lines, “foco” (“fire”) and “un astro de la costellazion che lì resplende” (“a star of the resplendent constellation”), are taken over by “la gemma” (“the gem”), and in which “parve” in “parve foco” (“seemed fire”) has the force of come (“like”). 34) The sublimity of the quotation arises largely from the visualizations, about whose stylistic effects Logninus made a perceptive remark some 18 centuries ago: “Weight, grandeur, and urgency in writing are very largely produced, dear friend, by the use of ‘visualizations’” (Longinus 1995: 215) (“}?(6@L 6" :,("80(@D\"l 6" •(ä<@l ¦B J@bJ@4l, ì <,"<\", 6" "Ê N"<J"F\"4 B"D"F6,L"FJ46fJ"J"4q”) (Longinus 1995: 214). 35) The words tenor and vehicle are usually used of metaphor. In the metaphor “He is a lion,” “He” (subject) is the tenor, and lion is the vehicle. According to Flexner et al., the tenor is “the subject of a metaphor, as ‘she’ in ‘She is a rose’ (1956); the vehicle is “the 116 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] E come li stornei ne portan l’ali nel freddo tempo a schiera larga e piena, così quel fiato li spiriti mali: di qua, di là, di giù, di su li mena; nulla speranza li conforta mai, non che di posa, ma di minor pena. E come i gru van cantando lor lai, faccendo in aere di sé lunga riga, così vidi venir, traendo guai, ombre portate da la detta briga: per ch’i’ dissi: «Maestro, chi son quelle genti che l’aura nera sì gastiga?»(Inferno, 5.40-51) As in the cold season their wings bear the starlings along in a broad, dense flock, so does that blast the wicked spirits. Hither, thither, downward, upward, it drives them; no hope ever comforts them, not to say of rest, but of less pain. And as the cranes go chanting their lays, making of themselves a long line in the air, so I saw approach with longdrawn wailings shades borne on these battling winds, so that I said: “Master, who are these people whom the black air so scourges?” (Sinclair 1971: Inferno, 75) In the above passage, Dante compares “the wicked spirits” (“li spiriti mali”) to two kinds of birds, first to starlings being borne along by Hell’s blast, then, when Dante wants to shift the reader’s perspective, to cranes that “go chanting their lays”. This kind of simile is the staple of epic similes in Homer, Virgil, and Milton, the most outstanding being Homer’s simile clusters in Book 2, lines 455-83 of the Iliad, in which the poet keeps shifting the perspective, comparing the Achaens first to “a consuming fire,” then to “the many tribes of winged fowl, wild geese or cranes or long-necked swans on the Asian mead,” then to “the many tribes of swarming flies that buzz to and fro throughout the herdsman’s farmstead in the season of spring,” and then to “the wide-scattered flocks of thing or idea to which the subject of a metaphor is compared, as ‘rose’ in ‘she is a rose’ ” (2109). As a simile is a figure very much like a metaphor, except that it uses such words as “like” to link up the subject and “the thing or idea to which the subject […] is compared,” the two rhetorical terms are here also applied to similes. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 117 goats” being separated by goatherds. Finally, he compares Agamemnon to “a bull among the herd” (Murray 1924: Iliad, Vol. 1, 85, 87). By shifting the perspective again and again, Homer succeeds in defamiliarizing what the reader is already familiar with, thereby sharpening his perception, enabling him to look at the tenor from a new point of view, and enriching his experience of the scene being described. By virtue of the images of the starling, the crane, etc., Dante’s similes perform the same functions. 5. Differences between Dante’s Epic Similes and Those of Homer, Virgil, and Milton The above similarity should not, however, obscure two major differences between the similes of Homer, Virgil, and Milton on the one hand and those of Dante on the other. In the first place, as The Divine Comedy is an epic about an individual’s journey to the Beatific Vision, the similes of Dante, unlike those of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, are not generally related to war. For this reason, the tenor of the figure can be widely different. Whereas the tenor in Homer’s, Virgil’s, or Milton’s simile is generally related to war, for example, a warrior, an army, a battle formation, a weapon at rest or in motion, or a battle, Dante’s tenor can be many things else. It can be the souls in Purgatory compared to people crowding round the bearer of an olive-branch to hear the news: E come a messaggier che porta ulivo tragge la gente per udir novelle, e di calcar nessun si mostra schivo, così al viso mio a’affisar quelle anime fortunate tutte quante, quasi obliando d’ire a farsi belle. (Purgatorio, 2.70-75 and as to a messenger who bears an olive-branch the people crowd to hear the news and no one heeds the crush, so every one of these fortunate souls fixed his eyes on my face, as if forgetting to go and make them fair. (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 37) 118 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] It can be Dante the narrator moving on in Purgatorio “through the foul and bitter air” like “a blind man” that “goes behind his guide”: Sì come cieco va dietro a sua guida per non smarrirsi e per non dar di cozzo in cosa che ’l molesti, o forse ancida; m’andava io per l’aere amaro e sozzo ascoltando il mio duca che diceva pur: «Guarda che da me tu non sia mozzo». (Purgatorio, 16.10-15) Just as a blind man goes behind his guide that he may not stray or knock against what might injure or perhaps kill him, so I went through the foul and bitter air listening to my Leader, who kept saying: ‘See that thou art not cut off from me.’ (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 209) It can be a tree being revived: Come le nostre piante, quando casca giù la gran luce mischiata con quella che raggia dietro a la celeste lasca, turgide fansi, e poi si rinovella di suo color ciascuna, pria che ’l sole giunga li suoi corsier sotto altra stella; men che di rose e più che di viole colore aprendo, s’ innovò la pianta, che prima avea le ramora sì sole [;] (Purgatorio, 32.52-60) As our plants, when the great light falls on them mingled with that which shines behind the celestial Carp, begin to swell and then each is renewed in its own colour before the sun yokes his steeds under other stars, so, showing colour less than of the rose and more than of the violet, the tree was renewed which before had its branches so bare [;] (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 421) the blinding light that radiates from an angel: |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 119 Come quando da l’acqua o da lo specchio salta lo raggio a l’opposita parte, salendo su per lo modo parecchio a quel che scende, e tanto si diparte dal cader de la pietra in igual tratta, sì come mostra esperienza e arte; così mi parve da luce rifratta quivi dinanzi a me esser percosso; per ch’a fuggir la mia vista fu ratta [;] (Purgatorio, 15.16-24) As when from water or mirror the beam leaps the opposite way, rising at the same angle as it descends, and at an equal length departs as much from the fall of the stone, as is shown by science and experiment, so it seemed to me I was struck by light reflected there before me, so that my sight was quick to flee [;] (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 197). a character trait (stubbornness in the following case): Come al nome di Tisbe aperse il ciglio Piramo in su la morte, e reguardolla, allor che ’l gelso diventò vermiglio; così, la mia durezza fatta solla, mi volsi al savio duca, udendo il nome che ne la mente sempre mi rampolla [;] (Puragorio, 27.37-42) As at the name of Thisbe Pyramus lifted his eyelids at the point of death and gazed at her, at the time when the mulberry became red, so, my stubbornness softened, I turned to the wise Leader, hearing the name that ever springs up in my mind [;] (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 353) the facial expression of one whose emotional equilibrium is disturbed: Com’a l’annunzio di dogliosi danni si turba il viso di colui ch’ascolta, da qual che parte il periglio l’assanni, così vid’io l’altr’anima che volta 120 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] stava a udir turbarsi e farsi trista, poi ch’ebbe la parola a sé raccolta [;] (Purgatorio, 14.67-72) As at the announcement of grievous ills the face of one listening is troubled, from whatever quarter the danger assail him, so I saw the other soul, which had turned to hear, become troubled and downcast when it had taken in these words [;] (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 186-87) or Beatrice’s look compared to light breaking sleep: E come a lume acuto si disonna per lo spirto visivo che ricorre a lo splendor che va di gonna in gonna, e lo svegliato ciò che vede aborre, sì nescia è la subita vigilia fin che la stimativa non soccorre; così de li occhi miei ogni quisquilia fugò Beatrice col raggio de’ suoi, che rifulgea da più di mille milia: onde mei che dinanzi vidi poi […] (Paradiso, 26.70-79) And as sleep is broken by a piercing light when the visual spirit runs to meet the brightness that passes through film after film, and the awakened man shrinks from what he sees, so unaware is his sudden waking till judgement comes to his help, – thus Beatrice chased every mote from my eyes with the radiance of her own which shone more than a thousand miles, so that I saw then better than before. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 377) When Dante wants to present in highly visual terms the souls who have hope of salvation, he can focus on meekness: Come quando, cogliendo biada o loglio, li colombi adunati a la pastura, queti, sanza mostrar l’usato orgoglio, se cosa appare ond’elli abbian paura, subitamente lasciano star esca, |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 121 perch’assaliti son da maggior cura; così vid’io quella masnada fresca lasciar lo canto, e gire inver la costa, com’uom che va, né sa dove riesca: né la nostra partita fu men tosta. (Purgatorio, 2.124-133) As when doves collected at their feeding, picking up wheat or tares, quiet, without their usual show of pride, if something appears that frightens them suddenly leave their food lying, because they are assailed with a greater care; so I saw that new troop leave the song and go towards the slope, like those who go they know not where; nor was our departure in less haste. (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 39) At times, even abstractions can be used as a tenor. Thus, when Dante’s is on the point of speaking, his state of mind is compared to a “little stork” that “lifts its wing with desire to fly”: E quale il cicognin che leva l’ala per voglia de volare, e non s’attenta d’abbandonar lo nido, e giù la cala; tal era io con voglia accesa e spenta di dimandar, venendo infino a l’atto che fa colui ch’a dicer s’argomenta. (Purgatorio, 25.10-15) And as the little stork lifts its wing with desire to fly and does not venture to leave the nest and drops it again, such was I with the desire to question kindled and quenched, going as far as the movement of one that prepares to speak. (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 325) The vehicle, too, can be highly unconventional, differing widely from those found in the similes of the mainstream epics. This is especially true of cases where Dante wants to move an already familiar scene to a different plane of perception, thereby lifting it out of the ordinary and giving it a touch of the otherworldly, of ethereal beauty and tenderness. A case in point is the simile that describes Dante bursting into tears when rebuked by Beatrice and then comforted by the angels: 122 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] Sì come neve tra le vive travi per lo dosso d’Itlalia si congela, soffiata e stretta dalli venti schiavi, poi, liquefatta, in se stessa trapela, pur che la terra che perde ombra spiri, sì che par foco fonder la candela; così fui sanza lacrime e sospiri anzi ’l cantar di quei che notan sempre dietro alle note de li etterni giri; ma poi ch’intesi ne le dolci tempre lor compatire a me, più che se detto avesser: «Donna, perché sì lo stempre?», lo gel che m’era intorno al cor ristretto spirito e acqua fessi, e con angoscia de la bocca e de li occhi uscì del petto. (Purgaotrio, 30.85-99) Even as the snow among the living beams along the back of Italy freezes, blown and packed by the Slavonian winds, then, dissolved, drips into itself if only the land that loses shadow breathes, so that it seems fire melting a candle; so was I without tears or sighs before the singing of those who keep ever in tune with the notes of the eternal spheres, but when I heard in the sweet harmonies their compassion on me, more than if they had said: ‘Lady, why dost thou so shame him?’, the ice that was bound about my heart turned to breath and water and with anguish came forth from my breast by mouth and eyes. (Sinclair 1971: Purgagtorio, 397) Hornstein et al. were certainly right when they made the following remark about Homer: “He takes his comparisons from all the experiences of life: the evening star and the snow storm; lions and eagles and flies; women wrangling in the streets and a little girl clinging to her mother’s dress” (1956: 227). But from the similes quoted above as well as from many others which cannot be quoted within the limited space of this paper, we can see that what is true of Homer is even more true of Dante. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 123 6. The New Frontiers of Dante’s Epic Similes While the experience conveyed by the similes of Homer, Virgil, and Milton is normally perceptible or apprehensible to the reader even without the similes, that conveyed by Dante’s similes can go further: it can be experience that is very often difficult to perceive or apprehend – and indeed inapprehensible without the similes, for what Dante wants to put across can be the mysterious, the mystic, or even the ineffable.36) When The Divine Comedy is, to borrow a phrase from Eliot, “[taking] the highest flights,”37) Dante often aspires to transport the reader far beyond the normal frontiers of perception or apprehension. Eliot made a salient point in this regard when, in his famous essay entitled “Dante,” he commented on Canto 33, lines 85-96 of the Paradiso, “One can feel only awe at the power of the master who could thus at every moment realize the inapprehensible in visual images” (Eliot 1951: 267-68). Going on to discuss the Comedy in the same essay, he added: And the third point is that the Divine Comedy is a complete scale of the depths and heights of human emotion; that the Purgatorio and Paradiso are to be read as extensions of the ordinarily very limited human range. Every degree of the feeling of humanity, from lowest to highest, has, moreover, an intimate relation to the next above and below, and all fit together according to the logic of sensibility” (Eliot 1951: 268-69). In his comments, Eliot has identified two aspects which determine the extraordinary functions performed by Dante’s epic similes, functions which differ fundamentally from those performed by the epic similes of Homer, Virgil, and Milton: “to realize the inapprehensible in visual images” and to depict the “complete scale of the depths and heights of human emotion,” particularly the 36) In entitling his essay on Dante “In Unknowability as Love: The Theology of Dante’s Commedia” (Montemaggi and Treherne 2010: 60-94), Montemaggi has, with the word “Unknowability,” also accurately highlighted the formidability the poet’s subject. 37) In his famous essay entitled “Poetry and Drama,” Eliot has the following to say about his conception of poetic drama: “It is indeed necessary for any long poem, if it is to escape monotony, to be able to say homely things without bathos, as well as to take the highest flights without sounding exaggerated. And it is still more important in a play, especially if it is concerned with contemporary life.” See Eliot 1957: 74. 124 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] “extensions of the ordinarily very limited human range.” To be sure, the epic similes in the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid, and Paradise Lost also, to a large extent, perform the function of “[realizing] the inapprehensible in visual images,” for, without the many epic similes in these poems, the reader would not be able to apprehend in vivid terms the supernatural worlds described by these epics. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that, in the epic similes of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, the tenor is generally apprehensible; the similes only serve to carry the reader to a different vantage point, where he can look at the tenor afresh. Thus, in 4.422-32 of the Iliad quoted above, when “the battalions of the Danaans” are compared to “the swell of the sea” “on a sounding beach,” the reader can imagine in advance what a battalion moving “rank after rank, without cease, into battle” is like; the simile only sharpens the perception by a defamiliarizing process. Or, to take the argument a step further, the reader, if he is imaginative enough or has read epics before, can supply an image very close to that supplied by Homer. Similarly, in the case of 12.746-57 of the Aeneid, also quoted above, in which Aeneas, the pursuer, is compared to “a hunter hound,” and Turnus, the pursued, to a “stag,” the reader can also visualize the pursuit even without the simile. Again, in 1.604-611 of Paradise Lost: Cruel his eye, but cast Signs of remorse and passion to behold The fellows of his crime, the followers rather (Far other once beheld in bliss), condemned For ever now to have their lot in pain, Millions of Spirits for his fault amerced Of heav’n, and from eternal splendors flung For his revolt, yet faithful how they stood, Their glory withered: as when heaven’s fire Hath scathed the forest oaks or mountain pines, With singèd top their stately growth though bare Stands on the blasted heath [,] (Paradise Lost, 1.604-15) before the vehicle of the simile is given,38) the reader can imagine, though 38) This epic simile does not follow the “Just as… so…” formula commonly found in Homer and Virgil; the fallen angels “condemned […] to have their lot in pain” constitute the tenor; the vehicle, preceded by “as,” comes after the tenor, not before it. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 125 not in concrete detail, what the fallen state can be like; with the simile given, the fallen state is apprehended by the reader in more vivid language. Like those of Homer and Virgil quoted above, the simile is not absolutely essential for the perception of the scene or situation. Not so with Dante. Compared with Homer, Virgil, and Milton, the author of The Divine Comedy is more ambitious; like the three mainstream epic poets, Dante also deals, particularly in the Inferno, with the apprehensible. But since “[t]he waters [he] take[s] were never sailed before” (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 33), 39)he has set himself the task of pushing back the frontiers of perception, presenting states, emotions, and scenes beyond the normal human imagination, concerned with, in Eliot’s words, “extensions of the ordinarily very limited human range.” Take 32.31-36 of the Inferno, which describe “the suffering shades” being punished in Hell: E come a gracidar si sta la rana col muso fuor de l’acqua, quando sogna di spigolar sovente la villana; livide, insin là dove appar vergogna eran l’ombre dolenti ne la ghiaccia, mettendo i denti in nota di cicogna. (Inferno, 32.31-36) And as the frog sits with its muzzle out of the water to croak when the peasant-girl dreams often of her gleaning, so, livid up to where the flush of shame appears, the suffering shades were in the ice, setting their teeth 39) In Canto 2 of the Paradiso, Dante addresses his readers in the following words: “O voi che siete in piccioletta barca, / disiderosi d’ascoltar, seguiti / dietro al mio legno che cantando varca, / tornate a riveder li vostri liti: / non vi mettete in pelago, ché, forse, / perdendo me rimarreste smarriti. / L’acqua ch’io prendo già mai non si corse: / Minerva spira, e conducemi Apollo, / e nove Muse mi dimostran l’Orse.” (Paradiso, 2.1-9) (“O ye who in a little bark, eager to listen, have followed behind my ship that singing makes her way, turn back to see your shores again; do not put forth on the deep, for, perhaps, losing me, you would be left bewildered. The waters I take were never sailed before. Minerva breathes, Apollo pilots me, and the nine Muses show me the Bears.” (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 33) In these lines, Dante is emphasizing that he is sailing into uncharted waters, waters into which other poets have never sailed before. It is natural, therefore, that his epic similes should perform certain functions which the epic similes of other poets have not performed before. 126 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] to the note of the stork. (Sinclair 1971: Inferno, 397) Without the simile, the reader would not be able to imagine, much less visualize, what form the punishment would take. In the Purgatorio, the epic similes perform this function with a much higher frequency. First, take 3.79-87 of this cantica, for example: Come le pecorelle escon del chiuso a una, a due, a tre, e l’altre stanno timidette atterrando l’occhio e ’l muso; e ciò che fa la prima, e l’altre fanno, addossandosi a lei, s’ella s’arresta, semplici e quete, e lo ’mperché non sanno; sì vid’io muovere a venir la testa di quella mandra fortunata allotta, pudica in faccia e ne l’andare onesta. (Purgatorio, 3.79-87) As the sheep come forth from the fold by one and two and three and the rest stand timid, bending eyes and muzzle to the ground, and what the first does the rest do, pressing up behind it if it stops, simple and quiet, and do not know why; so I saw start then to come forward the leaders of that fortunate flock, modest in looks and dignified in bearing. (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 49) The passage describes how a group of blessed souls come up to Dante and Virgil. Before the simile is presented in full, the reader has no way of visualizing what their coming will be like. Again, in the following passage, which has already been quoted to illustrate one of the formulas used by Dante in constructing epic similes, and which describes how the souls in Purgatory ask Dante to relay a message to their relatives, so that prayers by way of intercession can be said for them, the reader has no way of envisaging what the souls’ behaviour will be like until he see the whole simile: Quando si parte il gioco de la zara, colui che perde si riman dolente, |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 127 repetendo le volte, e tristo impara: con l’altro se ne va tutta la gente; qual va dinanzi, e qual di dietro il prende, e qual da lato li si reca a mente: el non s’arresta, e questo e quello intende; a cui porge la man, piu non fa pressa; e così da la calca si difende. Tal era io in quella turba spessa, volgendo a loro, e qua e là, la faccia, e promettendo mi sciogliea da essa[,] (Purgatorio, 6.1-12) When the game of hazard breaks up the loser is left disconsolate, going over his throws again, and sadly learns his lesson; with the other all the people go off; one goes in front, one seizes him from behind, another at his side recalls himself to his memory; he does not stop, but listens to this one and that one; each to whom he reaches his hand presses on him no longer and so he saves himself from the throng. Such was I in that dense crowd, turning my face to them this way and that, and by promising I got free from them [,] (Sinclair 1971: Purgatorio, 81) 40) In commenting on a simile in Canto 15 of the Inferno, Eliot, also in “Dante,” has made the following observation about the poetics of Dante and that of Shakespeare: There is a well-known comparison or simile in the great XVth canto of the Inferno, which Matthew Arnold singled out, rightly, for high praise; which is characteristic of the way in which Dante employs these figures. He is speaking of the crowd in Hell who peered at him and his guide under a dim light: e sì ver noi aguzzevan le ciglia, 40) It is also worth noting that, here, Dante is drawing on a very unepic-like scene (a game of hazard) in constructing his vehicle, a scene unlikely to be used by Virgil or Milton. With a similar taste for the mundane, though, Homer could well have “descended” to the same level, since he can compare “Ajax to an Ass pelted away with Stones by some Children, Ulysses to a Pudding, the Council-board of Priam to Grashoppers” (Ricks 1963: 123). 