Introduction:
Dante’s Divine Comedy is probably one of the greatest literary works ever written. Combining an incredible imagination with an exact and descriptive state of affairs with regards to historical and social commentary, the work has inspired many to create their own vision of Hell and to throw the relative people into it. A 21st century Inferno is a topical discussion and lends itself to considerable imagination since there is no shortage of evil around us with pride and avaraice being among the main sins practised with impunity.
The beginnings of Dante’s Inferno
Dante’s Inferno begins on Maundy Thursday in 1300 with the narrator who is Dante himself and who is in his mid-thirties, an age which he deems as halfway along life’s inexorable path. He is lost in a dark wood and faces three beasts that are a lion, a she wolf and a leopard. He then ends up falling into an inexorable abyss which ends up being Hell before being rescued by the poet, Virgil who claims to have been sent by Dante’s lover Beatrice and together they begin an incredibly descriptive and fantastic journey into the underworld.
The system of punishment they encounter is rather radical and appropriate since it based on the principle of poetic justice with those who sought to predict fortunes only able to walk forward and backward unable to see what is ahead of them since they attempted to predict the future in a manner which was forbidden. This maxim is based on the fact that the soul eventually chooses his/her fate through manifest destiny.
I have chosen the following characters in my version of the Inferno. The person from Nevada but who is actually from Reno is current Senator Harry Reid who is well known for his inane pursuit of power and whose arrogance knows no bounds. Another person from outside Nevada but who resided in the United States was Byron de la Beckwith who was so consumed with hate and vengeance that it drove him to murdering for the colour of someone’s skin. The third sinner on an international level is the former Chinese dictator Mao Tse Tung who killed millions of his countrymen in a terrifying series of purges and disastrous political decisions.
Analysis and comparisons
The first classified sin is that of murder which has Byron de la Beckwith as its principal sinner. The punishment for this grave sin would be to let Beckwith drown in a sea of black filth but as soon as he is about to expire, he is pulled out again to observe how the family of Medgar Evers (Beckwith’s victim) are facing the challenges of the death of their father.
Secondly we continue with the deadly sin of Gluttony which we can ascribe to Mao Tse Tung who was well known for his insatiable appetite not just for eating but also for acquiring fabulous riches and wealth. The following lines describing the glutton Ciaccio are appropriate here.
In the summer of 1958, Krushchev visits China and backs Mao completely by saying any nation which was an enemy of China was considered to be an enemy of the Soviet Union. In order for the huge water projects to work, thousands of villagers were moved to large units which lead to farm collectives of up to 20,000 households. These communes were run in a military fashion where everything was collectivised. There were communal dining rooms, collectivised land, collectivised labour and a work point system was used to calculate rewards. In some communes, money was abolished and famine surfaces in many parts of the country. As Mao wanted to satisfy exports as well as home industries, the work in the countryside increased and famine spread further.
The first three lines describe the intolerable ugliness of Hell with all its regression and lack of redemption. Perhaps the one factor which makes Hell such an undesirable place is the way there is no capability to atone for what has been done in this world and the incessant torture of remorse haunts one for eternity. Dante makes a reference to envy which is one of the seven sins and it is here where he puts this particular person who is made to suffer the eternal sin of envy for eternity. It is indeed a powerful statement in many ways depicting the horror of Hell in all its glory.
Dante then turns to Chiacco who was a glutton and here one has to empathise with the glutton’s lot who is covered by rain and without hope of eating anything forever. It is a terrible punishment but one which is completely attuned to what happened in Ciacco’s life where he gorged himself continually and constantly over all sorts of food with the resultant consequences.
Dante’s description of the states of being of those who committed the seven deadly sins is harrowing to say the least. He manages to convey a deathly glory to all proceedings which makes one’s hairs stand up on end without much hope for anything which is to come. The way Dante divides Hell into circles is also instructive although there is a certain amount of basis in the way he does things as his enemies are more often than not thrown into the innermost and deepest recesses of Hell. These sins are also part and parcel of the sufferings which are endured in hell and as much as possible, those who are present in their respective circles are made to suffer according to their sins and vices.
In fact gluttony is described as a ‘pernicious’ sin making one understand that the punishment for that is something even more terrible without any form for atonement. The comparison with envy is also instructive in that both are sins of relative lightness when compared to killing and stealing but Dante perhaps has other things in mind when describing these sins. Naturally enough all boils down to how we interpret the statements but what is really brought across at this stage is the power to convince mortals of the horrors and terrors of Hell.
The next sin which should fit the bill for Senator Harry Reid is pride. Dante throws those who are proud in a pit tearing at each other and my punishment for Reid and his ilk would be to freeze him in a state where he can observe the disastrous decisions he took without being able to intervene. This is a similar allusion to Charles Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol’ where the spirits have lost all power to intervene.
Next is the sin of avarice where there are those who covet that which belongs to others. In this category I would put most socialites but particularly Kim Kardashian whose revolting sense of indecency dominates all that goes before her. She will be placed in a small room which is around six feet square and will be left completely naked with no worldly possessions as she is made to observe all her fellow socialites flaunting their wealth.
Wrath is the fifth ranked sin in my Inferno and affords a punishment which is definitely horrifying in its nature. Those who are wrathful must receive a cup of water which makes them sleep and as they dream they are faced with the consequences of their actions. The former President Lyndon Johnson is placed in this category for he never controlled his anger with occasionally grave consequences to all around him.
Sloth is the sixth ranked sin and here those who are lazy are left to sink in their own slime and filth as they face destitution. They are tied to the floor unable to move and without any hope of getting up to change their situation due to their laziness. The character who I have placed in this rank and circle is the millionairess Paris Hilton who is lazy and has called poor people derogatory names since they are poor.
The final sin is lust and the one person who is lustful and who could not care less about his women was President John F Kennedy. Although lately idolized as a martyr, it is also true that he fornicated with women on a regular basis and was even known to have had several liasons at the same time. His punishment would be to be denuded of his sexual prowess whilst made to face the women he betrayed but again their looks and beauty cannot be touched.
My idea of Dante’s Inferno today would be a series of prison rooms with all the respective punishments meted out according to sin. The characters chosen are primarily politicians and celebrities since their sins are far greater than others since they have power and wealth and have used them badly over their lives. This vision of Hell is based on remorse without the power to change the past which makes the suffering all the greater. Although it may seem cruel and insensitive, the vast excesses of ill-used political power, mass murder and excess capitalism deserve a punishment that is far greater than that meted out here.
Works Cited:
Dante: The Inferno from ‘The Divine Comedy’; Cantos I-XXXIV
