The Divine Comedy (canto II): Rings of Hell

Cartography and cosmology merge and mingle in Dante's Divine Comedy; not to mention allegory, mythology, social critique and farce. The story begins on the eve of Good Friday in 1300, Dante himself is led through the various quarters and precincts of The Inferno by Virgil. The Divine Comedy is both a poetic look at the medieval christian view of heaven and hell, as well as a heavily veiled commentary on the politicians and power brokers of the world circa 1300-1350. It has also been suggested that Dante was depressed, to use our contemporary diagnosis, perhaps even suicidal. The writing of the Divine Comedy was then a literary journey of his own soul back to the light of the divine. Or he was hoping for a screenplay adaptation with up front points.

Hell was apparently found inside the earth and comes divided into nine rings and believe it or not-an antechamber! Sort of a pre-hell. There reside those cherubs who took no sides in the Rebellion of Angels (you remember the revolt against God led by Satan). Apparently, there were a fair number of angels who chose to wait out the conflict to see who won; this is never a good strategy in an allegorical war, in fact, it is the one way to get screwed no matter who wins. So these wishy-washy angels hang out just across the river from hell with the souls of humans who did nothing noteworthy in their lives and have neither good nor evil marks on their personal tabula rasa.

Sin it seems is punished metaphorically in or near the Inferno. The punishment is real, assuming you buy the entire cosmology here but the particular slings and arrows are apportioned by infraction and carry their own significance. In the anteroom of hell, for instance, the hesitant angels and ethical couch potatoes are stung my hornets and wasps which serve as metaphors for the sting of their consciences. It's poetry remember.

Following the waiting room of hell, we encounter another well known image, the river Acheron (not the river Styx that's another waterway of the Inferno) and the boatman Charon to carry the damned to hell or in this case the tourist Dante and his dead poet Virgil. Charon puts up a fiery fuss over taking a live human into hell, but Virgil utters some words of wisdom ("This is not the human you are looking for...) and they are allowed to be ferried cross the mersey or some such.

Next, the first actual ring of hell: Limbo.

Temporarily Out of Service

Due to circumstances beyond our control and a deluge of tryptophan. The Circles of Hell, particularly the one concerning gluttony, will be delayed one more day. Tune in tomorrow when MSG swollen fingers will attempt to return to issues of portent and blah-blah-blah.

And now Wii Frisbee golf and then second breakfast.

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art credit: M. Cammer-turkey carcass, charcoal and carbon black on paper

A tinta não "pegou"

Olá Amigos!

Hoje tive um probleminha em um de meus trabalho com uma cliente.

Pela primeira vez neste período de 4 anos na área como tatuador, encontrei essa cliente que de certa forma me deu dor de cabeça, pois fiz uma tattoo de 7cm X 9cm (uma carpa), contornei o desenho sem problemas. Porém na hora de colorir o desenho nunca vi coisa igual, a pele da cliente não segurava a tinta de forma alguma. Eu usei uma haste com 12 agulhas soldadas flat alternada e tintas da Masters Ink e Electric Ink. Na hora do preenchimento e sombreado degradê, parecia até a eu estava trabalhando sem tinta alguma na biqueira. A tinta não penetrava na pele de jeito algum. Pela primeira vez fiquei até confuso e não entendia o que estava acontecendo. Foi a tattoo mais demorada de se conclui que eu já fiz. Uma tattoo que normalmente levo 01:30h nesta gastei quase 04:00h para consegui a pintura desejada. Eu gostaria de saber se já aconteceu algo semelhante com algum dos tatuadores e qual foi a melhor forma de se resolver uma situação como esta???

Desde já agradecemos a atenção!

Um Abraço!
Welton Ricardo
Equipe Bangalô Stúdio

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Gobble

Before moving on to a dissertation on Dante's Rings of Hell, as promised in my last post. I thought I would take a moment to reflect on the season, which for me thus far has meant a bit of driving between relatives homes and planning a variety of holiday meals, including of course...
Snopes or not, Benjamin Franklin did propose the turkey as the national bird of the USA.
Surfing the web can uncover the results of someone else's many wasted hours.
Damn good looking bird, you have to admit. For my vegan readers I refer to the turkey above, for the rest of us--the one below.
Wishing all of you in the U.S. a happy turkey day and pointing out that a word is just a word but context is everything!

