L ' I N F E R N O

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INF C28 22-63 / KLINE
Even a wine-cask, that has lost a stave in the middle or the end, does not yawn as widely, as a spirit I saw, cleft from
the chin down to the part that gives out the foulest sound: the entrails hung between his legs: the organs appeared,
and the miserable gut that makes excrement of what is swallowed. While I stood looking wholly at him, he gazed at
me, and opened his chest with his hands, saying: ‘See how I tear myself: see how Mahomet is ripped! In front of me,
Ali goes, weeping, his face split from chin to scalp, and all the others you see here, were sowers of scandal and
schism in their lifetimes: so they are cleft like this. There is a devil behind who tears us cruelly like this, reapplying
his sword blade to each of this crowd, when they have wandered round the sad road, since the wounds heal before
any reach him again. But who are you, who muse there on the cliff, maybe to delay your path to punishment, in
sentence for your crimes?’ My Master replied: ‘Death has not come to him yet, nor does guilt lead him to torment,
but it is incumbent on me, who am dead, to grant him full experience, and lead him, through the Inferno, down here,
from circle to circle, and this is truth, that I tell you.’ When they heard him, more than a hundred spirits, in the ditch,
halted, to look at me, forgetting their agony, in their wonder. After lifting up one foot, to leave, Mahomet said to me:
‘Well now, you who will soon see the sun, perhaps, tell Fra Dolcino of the Apostolic Brothers, if he does not wish to
follow me quickly, down here, to furnish himself with supplies, so that the snow-falls may not bring a victory for the
Novarese, that otherwise would be difficult to achieve.’ Then, he strode forward to depart.
INF C28 64-93 / KLINE
Another, who had his throat slit, and nose cut off to the eyebrows, and had only a single ear, standing to gaze in
wonder with the rest, opened his wind-pipe, that was red outside, all over, and said: ‘You, that no guilt condemns,
and whom I have seen above on Latian ground, unless resemblance deceives me, remember Pier della Medicina, if
you ever return to see the gentle plain, that slopes down from Vercelli to Marcabò. And make known to the
worthiest two men in Fano, Messer Guido, and Angiolello, also, that unless our prophetic powers here are in vain,
they will be cast out of their boat, and drowned near Cattolica, by treachery. Neptune never saw a greater crime,
between the isles of Cyprus and Majorca, not even among those carried out by pirates, or by Greeks. Malatestino,
the treacherous one, who only sees with one eye, and holds the land, that one, who is here with me, wishes he had
never seen, will make them come to parley with him, then act so that they will have no need of vow or prayer to
counter Focara’s winds. And I said to him: ‘If you would have me carry news of you, above, show me and explain
who he is that rues the sight of it.’
INF C28 94-117 / KLINE
Then he placed his hand on the jaw of one of his companions, and opened the mouth, saying: ‘This is he: and he does
not speak. This outcast quelled Caesar’s doubts at the Rubicon, saying that delay always harms men who are ready.’ O
how dejected, Curio seemed to me, with his tongue slit in his palate, who was so bold in speech! And one who had both
hands severed, lifting the stumps through the dark air, so that their blood stained his face, said: ‘You will remember
Mosca too, who said, alas, “A thing done, has an end” which was seed of evil to the Tuscan race.’ ‘And death to your
people’ I added, at which he, accumulating pain on pain, went away like one sad and mad. But I remained behind to
view the crowd, and saw a thing, which, without more proof, I would be afraid to even tell, except that conscience
reassures me, the good companion, that strengthens a man, under the armour of his self-respect.
♫INFERNAL
INF C28 21
THE MUSIC HAS GIVEN DANTE HEART. HE HOLDS UP AN IMAGINARY HEAD./.LANTERN,
THAT OF BERTRAN(D) DE BORN.
BERTRAND DE BORN (C 1140-1215): LORD OF THE CASTLE OF HAUTEFORT (ALTAFORTE), NEAR PÉRIGORD, WHO SPENT HIS
LIFE IN FEUDAL WARFARE, ENDED IT IN THE CISTERCIAN MONASTERY OF DALON, NEARBY. HE WAS ONE OF THE MOST
INDIVIDUAL OF THE PROVENÇAL TROUBADOURS. ONE OF HIS FINEST POEMS (‘SI TUIT LI DOHL ELH PLOR ELH MARRIMEN’) IS HIS
SONG OF LAMENT ON THE DEATH OF PRINCE HENRY PLANTAGENET, THE ELDER BROTHER TO RICHARD COEUR DE LION &
NAMED THE ‘YOUNG KING’, THE SON OF HENRY II OF ENGLAND, AND TWICE CROWNED IN HIS FATHER’S LIFETIME.
BERTRAND WAS ACCUSED OF STIRRING UP THE STRIFE WHEREBY HENRY II REFUSED TO GRANT THE SOVEREIGNTY OF
ENGLAND OR NORMANDY TO HIS SON, AND WHICH LASTED UNTIL THE YOUNG KING’S DEATH IN 1183. (SEE EZRA POUND’S
POEM ‘NEAR PÉRIGORD’ FROM LUSTRA, AND HIS TRANSLATION OF THE LAMENT ‘PLANH FOR THE YOUNG ENGLISH KING’ IN
PERSONAE: ALSO HIS TRANSLATION OF ‘DOMPNA POIS DE ME NO’US CAL’ IN LUSTRA, WHERE BERTRAND MAKES ‘A BORROWED
LADY’, ‘UNA DOMPNA SOISEUBUDA’ OR ‘UNA DONNA IDEALE’, OUT OF THE BEST CHARACTERISTICS OF THE NOBLE WOMEN HE
KNOWS, AND ITS COMPANION PIECE ‘NA AUDIART’ IN PERSONAE.)
DANTE:
INF C28 118-120 / DANTE INF C28 118-120 / KLINE
Io vidi certo, e ancor par ch'io 'l veggia, I saw it clearly, and still seem to see, a headless
un busto sanza capo andar sì come trunk, that goes on before, like the others,
andavan li altri de la trista greggia; in that miserable crew,
INF C28 121-123 / DANTE
e 'l capo tronco tenea per le chiome, and holds its severed head, by the hair,
pesol con mano a guisa di lanterna: swinging, like a lantern, in its hand.
e quel mirava noi e dicea: «Oh me!». It looked at us, and said: “Ah me!”.