Cherry Ji

Dantes Inferno
Professor Angelo Mangini
5 May 2015
The Woman
In A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle one Sherlock Holmes meets his match
in the sharp and savvy Irene Adler whom he hitherto forth refers to as The Woman because he
considers her to be the pinnacle of her sex. Mr. Holmes only makes the pleasure of Irene Adlers
company during one instance, in one short story, but she remains a large influence on the rest of
Sherlock Holmess life. She remains as a concept, a symbol, and distinctly separate from the rest
of her sex as an exception, almost an exemption to the limitations of man. While Beatrice is not
by any means the only woman Dante ever meets, to a certain degree, she is. He never considers
another woman for a moment to be even remotely as important as Beatrice is and she is the
cynosure of the image of Dantes life so much so that she plays a pivotal role in both his Vita
Nuova and his most famous work the Commedia. However, his depiction of his beloved Beatrice
in the Vita Nuova is very different from her character in the Inferno, the first of the trio of
sections in the Commedia. Her transformation is by no means random, but weighed down with
implication as to how Dante saw her, saw himself through her, and his perceptions of life and
love, virtue and sin. The change is drastic but controlled and as she guides Dante through his
journey, at first through Virgil, and then in person as he reaches Paradiso, we begin to see the
reflections of Dante the Poet in Dante the Pilgrim and the blurring of lines between poet and
muse and therefore the true importance of Beatrice, both as a character and a real life inspiration
to Dantes works. Her differences between the Vita Nuova and the Inferno is much less a

difference so much as it is a transformation of sorts, going from one point to the next,
transforming from a being in actuality to an entity both symbolic and divine.
The first and most obvious distinction between Beatrice as she is portrayed in the Vita
Nuova versus the Inferno is that the Vita Nuova, while being fictional, to a degree, is more
autobiographical than the Inferno. It is a collection of poems Dante wrote and comments on
himself, and therefore retains much of hisDante the Poetown voice and emotions. While
scholars have argued over whether or not Beatrice was real or more allegorical (as most of his
other works are), the fact itself is not actually terribly relevant because the importance lies in the
actuality of Beatrice for Dante himself, because to him, she was most definitely real, whether in
imagination, fantasy, or fiction, she was and is one of the most important figures in Dantes life.
Beatrice in the Vita Nuova acts as a kind of proxy for Dantes love. In the first poem, Beatrice
appears with Amore who seemed to me to hold my lady wrapped in a cloth sleeping after
Dantes second encounter with Beatrice, nine years after their initial meeting (III, 3-7, 10-12).
The appearances of Amore deserve attention as they for it reveals the methodology of Dantes
meticulous decision making in marking both Beatrice with Amores appearances and also vice
versa. For the most part, Amore only appears in Dantes dreams as opposed to his fantasies,
though he uses the verbs apparire and vedere instead of fantasia or sonno visione which
he usually uses to mark a dream scene. This draws an interesting middle-point between his
distinctions of dreams and actual seeing because the modes by which Beatrice appears should
also be noted with care. While the first two instances of their meeting, she appears in actuality
(or in the reality of the Vita Nuova), the third instance plays compliment to the second meeting,
because it happens right after their second meeting. Beatrice seen sleeping in the arms of Amore
could be interpreted in a variety of different ways, but this might mark the first time Beatrice

takes on a central role in Dantes life. It also seems to identify her as the sole possessor of his
love, because to Dante, she is engulfed in the arms of Amore, in the arms of Love, and is
therefore the center of his concept of love, inexplicably tied to it from then on. Thus marks the
beginning of Beatrices symbolic transformation into the heart of Love itself for Dante as
opposed to Beatrice object of his affections.
Though Beatrice now represents a large part of what Love means to Dante, Dantes
treatment of Amore is still left ambiguous and slightly confusing. Playing counter to Beatrice, for
whom Dante makes clear distinctions between seeing, fantasy, and dreaming, the so-called
character of Amore is not treated with such care. In fact, there is not instance in which Amore
is considered in any way, shape, or form to be anything other than a figment of his imagination.
In fact, the only time Dante uses the word imaginazione is in reference to when Amore control
of Dantes soul; this plays counter to the four uses of apparire and vedere he used when
describing Beatrice previously. The ambiguity with which Dante refers to Amore hitherto after
lampshades the actuality of Beatrice and her increasing solidity as a figure in Dantes life even as
she dies shortly after the first few poems. Her death marks yet another pivotal point in Dantes
perception of herat this point, Dante specifically refuses to treat her death. Perhaps it is the
utter devastation that ravaged Dante at the news of her death, perhaps it is simply that to Dante,
her death remains philosophical in the sense that she remains alive in his mind and indeed
through his writing (as Shakespeare and many others have immortalized their loves via their
writing). At this point, Beatrice obtains a level of divinity that is not entirely comparable to the
level she reaches by the end of Paradiso, but it is the beginning, a preface, if you will,
foreshadowing what she will become in the Commedia. The Guinizellian (the philosophical
conception of love) nature of Dantes description of her death (the assumption of her presence in

