"Perversion of Love"

855 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Dante the divine comedy xxxiii

What was once so pure is now a rarity. In today’s society, half of the marriages in the United States are ending in divorce. A person cannot go to the theater without seeing at least one sex scene on the screen, and the shorter or tighter the outfit, the better. The fine line between loving the whole person, inside and out, to just being sexually attracted to them is being crossed more than ever before. This is what the 21st century calls “normal.” However, one has to question if anything has really changed since the writing of The Divine Comedy. By comparing Dante’s Inferno circle about lust and the 2013 hit movie, Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor, there is a clear parallel between the two. In both stories, the major theme is love; however, both show the perversion of that throughout. Dante Alighieri completed Inferno, a one of three series of The Divine Comedy, in 1314. Inferno lays out Dante’s version of Hell and describes the sinners and their punishments. He separates Hell into nine circles that are arranged in a funnel shape; the greater sins being at the bottom of the funnel. Now, it is no surprise that lust is one of the nine circles of Hell, but it’s of the lesser punishments. On the other hand, Temptation is dealing solely with love and lust. A young couple is broken apart when the wife, who ironically is a marriage counselor, finds a love interest through her job. What seems to be a perfect marriage, with only love for each other, turns into a broken relationship due to lust and deceit. While Inferno has one main theme, each circle of Hell has its own sin, or theme. The sub-themes range from gluttony, suicide, and betrayal. Ironically, the main theme for Inferno and the sin for circle two coincide. As ... ... middle of paper ... ...his day. It was obviously a big enough problem to give it a circle in Hell. This sinful act is on the rise, and not going away anytime soon. Unless the society stops applauding this act, future generations may think love and lust mean the same thing. But that leads to the question, if Dante’s Inferno was rewritten from today’s perspective, would lust become one of the greater sins in Hell? Works Cited Alighieri, Dante. “Inferno.” The Bedford Anthology of World Literature: The Middle Period, 100 C.E.-1450. Ed. Paul Davis, Gary Harrison, David M. Johnson, Patricia Clark Smith, John F. Crawford. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2004. 678-848. Print. Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor. Dir. Tyler Perry. Perf. Jurnee Smollett, Lance Gross, Robbie Jones. Lionsgate, 2013. Film E.L. James. Fifty Shades of Grey. United Kingdom: Vintage Books, 2011. Print.

Show More
Related

  • Divine Justice In 'Sir Gawain And The Green Knight'

    837 Words  | 2 Pages

    In most ancient literature some sort of divine justice is used to punish people's acts in life. This is that case with Dante's Inferno, where the Author categorizes hell in 9 circles. Circle 9 being the lowest sins and punishments as the circles decrease. From the time this was written to now in days many things have changed, and things are not seen the same no more. Back then sins like greed and gluttony were ranked as high sins but now people would probably rank those very low with other things like murder way on top. Yet the basic structure set by Dante remains.

    Read More

  • Use Of Cultural Bias In Dante's Inferno

    1248 Words  | 3 Pages

    Dante’s Inferno is an unparalleled piece of literature where Dante creates, experiences, and explains hell. He organizes it into four different sections, inconvenience, violence, simple fraud, and treachery. These sections are further divided into ten different circles of hell, which are the Neutrals, Limbo, Lust, Gluttony, Avarice and Prodigality, Anger and Sullenness, Heresy, Violence, the Ten Malebolge, and the Frozen Floor of Hell. King Minos passes judgement on each of the people who enter hell, and he then sends them to their designated circle. The organization of Dante’s four sections, his ten circles, and the judgement from King Minos all display forms of cultural bias. This paper will demonstrate possible differences by providing an

    Read More

  • Dante's Divine Comedy - Close Reading of Canto V of the Inferno

    917 Words  | 2 Pages

    Dante Alighieri presents a vivid and awakening view of the depths of Hell in the first book of his Divine Comedy, the Inferno. The reader is allowed to contemplate the state of his own soul as Dante "visits" and views the state of the souls of those eternally assigned to Hell's hallows. While any one of the cantos written in Inferno will offer an excellent description of the suffering and justice of hell, Canto V offers a poignant view of the assignment of punishment based on the committed sin. Through this close reading, we will examine three distinct areas of Dante's hell: the geography and punishment the sinner is restricted to, the character of the sinner, and the "fairness" or justice of the punishment in relation to the sin. Dante's Inferno is an ordered and descriptive journey that allows the reader the chance to see his own shortcomings in the sinners presented in the text.

    Read More

  • The Bond of Communion: An Analysis of the Communal Bonds throughout Dante's Inferno

    1311 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the beginning of the epic, Dante introduces the Lustful. The placement of the Lustful in The Inferno demonstrates the impact Lust has on the severing communal bonds, community, and consequent moral depravity. The Lustful are located in the second circle of The Inferno and their punishment, through Contrapasso, reveals the consequences of breaking trust and love related communal bonds. Beginning his journey into Hell, “[Dante] came to place stripped bare of every light/ roaring on the naked dark like seas/ wracked by the war of winds.” (5.28-29) Immediately Dante establishes the setting of the ...