128 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] come vecchio sartor fa nella cruna. and sharpened their vision (knitted their brows) at us, like an old tailor peering at the eye of his needle. The purpose of this type of simile is solely to make us see more definitely the scene which Dante has put before us in the preceding lines.41) she looks like sleep, As she would catch another Antony In her strong toil of grace. The image of Shakespeare’s is much more complicated than Dante’s, and more complicated than it looks. It has the grammatical form of a kind of simile (the ‘as if’ form), but of course ‘catch in her toil’ is a metaphor. But whereas the simile of Dante is merely to make you see more clearly how the people looked, and is explanatory, the figure of Shakespeare is expansive rather than intensive; its purpose is to add to what you see (either on the stage or in your imagination) […] It is more elusive, and it is less possible to convey without close knowledge of the English language. Between men who could make such inventions as these there can be no question of greater or less. But as the whole poem of Dante is, if you like, one vast metaphor, there is hardly any place for metaphor in the detail of it. (Eliot 1951: 243-44) In the above quotation, what is most relevant to the present discussion is the phrase “to make us see more definitely the scene which Dante has put before 41) The whole passage relevant to Eliot’s discussion is as follows: “Già eravam da la selva rimossi / tanto, ch’i’ non avrei visto dov’era, / perch’io in dietro rivolto mi fossi, / quando incontrammo d’anime una schiera / che venian lungo l’argine, e ciascuna / ci riguardava come suol da sera / guardare uno altro sotto nuova luna; / e sì ver noi aguzzavan le ciglia / come ’l vecchio sartor fa ne la cruna.” (Inferno, 15.13-21) (“Already we had got so far from the wood that I should not have seen where it was if I had turned backward, when we met a troop of souls who were coming alongside the bank, and each looked at us as men look at one another under a new moon at dusk, and they puckered their brows on us like an old tailor on the eye of his needle.”) (Sinclair 1971: Inferno, 193). Eliot’s “aguzzevan” (for “aguzzavan” (infinitive aguzzare, meaning “rendere aguzzo, appuntire” [to make sharp, to point] (Cusatelli 1980: 53)) is probably a misprint. |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 129 us.” What Dante puts before the reader can be a scene, a persona or personae, an object, an emotion, a colour, and so on. In the quotations from the Inferno and the Purgatorio, it is the personae that the similes make us see more definitely. In the following lines from the Paradiso, which describe the Sphere of the Moon, it is the scene as well as its colour and sense of touch that the similes fasten on: Perev’a me che nube ne coprisse lucida, spessa, solida e pulita, quasi adamante, che lo sol ferisse. Per entro sé l’etterna margarita ne ricevette, com’acqua recepe raggio di luce permanendo unita. S’io era corpo, e qui non si concepe com’una dimensione altra patio, ch’esser convien se corpo in corpo repe, accender ne dovria più il disio di veder quella essenza in che si vede come nostra natura e Dio s’unio. (Paradiso, 2.31-42) It seemed to me that a cloud covered us, shining, dense, solid and smooth, like a diamond that is smitten by the sun; the eternal pearl received us into itself, as water receives a ray of light and remains unbroken. If I was body – and here we cannot conceive how one bulk admitted another, which must be if body enters into body – it should the more kindle our desire to see His being in whom is seen how our nature was joined to God. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 35) Here, the similes (“like a diamond that is smitten by the sun”; “the eternal pearl received us into itself, as water receives a ray of light and remains unbroken”) are more than making us “see more definitely” what the poet “has put before us”; they are, again in Eliot’s words, “[realizing] the inapprehensible in visual [and tactile] images” (Eliot 1951: 267-68), for, unlike Homer, Virgil, or even Milton, Dante is conveying highly abstract, philosophical, and theological ideas in the concrete language of poetry. I say “even Milton” because, although Milton in Paradise Lost also deals with a Christian theme, just as Dante in The 130 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] Divine Comedy does, trying to make his readers apprehend the inapprehensible, he is less adequate than Dante to the almost superhuman task, the task of bodying forth in words ideas which are beyond words. Compared with the epic similes of Homer, Virgil, and Milton, the above example also appears more complicated; it consists of more than one figure, and the nature of the figures is not easy to determine. Thus, while the clause “It seemed to me that” (“Parev’a me che”) appears to be the language of plain description, it also partakes of the qualities of the language of a simile, sharing the functions of such words as “like” (“com[e]”) and “as” (“com[e]”). While “like a diamond that is smitten by the sun” (“quasi adamante che lo sol ferisse”) is clearly a simile, the clause “the eternal pearl received us into itself” (“Per entro sé l’etterna margarita / ne ricevette”) is a metaphor, which is followed by a simile: “as water receives a ray of light and remains unbroken” (“com’acqua recepe / raggio di luce permanendo unita”). In this quotation, then, we see Dante moving away from Homer and Virgil in terms not only of the content of his epic similes, but also of their structure and nature. In appreciating Dante’s capacity for realizing the inapprehensible, it will be most instructive to compare Dante’s treatment of God – and His Son-in The Divine Comedy with Milton’s treatment of God – and His Son-in Paradise Lost, since, unlike the Iliad, the Odyssey, and the Aeneid, which deal with pagan gods, the two works by Dante and Milton concern themselves with God in the Christian faith. In Paradise Lost, God and His Son are anthropomorphic, very much like Zeus and Athene in the Iliad, as can be seen in Book 6 of Paradise Lost, in which Milton describes how God the Father sends Messiah his Son to defeat Satan and the other fallen angels after Michael and Gabriel have failed to do so, since “Equal in their creation they [the warring parties] were formed” (Paradise Lost, 6.690): “Go then, thou mightiest in thy Father’s might, Ascend my chariot, guide the rapid wheels That shake heav’n’s basis, bring forth all my war, My bow and thunder, my almighty arms Gird on, and sword upon thy puissant thigh; Pursue these sons of darkness, drive them out From all heav’n’s bounds into the utter deep; There let them learn, as likes them, to despise God and Messiah his anointed