Heaven) and her final, actual vision in Heaven plays parallel to her development in the
Commedia throughout all three sections.
Thus far, the representation of Beatrice has been the center of the entire text of the Vita
Nuova, but it is complex and difficult to define at places. It seems almost confused, with all these
forces complimenting and supplementing her actual existence. She exists in three states and it is
not always clear in which sense Dante sees her as he often does not explicitly define how he
sees her, whether in actuality, in dream, or in fantasy, the latter two being especially difficult to
separate. On top of that, there is her complex relationship with Amore, linked, but distinct. She
shifts between human and something more on many occasions and leaves a kind of fevered,
confused impression on the reader. Thus far, we are still not sure as to what kind of role she will
play definitively in Dantes life or the rest of his works. This could be attributed to the mixed
nature of Dantes writing in the Vita Nuova. It is fictional but heavily autobiographical and
therefore the facts we are presented with shift between reality and his perception of reality. This
shifting perspective allows us to see just how much of an effect Beatrice had on Dante as a
person. She has become associated with Love, the kind of love that is untainted by lust or desire,
the kind that is pure and good and eternal, but at the same time evokes a kind of fervor in Dante
that is not only startling but difficult to suppress, as demonstrated by his desperate need to be
alone after she salutes him in the street. The level of attention he gives her at this point borders
on obsession on almost Nabokov levels of disturbing, considering they have only interacted on a
handful of occasions. However unsettling and confusing her constant shifting from one state to
another seems to be in the Vita Nuova, her association with Love is unquestioned and comes to
full fruition in the Commedia, though which we gain a deeper understanding of why it was
necessary to paint Beatrice in such a light before the Commedia begins.

To understand the nature of Beatrice and her representation as Love in the Inferno, we
must first understand Dantes basic definition of love. In Canto V, Dante comes across Francesca,
who was killed by her lover. This scene, set in Dantes ever-present conception of love as a force
that gives life, does not seem to make much sense. Francesca died by the hands of her lover; love
in this case, is decidedly not life-giving. Love in this canto is first described as a force that
[leads] us to ones death (v, 105). However, Guido Cavalcanti, the author of Donna me prega
sheds some light on the reasoning behind this. In his work, Cavalcanti explicitly defines love and
desire as forces that replace and indeed overtake reason. In Dante the Pilgrims encounter with
Francesca, it is clear that love is the commanding force of their conversation, to the point that the
world love itself becomes heavy with the intensive repetition. Here, the Cavalcantian
definition of love appliesthat love which absolves no one beloved from loving does not
exculpate the sins of the beloved (v, 112). Through Francescas dialogue, it is as if, ultimately,
her love could absolve her of her infidelity. This is set in high contrast to the Love that Beatrice
is associated with because when Dante speaks of Beatrice and his love for her, it is always with
the undertone of reason, and indeed he makes the point of explicitly defining his love for her as
coupled and even synonymous with reason. The distinction between the love that Francesca
speaks of and the Love that Beatrice embodies thus far gives us an idea of Beatrices role in
Dantes Infernoshe is the pinnacle of Love, pure and true, while the love that other people
share is somehow shaded with desire which is decidedly not as pure as the Love Dante has for
Beatrice, or the Love that she seems to symbolize.
At this point, Beatrice has already began her transformation from being a mere character,
to something else entirely. Metaphorical as she might have been speculated to be in the Vita
Nuova, this is where her true metaphorical purpose begins. Canto 5 is where Dante begins to

