Dante's Inferno Women

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Recommended: The role of the woman in history

It is often in the past that women get short credited. In today’s society women were the last to get rights and have often been held from doing somethings. In the past women and been viewed as property of their husband and had no say and have been held on a pedestal. Women have been used to unite kingdoms and women have broken kingdoms apart. Women have played many different roles in the past, and that is what is going to be examined in this essay. What were the roles that women played in The Bible, The Quran and Dante’s Inferno and how do they differ from book to book? The Bible was compiled in approximately 120AD, it was written by many different authors that were inspired by the Holy Spirt. It was written mainly in Israel but some books …show more content…

It portrays women as stereotypical gentile full of emotion and compassionate. "‘In Heaven there’s a gentle lady – one who weeps for the distress toward which I send you, so that stern judgment up above is shattered. And it was she who called upon Lucia, requesting of her: "Now your faithful one has need of you, and I commend him to you." " (Inf. II, 94-111) This shows her crying which proves that she is compassionate. This shows that Beatrice is over whelmed with emotion and without the guidance of Dante she is too distraught to help Dante. “Lucia, enemy of every cruelty, arose and made her way to where I was, sitting beside the venerable Rachel. She said: "You, Beatrice, true praise of God, why have you not helped him who loves you so that – for your sake – he’s left the vulgar crowd? Do you not hear the anguish in his cry? Do you not see the death he wars against upon that river ruthless as the sea?" No one within this world has ever been so quick to seek his good or flee his harm as I…’" (Inf. II, 94-111) In this quote unlike Gentle Mary, Lucia seems to be scolding Beatrice because she is too distraught to help her love Dante who is straying off the path of God. When Beatrice gets her emotions under control she is the one who convinces Virgil to help her save Dante. Dante’s Inferno shows women as both the stereotypical emotion, helpless damsel in destress and a strong powerful figure that can save lives without the help of a

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