    Read More

  • Essay on Morality in Dante’s Inferno, Hamlet, The Trial, and Joyce’s The Dead

    2804 Words  | 6 Pages

    In analyzing this gradient of morality, it is useful first to examine a work from early literature whose strong purity of morality is unwavering; for the purposes of this discussion, Dante’s Inferno provides this model. It is fairly straightforward to discover Dante’s dualistic construction of morality in his winding caverns of Hell; each stern, finite circle of Hell is associated with a clear sin that is both definable and directly punishable. As Dante moves downwards in this moral machination, he notes that

    Read More

  • The Role and Function of the Major Monsters in Dante’s Inferno

    1944 Words  | 4 Pages

    ...he Inferno or the story of Hell, another one being the symbols of human’s sins which reinforce the poet Dante’s allegory.

    Read More

  • Where Achilles Would Reside Based on Dante Alighieri's Inferno

    764 Words  | 2 Pages

    It is with the second circle that the real tortures of Hell begin. There lie the most heavy-hearted criminals in all of Hell, those who died for true love. Here, those who could not control their sexual passion, are buffeted and whirled endlessly through the murky air by a great windstorm. This symbolizes their confusing of their reason by passion and lust. According to Dante, ?SEMIRAMIS is there, and DIDO, CLEOPATRA, HELLEN, ACHILLES, PARIS, and TRISTAN? (Alighieri 57).

    Read More

  • Divine Grace and Justice in Dante's Inferno

    1539 Words  | 4 Pages

    Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: Inferno. Trans. Allen Mandelbaum. Notes Allen Mandelbaum and Gabriel Marruzzo. New York: Bantam Books, 1980

    Read More

  • Dante's Divine Comedy - Symbolism in the Punishment of Sin in The Inferno

    4191 Words  | 9 Pages

    ...ion. Dante cites now-historical and mythological figures to exemplify the sins and to make for the better understanding of sin to even the most inept of readers. This work stands alongside The Bible as one of the greatest religious-literary masterpieces of all time.

    Read More

  • Beatrice in Dante's Divine Comedy

    969 Words  | 2 Pages

    Maynard Mack. W.W. Norton & Co., Inc., 1995. 1693 - 1828 -. Alighieri, Dante. Microsoft Encarta 98 Encyclopedia. CD ROM.

    Read More

  • The Weakness of Human Nature in Dante's Inferno

    2210 Words  | 5 Pages

    Alighieri, Dante. "The Inferno." The Divine Comedy. Trans. John Ciardi. New York: First New American Library Printing, 2003.

    Read More

  • Punishments In Dante's Punishment

    1555 Words  | 4 Pages

    Sinners in this section are punished for their lust. The punishment that they have to endure is to be ripped apart by vicious winds (Dante 41). This circle has people included in it that shared a mere kiss with a married person. One lady that is being punished in this section fell in love and kissed her husband’s brother while reading a steamy romantic book (Dante 43). The sinners in this circle are unjustly punished and there should be more fitting punishments. Along with more fitting punishments there should be different levels of punishments based on how severe of lechery was committed. Dante had a lot of different reasons for putting the lustful sin in this order. One reason that he had for doing this is because of self-pity for himself. His love for Beatrice would have placed him in this circle and he realized this. He placed this sin really low on the scale because he knew he was prone to committing this sin. Dante’s own personal experience influenced his decision to put the lustful as only the second circle in the organization of

    Read More

  • The Vaule of Personal Development in The Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri

    1223 Words  | 3 Pages

    Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy, Inferno. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2009. Print.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Dante's Inferno

    1248 Words  | 3 Pages

    Dante’s The Divine Comedy illustrates one man’s quest for the knowledge of how to avoid the repercussions of his actions in life so that he may seek salvation in the afterlife. The Divine Comedy establishes a set of moral principles that one must live by in order to reach paradiso. Dante presents these principles in Inferno where each level of Hell has people suffering for the sins they committed during their life. As Dante gets deeper into Hell the degrees of sin get progressively worse as do the severity of punishment. With that in mind, one can look at Inferno as a handbook on what not to do during a lifetime in order to avoid Hell. In the book, Dante creates a moral lifestyle that one must follow in order to live a morally good, Catholic

    Read More

  • The Divine Comedy

    1698 Words  | 4 Pages

    Throughout the Middle Ages, art and philosophy have been lost in darkness, but with the reintroduction of ideas that came with the Renaissance in Italy, brought about a literary revival. One of the writers that influenced this revival is Dante Alighieri, a 13th century poet from Florence, Italy. His world famous epic, La Commedia, or more commonly known as The Divine Comedy, remains a poetic masterpiece depicting truth and sin. The Divine Comedy, through the journey into the three hells, expresses a universal truth of good versus evil. Alighieri’s life of heartbreak with the influences of other famous poets like Homer and Virgil has affected his writing style, and through reviews by literary experts and their interpretation of Alighieri’s unique use of motifs, The Divine Comedy can be broken down into an epic that expresses a global message of human life.

    Read More

More about "Perversion of Love"

Open Document