explore the possibility of transcendence through love salvific mission of the word with
Francescas story playing counter to the Love for Beatrice (Barolini, 70). But instead of simply
leaving it at that, Dante constantly reminds us of the opposing side by slipping in Cavalcantian
undertones. This kind of contrast comes to a crescendo in Paradiso and the ending of Donna me
prega with Dante aligning love and life, Cavalcanti love and death, and Beatrice is Dantes
definitive proof, at least for him. Francescas encounter with Dante the Pilgrim is an isolated case
in which there are no historical records that correlate with Dantes specific portrayal of her and it
is only after his portrayal that rumors began to crop up about her life and death. This suggests
that Dante created Francesca for the sole purpose of playing foil to Beatrices character and
purpose. Francesca is, in this context, Cavalcantis definition of love incarnate and the direct
antithesis to Beatrice. And as one of the first people Dante meets in hell, she helps establish
Beatrices importance in the rest of the Commedia and Inferno.
For the most part, Beatrices actual presence in the Inferno is negligible. She exists as a
sort of motivation for Dante rather than solid character of any kind. She is the light at the end of
the dark tunnelquite literally as she becomes his guide through Paradiso after the Inferno and
Purgatorio. But for the time being, her name is that of the Holy Ground, and is not mentioned in
the Inferno; it is too precious and pure to speak in Hell. This kind of transcendent state that
Beatrice inherits marks an important stage in her transformation and she inhabits this state for
most of the Inferno. She exists as an idea and a conceptsomething that keeps Dante from being
completely lost through his journey. She is both of this Earth and not; she is both and neither.
She is even though Beatrice as a historical figure is long gone. She gains a kind of eternalness in
the Inferno that she does not quite have in the Vita Nuova. It is interesting to note that while
Dante actively acknowledges that the lessons from his teacher, Brunetto Latini on how man can

make himself immortal through literature goes against the then-current Christian values of only
being able to obtain that kind of immortality through divine means, but Dante still manages to
immortalize Beatrice, both in the physical text as a divine being in Heaven at the end of
Paradiso but also in real life as she lives on in his text. There is a very specific brand of irony at
work when taking Beatrices very singular position in Dantes texts.
At this point, the differences of the portrayal of Beatrice between the Vita Nuova and the
Inferno is as follows: in the Vita Nuova, she is real, she is at least somewhat solid in her
conception. She is actual. She lives, she interacts with Dante, she dies, and she ascends to
Heaven (in assumption). She is directly related to Amore though she is still a distinct and
separate entity in and of herself. It is clear that Dantes love for her is strong and at times
incredibly turbulent in nature, even though he insists that it is pure and unadulterated by desire or
lust or any such thing. She is very much solid. In the Inferno, she is less solid, more of a presence
than an actual person. She serves a very specific purpose and there is less description of her. The
whole of the Vita Nuova was devoted to her description and how she made Dante feel, how she
made him see with new eyes this New Life, but in Inferno, she exists as a wholly transcendent
entity, right on the border of divine. Virgil speaks of her as the gentle lady [in Heaven]one
who weeps for the distress towards which I send you which sets her very clearly, from the
beginning in the realm of Heaven already, even as Dante is just entering Hell (ii, 94-111). She is
set up on a pedestal as one of the three divine women who give Dante the power and position to
be the chosen one to experience Hell while still alive, the other two being the Virgin Mary and
Saint Lucia. Putting Beatrice on the same level as these divine figures establishes her as
specifically trans-mortal. To Dante, she is equivalent to the Mother of Jesus himself, in Heaven
with all the other divine figures. She is a symbol more than a character in Inferno (though that

changes during Paradiso). Because as Dante makes his way through Hell, there is no doubt that
the world is a dreary place, full of sinners and punishments, rains of fire and endless, aimless
torture. In a place of indefinite suffering, Beatrice exists as the sole reminder to Dante that there
is still good to be found, that there is light at the end of the seemingly endless, dark tunnel. She
exists as proof of the goodness and grace of God himself.
So even though she was more real in the Vita Nuova, it could be argued that she is
actually more solid in the Inferno because of her status as a divine figure. While alive, she is still
confined to the limitation of humans but as a divine figure, she is unquestionable and the
unwavering symbol of good, of love and grace, of the promise of purity. While she is the center
of the Vita Nuova, her rarity in the Inferno makes her even more precious. Her name is not even
mentioned but her presence is constant and reassuring, even as a reader, to feel and know that not
all is lost, not all is darkness and sin and suffering. Her slow transformation from human to
divine can be seen more clearly in the Vita Nuova as she lives, and then dies, and then is implied
to be in Heaven and though the Vita Nuova is by no means a definite prequel to the Commedia,
in certain aspects, it can be seen as such. When tracing Beatrices change, she reaches the end of
her transformation into the divine at the end of the Vita Nuova and begins in that state as the
Commedia begins. Her change could also be seen as a reflection of Dantes feelings towards her
throughout his life. Even though they met when they were nine and then again nine years later,
while she was alive, she was just that alive, and human. However, her death is perhaps the one
event that triggered Dantes desperate need to make her real once more, and in fact, to make her
more real than she ever was before. He fixates on his meetings with her, on the instances when
she acknowledge him and has dreams and fantasies about her, waxes poetic about her, has
feverish visions of her until she becomes that immortal figure in his life, until he has built her