King.” (Paradise Lost, 6.710-18) |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 131 Forth rushed with whirlwind sound The chariot of Paternal Deity, Flashing thick flames, wheel within wheel, undrawn, Itself instinct with spirit, but convoyed By four Cherubic shapes. Four faces each Had wondrous; as with stars, their bodies all And wings were set with eyes; with eyes the wheels Of beryl, and careering fires between: Over their heads a crystal firmament, Whereon a sapphire throne, inlaid with pure Amber, and colors of the show’ry arch. He in celestial panoply all armed Of radiant Urim, work divinely wrought, Ascended; at his right hand Victory Sat eagle-winged, beside him hung his bow And quiver with three-bolted thunder stored, And from about him fierce effusion rolled Of smoke and bickering flame, and sparkles dire. (Paradise Lost, 6.749-66) Describing God and Messiah like a human king and his prince, the above quotations bear a close resemblance to the following passage from the Iliad, in which Athene and Hera prepare for war: "ÛJD z!20<"\0 6@bD0 )4Îl "Æ(4`P@4@ BXB8@< :¥< 6"JXP,L,< ©"<Î< B"JDÎl ¦Bz @Ü*,4 B@46\8@<, Ó< Õz "ÛJ¬ B@4ZF"J@ 6" 6V:, P,DF\<, º *¥ P4Jä<z ¦<*ØF" )4Îl <,N,80(,DXJ"@ J,bP,F4< ¦l B`8,:@< 2TDZFF,J@ *"6DL`,<J". ¦l *z ÐP," N8`(," B@F $ZF,J@, 8V.,J@ *z §(P@l $D42× :X(" FJ4$"D`<, Jè *V:<0F4 FJ\P"l •<*Dä< ºDfT<, J@ÃF\< J, 6@JXFF,J"4 Ï$D4:@BVJD0. ~/D0 *¥ :VFJ4(4 2@äl ¦B,:"\,Jz –Dz ËBB@Llq "ÛJ`:"J"4 *¥ Bb8"4 :b6@< @ÛD"<@Ø, Ÿl §P@< ƒSD"4, J±l ¦B4JXJD"BJ"4 :X("l @ÛD"<Îl ?Ü8L:B`l J,, ²:¥< •<"68Ã<"4 BL64<Î< <XN@l ²*z ¦B42,Ã<"4. 132 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] J± Õ" *4z "ÛJVT< 6,<JD0<,6X"l §P@< ËBB@Ll. (Iliad, 8.384-96) but Athene, daughter of Zeus that beareth the aegis, let fall upon her father’s floor her soft robe, richly broidered, that herself had wrought and her hands had fashioned, and put on her the tunic of Zeus the cloud-gatherer, and arrayed her in armour for tearful war. Then she stepped upon the flaming car and grasped her spear, heavy and huge and strong, wherewith she vanquisheth the ranks of men, of warriors with whom she is wroth, she the daughter of the mighty sire. And Hera swiftly touched the horses with the lash, and self-bidden groaned upon their hinges the gates of heaven, which the Hours had in their keeping, to whom are entrusted great heaven and Olympus, whether to throw open the thick cloud or shut it to. There through the gate they drave their horses patient of the goad. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 367) The conception of the son / daughter driving his / her father’s chariot is common to both passages. What is the most obvious debt of Milton’s description of the chariot to Homer is the line “Flashing thick flames, wheel within wheel, undrawn,” which harks back to Homer’s “flaming car” (“ÐP," N8`(,"”). At the same time, Milton’s description of the “four Cherubic shapes” and of “Victory” also reminds one of 5.738-42 of the Iliad, which describe Athene’s aegis as having Rout, Strife, Valour, Onset, and the Gorgon set in it: •:N *z –Dz ê:@4F4< $V8,Jz "Æ(\*" 2LFF"<`,FF"< *,4<Z<, ¼< B,D :¥< BV<J® M`$@l ¦FJ,NV<TJ"4, ¦< *z }+D4l, ¦< *z z!86Z, ¦< *¥ 6DL`,FF" z3T6Z, ¦< *X J, '@D(,\0 6,N"8¬ *,4<@Ã@ B,8fD@L, *,4<Z J, F:,D*<Z J,, )4Îl JXD"l "Æ(4`P@4@. (Iliad, 5.738-42) About her shoulders she flung the tasselled aegis, fraught with terror, all about which Rout is set as a crown, and therein is Strife, therein Valour, and therein Onset, that maketh the blood run cold, and therein is the head of the dread monster, the Gorgon, dread and awful, a portent of Zeus that beareth the aegis. (Murray 1924: The Iliad, Vol. 1, 249) Being anthropomorphic, Milton’s God speaks like a man, even with man’s |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 133 vanity and boastfulness, as can be seen in his words to His Son, the Filial Godhead: “ ‘My overshadowing Spirit and might with thee I send along; ride forth, and bid the deep With appointed bounds be heav’n and earth; Boundless the deep, because I am who fill Infinitude, nor vacuous the space. Though I uncircumscribed myself retire, And put not forth my goodness, which is free To act or not, necessity and chance Approach not me, and what I will is fate.’ ” (Paradise Lost, 7.165-73) To tone down the anthropomorphic nature of his God, Milton has followed the “Divine Boast” with an apology: “So spake th’ Almighty, and to what he spake His Word, the Filial Godhead, gave effect. Immediate are the acts of God, more swift Than time or motion, but to human ears Cannot without process of speech be told, So told as earthly notion can receive.” (Paradise Lost, 7.174-79) These lines, spoken by Raphael in his account of how God created heaven and earth, certainly help to reduce God’s anthropomorphism somewhat, but, still, once the ineffable is conveyed to the reader in human language, it becomes less ineffable, reminding one of Homer’s Zeus, especially when the Greek god boastfully speaks to Hera and Athene of his prowess in the presence of the other gods in Olympus, warning the two goddesses not to disobey him: BV<JTl, @Í@< ¦:`< (, :X<@l 6" P,ÃD,l –"BJ@4, @Û6 –< :, JDXR,4"< ÓF@4 2,@\ ,ÆFz ¦< z?8b:Bå. FNä^< *¥ BD\< B,D JD`:@l §88"$, N"\*4:" (LÃ", BDÂ< B`8,:`< J, Æ*,Ã< B@8X:@4` J, :XD:,D" §D(". (Iliad, 8.450-53) 134 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] Come what will, seeing I have such might and hands irresistible, all the gods that are in Olympus could not turn me; and for you twain, trembling gat hold of your glorious limbs or ever ye had sight of war and the grim deeds of war. (Murray 1924: Iliad, vol. 1, 371-72) Compared with the above quotation, Milton’s description is more aweinspiring, and more readily evokes the sublime, which is characteristic of epics. Nevertheless, once God is humanized, the ineffable loses its ineffability. As a matter of fact, the task of presenting God is a Catch 22: to present God, you have to describe Him; once you describe Him, you are no longer presenting God, for God is unpresentable. So far, to my knowledge, of all human attempts in the history of literarure at such a presentation, including the Old Testament, The Divine Comedy is the most successful: while describing God, Dante has succeeded in describing the indescribable; yet, even though the indescribable is described, it still retains its supreme mysteriousness, or, to use the language of paradox, its indescribability; while seeing God and feeling God’s presence, the reader is made to feel that His presence is infinitely far away, and that, in looking at God, he is peeping into infinitude: Ne la profonda e chiara sussistenza de l’alto lume parvermi tre giri di tre colori e d’una contenenza; e l’un da l’altro come iri da iri parea reflesso, e ’l terzo parea foco che quinci e quindi igualmente si spiri. (Paradiso, 33.115-20) In the profound and clear ground of the lofty light appeared to me three circles of three colours and of the same extent, and the one seemed reflected by the other as rainbow by rainbow, and the third seemed fire breathed forth equally from the one and the other. