L ' I N F E R N O

PUCCIO (VOICE):
INF C25 43-45 / DANTE INF C25 43-45 / KLINE
dicendo: Cianfa dove fia rimaso?; saying: Where has Cianfa gone? At which
per ch'io, acciò che 'l duca stesse attento, I placed my finger over my mouth,
mi puosi 'l dito su dal mento al naso. in order to make my guide stop and wait.
PUCCIO SCIANCATO DEI GALIGAI *---- ? - *---- ? AGE : *-- ?
PLACE./.LANGUAGE ETC
FLORENCE.
DESCRIPTION
VOICE ONLY.
DANTE:
Puccio Sciancato dei Galigai, Florentine.
DANTE SIGNALS TO VIRGIL TO STOP AND STAY QUIET. THEY STARE DOWN FOR A WHILE.
DANTE MAKES NOTES THEN READS THEM TO THE AUDIENCE IN A HUSHED TONE.
DANTE:
INF C25 46-48 / DANTE INF C25 46-48 / KLINE
Se tu se' or, lettore, a creder lento Reader, if you are slow to credit, now,
ciò ch'io dirò, non sarà maraviglia, what I have to tell, it will be no wonder,
ché io che 'l vidi, a pena il mi consento. since I who saw it, scarcely credit it myself.
174
INF C25 49-51 / DANTE
Com' io tenea levate in lor le ciglia, While I kept looking at them, a six-footed serpent,
e un serpente con sei piè si lancia Cianfa darted in front of one of them,
dinanzi a l'uno, e tutto a lui s'appiglia. and fastened itself on him, completely.
INF C25 52-54 / DANTE
Co' piè di mezzo li avvinse la pancia It clasped his belly… with its middle feet,
e con li anterïor le braccia prese; seized his arms with the front ones,
poi li addentò e l'una e l'altra guancia; and then fixed its teeth in both his cheeks.
INF C25 55-78 / KLINE
The rear feet it stretched along his thighs, and put its tail between them, and curled it upwards round his loins,
behind. Ivy was never rooted to a tree, as the foul monster twined its limbs around the other. Then they clung
together, as if they were melted wax, and mixed their colours: neither the one nor the other seemed what it had at
first: just as in front of the flame on burning paper, a brown colour appears, not yet black, and the white is
consumed. The other two looked on, and each cried: ‘Ah me, Agnello, how you change! See, you are already not
two, not one!’ The two heads had now become one, where two forms seemed to us merged in one face, and both
were lost. Two limbs were made of the four forearms, the thighs, legs, belly and chest became such members as
were never seen before. The former shape was all extinguished in them: the perverse image seemed both, and
neither, and like that it moved away with slow steps.
DANTE STOPS. HIS EYE HAS BEEN CAUGHT BY SOMETHING EVEN MORE INTERESTING. OR VIRGIL SEES IT
AND INTERRUPTS DANTE.
VIRGIL:
INF C25 79-81 / DANTE INF C25 79-81 / KLINE
Come 'l ramarro sotto la gran fersa As the lizard, in the great heat of the Dog days,
dei dì canicular, cangiando sepe, appears like Like a flash of lightning,
folgore par se la via attraversa, scurrying from hedge to hedge, if it crosses the
track,