into an idea of pure Love and goodness. It seems strange and off putting in that kind of
summation, almost mad, but as Aristotle said, There is no great genius without a mixture of
madness.
In this light, the whole of her role in the Inferno makes sense. As much as the Commedia
is a metaphorical representation of Dantes own journey through his life, so is the figure of
Beatrice parallel to what she had been for Dante during his life. And in a broader scope, what she
embodies for each and every single Christian on their pilgrimage towards Heaven and salvation,
she is the beacon of hope and the reminder to not lose faith in the goodness of God because as
little as she is mentioned in the actual text of the Inferno, she is still cited as the reason that Virgil
is acting as Dantes guide. By neglecting to help him who loves you so thatfor your sake
hes left the vulgar crowd she becomes linked with the persuasive word and thereby herself
convinces Virgil to guide him to her (ii, 94-111). And, by aligning her pity with Dantes
motivation to bloom as little flowers and comparing her compassion to the white sun that
strikes the flowers and urges them to grow, Dante connects her to emotion and softness, while
men are associated with being overly logical and hard (ii, 127-138). He simultaneously
insinuates that she is the reason that he has strayed from the good path, but also that she has sent
him a guide for his journey, and so that she is the reason for his journey. Without her, there would
be no journey, no pilgrimage, and by proxy, no way to reach Heaven. She has to play that dual
role of both the orchestrator and the motivation to finishit is for her and because of her that the
Commedia exists. Through her transformation in Dante the Poets life, she has become the reason
his pilgrimage is deemed necessary. He has to literally scale the entirety of Hell and the
Purgatory before he sees himself as worthy enough to enter her divine realm and see her again.

They say that behind every great man is an even greater woman, and how true that holds,
even in Dantes time. Beatrice makes the incredibly transformation from human, to muse, to
divinity throughout Dantes Vita Nuova and Commedia, but through that, we see not only her as
an entity grow and become something more than what she was, but also Dante the Poet and
Dante the Pilgrim grow through her. She acts as both reason and inspiration, both human and
symbol to Dante, in every single sense. She changes as Dante does; first she is associated with
Love as Dante falls in love with her, but she quickly outgrows the human confines of love to a
more pure and almighty form, one that is not marred by the strains of desire and lust. Her Love is
that of rationality and clarity and thus, she continues to grow in importance until she reaches her
place among the divine in the Commedia. And, though her presence is less apparent in the
Inferno (in fact she is barely mentioned, a sharp contrast to her constant presence in the Vita
Nuova), she is somehow more solid in her overarching presence, overlooking Dantes entire
journey as Virgil guides him through Hell and Purgatory, and then to her in Heaven. By the end
of the Commedia she becomes the embodiment of the goodness of God and proof that goodness
is still possible in a world full of sin and sadness. In the end, she is meant to inspire, regardless of
who she was in life, because it is only through Dantes eyes does her being rise to this level of
the divine. Her change throughout Dantes most well-known works gives us insight unto Dantes
own spiritual journey as well as how he wishes for all Christians setting out on their spiritual
pilgrimage to remain hopeful and faithful in the goodness of God, because the light exists, and
for Dante, it exists in the form of Beatrice.

Works Cited
Alighieri, Dante, and John Ciardi. The Inferno. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers UP, 1954. Print.
Alighieri, Dante, and Mark Musa. Vita Nuova. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1973. Print.
Barolini, Teodolinda, and Wayne Storey. Dante for the New Millenium. New York: Fordham UP,
2003. Print.
Barolini, Teodolinda, and Wayne Storey. Dante for the New Millenium. New York: Fordham UP,
2003. Print.
Barolini, Teodolinda. Dante and the Origins of Italian Literary Culture. New York: Fordham UP,
2006. Print.
Hollander, Robert. ""Vita Nuova": Dante's Perceptions of Beatrice." Dante Studies, with the
Annual Report of the Dante Society 92 (1974): 1-18. JSTOR [JSTOR]. Web.