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 485) In these lines, God is presented almost as symbols, devoid of anthropomorphism; yet He can be seen in visual terms: in motion, mysterious, unfathomable, and, even though described, remaining indescribable. For story-telling purposes, Homer’s Zeus or Milton’s Christian God is certainly more interesting, appealing |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 135 more widely to the populace; but if we look for a description which has come closest to God, no other description has ever attained to the level of the above quotation. This is perhaps why Eliot has the following to say about the last canto of the Paradiso: If anyone is repelled by the last canto of the Inferno, I can only ask him to wait until he has read and lived for years with the last canto of the Paradiso, which is to my thinking the highest point that poetry has ever reached or ever can reach […] (Eliot 1951: 251) Eliot is right, for who is more worthy of the above praise than the poet who succeeds in presenting God, the infinitely ineffable, infinitely mysterious, and infinitely unfathomable? In trying to achieve the almost unachievable, to cope with his Catch-22 situation, Dante has to use epic similes in ways foreign to non-Christian Homer and Virgil, ways which are not useful to Milton because of his anthropomorphic approach: Qual è colui che somniando vede, che dopo il sogno la passione impressa rimane, e l’altro a la mente non riede, cotal son io, ché quasi tutta cessa mia visione, ed ancor mi distilla nel core il dolce che nacque da essa. Così la neve al sol si disigilla; così al vento ne le foglie levi si perdea la sentenza di Sibilla. (Paradiso, 33.58-66) Like him that sees in a dream and after the dream the passion wrought by it remains and the rest returns not to his mind, such am I; for my vision almost wholly fades, and still there drops within my heart the sweetness that was born of it. Thus the snow loses it imprint in the sun; thus in the wind on the light leaves the Sibyl’s oracle was lost. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 481) Gradually approaching the ultimate human experience, the experience of 136 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] seeing the Beatific Vision, Dante, with superb mastery, steadily builds up the climax, makes his theoretically incommunicable joy communicable, thereby enabling the reader to share it. To add emphasis to his description, he uses one “cotal” (“such”) and two “così’s” (“thus,” “thus”), very much in the same way as Homer does in his simile cluster in 2.455-83 of the Iliad, when he describes the Achaean army, using a series of “z/ÙJ,’s” or “²ÙJ,’s” (“Even as’s”) and “òl’s” (“even so’s” or “so’s”) with telling cumulative effect. Rising from one climax to another, Dante reinforces the similes with an apostrophe, showing that his similes can interact with other rhetorical devices and thereby increase twofold, threefold… the force of his description: O somma luce che tanto ti levi da’ concetti mortali, a la mia mente ripresta un poco di quel che parevi, e fa la lingua mia tanto possente, ch’una favilla sol de la tua gloria possa lasciare a la futura gente; ché, per tornare alquanto a mia memoria e per sonare un poco in questi versi, più si conceperà di tua vittoria. (Paradiso, 33.67-75) O Light Supreme that art so far exalted above mortal conceiving, grant to my mind again a little of what thou appearedst and give my tongue such power that it may leave but a gleam of thy glory to the people yet to come; for by returning somewhat to my memory and by sounding a little in these lines the better conceived will be thy victory. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 482-83) At this point, Dante has reached the most challenging moment of his entire career as a poet, the moment so well defined by Sinclair: Nowhere else does Dante attain to the greatness of the last canto of the Paradiso, and in it more than any other it must be remembered that a canto is a song. Here his reach most exceeds his grasp, and nothing in all his work better demonstrates the consistency of his imagination and the integrity of his genius. In the culmination of his story he reports his |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 137 experience with such intensity of conviction, in a mood so docile and so uplifted, and in terms so significant of a vision at once cosmic and profoundly personal, that we are persuaded and sustained to the end. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 487)42) At the pinnalce of human experience, Dante’s imaginative power is put to the utmost test; though “his reach most exceeds his grasp,” he is able to call forth all his abilities as a poet, and rises to the supreme challenge as best he can, first using an interjection (“Oh”) and then an apostrophe to emphasize the height of his emotional state: Oh quanto è corto il dire e come fioco al mio concetto! e questo, a quel ch’i’ vidi, è tanto, che non basta a dicer ‘poco’. O luce etterna che sola in te sidi, sola t’intendi, e da te intelletta e intendente te ami e arridi! (Paradiso, 33.121-26) O how scant is speech and how feeble to my conception! and this, to what I saw, is such that it is not enough to call it little. O Light Eternal, that alone abidest in Thyself, alone knowest Thyself, and, known to Thyself and knowing, lovest and smilest on Thyself! (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 485) Then he proceeds to depict the Holy Trinity direct, the ultimate challenge to any poet: Quella circulazion che sì concetta pareva in te come lume reflesso, da li occhi miei alquanto circunspetta, 42) Dante’s awareness of his “impossible mission” is, of course, repeated by the poet himself again and again in the Paradiso, so much so that it has prompted Jacoff to say: “The Paradiso oscillates between statements of its daring originality and confessions of its impossibility, of the ineffability of its vision and of the inadequacies of language to render it. The simultaneous sense of victory and defeat within which the poem comes into being contributes to its paradoxical effects, generating the haunting pathos that subtends the poem’s astonishing accomplishment” (Jacoff 2007: 124). 