Matheus Falcão, Dragão na Costela, 176

¨Bom me chamo matheus e estou enviando fotos da minha tattoo porque foi a primeira que fiz e a maior também.

Um dia estava vendo uma revista de tattoo e na hora em que eu bati o olho nessa eu me apaixonei. Juntei uma grana e resolvi fazer. Fiz em duas sessões, uma para contornar e outra para colorir.

Valeu muito a pena, espero que gostem.¨

Matheus Falcão

The Divine Comedy (canto I)

This post is not a reflection on my life, the presidency of Barack Obama, the state of humanity nor the entropy of the universe. Tis only that once again I have noticed the influx of a certain metaphor into my consciousness; mere happenstance? synchronicity? who knows? However, in the past week or so I have encountered references far outside any explanatory statistical relevance to Dante, the Rings of Hell, Purgatorio and the Divine Comedy. At some point the light bulb went on and I wondered just what I still knew or had long forgotten about this masterwork of 12th century poet Dante Alighieri.

So I danced around the interwebs first focused on the dauntingly inviting "Rings of Hell" and then onto the complete work of The Divine Comedy and Dante himself. Time to share some of what I uncovered. I'm not really sure how far I am will pursue this line of inquiry, we certainly are going to wander through the nine rings of hell, whether we get to seven to ten levels of Purgatory or ultimately to Paradise, well stay tuned.

Let's begin with some general story notes and observations. The Divine Comedy is presented in three parts: Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso. Basically, those translate to hell, purgatory and heaven. There are many more contemporary literary and social references to The Inferno then there are to either Purgatorio or Paradiso, which has got to say something about our collective darker side. I know I was first drawn to the whole Rings of Hell imagery. Purgatory is so, well, intermediary; sort of a spirtual cul de sac. Paradiso, on the other hand, just never came up in my initial cerebral percolation. Where the hell is some good old fashioned ecstasy when you need it!

(Sorry. I bit distracted there for a moment. Self reflection don't ya know. Meanwhile, back in Hades...)

Speaking of the infamous Rings. Dante viewed hell as a series of ever more vehement levels of sin, depravity and punishment. You will see when we explore those circles in detail that his reflection of medieval european sensibilities was not so far from those that vex our humanoid morality today. Some things just never change, despite the best efforts of the sane and the profane.

Before encountering The Inferno, I would point out that Dante lived roughly seven hundred years ago (approx. 1265-1321), therefore a great deal of what we think we know about him comes from later exegesis of his life and work. Mind you the first biography of Dante was written some two hundred years after his death, so all of what we think we know is influenced by historical writing and commentary. Dante was a poet and scholar of the late Medieval period but our first full biography of his life was written two centuries later in the near full flower of the Renaissance. That being said, an additional five hundred years have not diminished the impact of The Divine Comedy still considered the poetic masterwork of Italian literature. How many "great" authors of today will we be reading in 2709?

One final introductory mote of interest. Dante called his original work Comedy (Commedia), the 'Divine' was not appended until nearly two hundred years after his death. While it would appear on the surface that a major work constructed on the prevailing ecclesiastical themes of heaven and hell would be considered a religious work; in fact, Dante was using the religious metaphor to criticize and ridicule the political and religious figures of his time. The veil of the heaven-purgatory-hell imagery was both a literary vehicle as well as some social protection from the slings and excommunicatory arrows of his satirical targets.

Next time: a few Rings of Hell

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Tem gente que ama tatuagem e também ama uma boa comida. Para marcar estes amores nada melhor que uma boa, colorida e suculenta tatugem em seus corpos. Wraps, tortas, doces, pizza, picolés, ovos, milho, sorvetes e pirulitos são pequenas amostras das guloseimas do quadro Crazy Tattoos.

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