138 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] dentro da sé, del suo colore stesso, mi parve pinta de la nostra effige; per che ’l mio viso in lei tutto era messo. (Paradiso, 33.127-32) That circling which, thus begotten, appeared in Thee as reflected light, when my eyes dwelt on it for a time, seemed to me, within it and in its own colour, painted with our likeness, for which my sight was wholly given to it. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 485) Finally, at the pinnacle of pinnacles, he enlists the support of another simile to present the supreme moment of his experience and the most profound mystery of the Christian faith: Qual è ’l geometra che tutto s’affige per misurar lo cerchio, e non ritrova, pensando, quel principio ond’elli indige, tal era io a quella vista nova: veder volea come si convenne l’imago al cerchio e come vi s’indova; ma non eran da ciò le proprie penne: se non che la mia mente fu percossa da un fulgore in che sua voglia venne. (Paradiso, 33.133-41) Like the geometer who sets all his mind to the squaring of the circle and for all his thinking does not discover the principle he needs, such was I at that strange sight. I wished to see how the image was fitted to the circle and how it has its place there; but my own wings were not sufficient for that, had not my mind been smitten by a flash wherein came its wish. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 33.485) The function of this simile is not only to convey to the reader in concrete terms how impossible it is to apprehend the Holy Trinity through human reasoning, and how the attainment of the ultimate understanding has to depend on faith, but also to prepare him for the conclusion of the entire Divine Comedy, “the highest point that poetry has ever reached or ever can reach”: |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 139 A l’alta fantasia qui mancò possa; ma già volgeva il mio disio e il velle, sì come rota ch’igualmente è mossa, l’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle. (Paradiso, 33. 142-45) Here power failed the high phantasy; but now my desire and will, like a wheel that spins with even motion, were revolved by the Love that moves the sun and the other stars. (Sinclair 1971: Paradiso, 485) 7. Conclusion In praising Four Quartets, Helen Gardner has the following to say about Eliot and Dante: When we read Four Quartets we are left finally not with the thought of ‘the transitory Being who beheld this vision’, nor with the thought of the vision itself, but with the poem, beautiful, satisfying, self-contained, self-organized, complete. His master in this is not an English poet, but the greatest of European poets of vision: Dante. Although the range and scope of The Divine Comedy forbid us to make a comparison, yet there is a sense in which Mr Eliot can without impropriety be named with Dante. He too has found a ‘dolce stil nuovo’, and the origin of that style he could explain in Dante’s words: Io mi son un che, quando amor mi spira, noto, ed a quel modo che ditta dentro, vo significando. (Gardner 1949: 185-86) By the turn of the last millennium, Eliot was elected the greatest poet of the twentieth century; yet, his stature is still not sufficient to enable Gardner to make a comparison of his Four Quartets with The Divine Comedy; it is clear, then, what “altitude” and “depth”43) – again using Eliot’s words – Dante’s poem, particularly 43) In “Dante,” Eliot has the following words to say about Dante and Shakespeare: “Shakespeare gives the greatest width of human passion; Dante the greatest altitude and greatest depth. They complement each other. It is futile to ask which undertook the more difficult job. But certainly the ‘difficult passages’ in the Paradiso are Dante’s difficulties 140 |Mediterranean Review | Vol. 4, No. 1 [June 2011] its last canto, particularly the conclusion that culminates in the “Qual..tal..” epic simile (Paradiso, 133-41) and in the arguably greatest concluding lines (Paradiso, 33.142-45) of all poetry. The height thus reached is not only beyond Eliot, but also beyond Homer, Virgil, and Milton. Taking Homer as a point of departure, Dante had moved to frontiers beyond Homer and Virgil, which Milton, coming after him, would also find to be beyond his reach. In following and then departing from the Homeric tradition, Dante had broadened the gamut of the epic simile, using it to portray what Homer, Virgil, and Milton were not able to portray, conveying the most tender, most complex of feelings, and the most profound, most mysterious of human experiences, reaching into the ineffable. Inspired by Homer and taking him as a point of departure, Dante has put the epic simile to many more new uses in The Divine Comedy, some of which Homer would not have dreamt of. In literary theory, the epic simile is also called the Homeric simile. In the light of the many new functions of the epic similes in The Divine Comedy, which are beyond Homer, Virgil, and Milton, one is certainly justified to postulate a new class of epic similes: the Dantesque similes. rather than ours: his difficulty in making us apprehend sensuously the various states and stages of blessedness” (Eliot 1951: 265). |Laurence K. P. Wong| Homer as a Point of Departure: Epic Similes in The Divine Comedy | 141 References Alighieri, Dante, Le opere di Dante: testo critico della Società Dantesca Italiana. Ed. M. Barbi, E. G. Parodi, F. Pellegrini, E. Pistelli, P. Rajna, E. Rostagno, and G. Vandelli. 2nd ed. Firenze: Nella sede della Società, 1960. Ariosto, Ludovico, Orlando furioso. 2 vols. 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