Dante's Lyric Poems (Italian Poetry in Translation)
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Dante here sends his canzone to madonna, from whom he requests a reward. Giacomo da Lentini, who is hardly shy with regard to the reward (“guiderdone”) that is expected for his love-service, starts one of his canzoni like this: “Guiderdone aspetto avere / da voi, donna, cui servire / no m’enoia [I hope to earn reward / from you, my fair, in serving whom / I’m not displeased].” In La dispietata mente Dante asks for the solace of “vostra salute [your salutation],” as we read at the end of the first stanza: “piacciavi a lui mandar vostra salute / che sia conforto della sua vertute [would you please send along your salutation,/so it may serve to strengthen my resolve]” (12–13). The reward will be invoked even more explicitly at the beginning of the fourth stanza, where the word “dono [gift]” is used outright: “E voi pur siete quella ch’io più amo / e che far mi potete maggior dono [And yet you are the one I love the most,/the one who offers me the greatest gift]” (40–1).
The unfolding of La dispietata mente is not so much rigorously logical as it is a series of variations on the theme of absence and of the resultant need for the saluto / salute that only madonna can provide. The expression of this need, which acts as a seal on the first stanza, is then elaborated in the following stanza. In the second stanza the obligation of madonna to satisfy the need of her lover is compared to the obligation of a “buon signor [honest lord]” who doesn’t hold back from helping his servant who calls on him, because in defending the servant he also defends his own honour: “ché buon signor già non ristringe freno / per soccorrer lo servo quando ’l chiama,/ché non pur lui, ma ’l suo onor difende [an honest lord will never hesitate / to aid his servant when he calls for help,/since he defends his honour, not just him]” (17–19). The master / servant trope, here probably used by Dante for the first time, is one that he will turn to not infrequently, in the treatises De vulgari eloquentia and Convivio and in the Commedia: from “ma vergogna mi fé le sue minacce,/che innanzi a buon segnor fa servo forte [but his threats made me feel shame, which before a good lord makes a servant strong]” (Inf. 17.89–90) to “Come ’l segnor ch’ascolta quel che i piace,/da indi abbraccia il servo, gratulando / per la novella, tosto ch’el si tace [Like the lord who listens to what pleases him, and then embraces his servant, celebrating the news with him, as soon as he is silent]” (Par. 24.148–50). It is a trope that opens a window onto contemporary society. While in La dispietata mente the comparison denotes a purely social context, in the moral context of the mature canzone Doglia mi reca nello core ardire the metaphor servo / signore broadens to become one of the structural metaphors of the canzone’s ethical discourse, anticipating the final occurrence of servo in the Commedia: “Tu m’hai di servo tratto a libertate [You have brought me from servitude to freedom]” (Par. 31.85).
The third stanza reveals the urgent desire of the lover, who by now has reached the point of addressing madonna directly to ask for the ultimate hope, “l’ultima speme,” that is, her greeting: “E ciò conoscer voi dovete, quando / l’ultima speme a cercar mi son mosso [And this you ought to know, since I’ve begun / my final quest to gain my hope’s reward]” (31–2). The fourth stanza forcefully states that only she is capable of helping him. The fifth stanza explains in minute detail how the “salute” of the woman, once having come to comfort the lover’s heart – “Dunque vostra salute omai si mova / e vegna dentro al cor, che lei aspetta [So let your greeting now be on its way / and come into my heart, which waits for it]” (53–4) – could not enter without being accompanied by the “messi d’Amor [Love’s messengers]” (60).
It has been much discussed whether the woman to whom La dispietata mente is addressed is the first screen-woman in the Vita Nuova or Beatrice herself. I don’t intend to enter here into a discussion that has no empirical basis, but only to indicate the parameters – poetic and hermeneutic, not biographical – within which it is legitimate to formulate the question. The poet of La dispietata mente is experimenting. If on the one hand the woman of La dispietata mente is treated in the old manner, according to the Sicilian practice of service and reward, on the other hand what Dante asks of her is “vostra salute”: a new kind of reward that definitely puts us on the road toward the Vita Nuova. Precisely as in the Vita Nuova, here it is the Guinizzellian motif of the lady’s greeting – Guinizzelli’s lady “abassa orgoglio a cui dona salute [curtails the pride of those she greets]” (Io voglio del ver la mia donna laudare, 10) – that signals the potential transition to the new poetic.
Another example of this canzone’s originality with respect to traditional motifs is provided by Dante’s remarkable variation on the Sicilian topos of the lady painted in the lover’s heart. In La dispietata mente Dante compares the obligation of the lady towards the lover, who carries her image painted in his heart, to the obligation of God towards human beings created in His image.
The topos of the lady painted in the heart is already used with philosophical rigour by Giacomo da Lentini in Meravigliosamente, where it enables an intricate discourse on the relationship between the vero (truth) – in this case the real lady – and the veri-similar, the represented reality akin to the truth – in this case the painted image that represents the lady. In other words, the image of the lady painted by Love in the lover’s heart – “In cor par ch’eo vi porti,/pinta come parete [I seem to bear you in my heart / painted as you appear]” (Meravigliosamente, 10–11) – is already, starting with Giacomo, a metadiscourse on representation itself. This metadiscourse will be important to Dante throughout his poetic itinerary, from his lyrics (see the late canzone Amor, da che convien pur ch’io mi doglia) to the Commedia: for instance, the term “exemplo,” used by Giacomo in Meravigliosamente (“Com’om che pone mente / in altro exemplo pinge / la simile pintura [As one who contemplates / a model with great care / can paint its replica]” [4–6]), will appear in Paradiso.
In one of the extraordinary translationes that characterize Dante’s Paradiso, the image of the lady painted in the lover’s heart becomes the human image painted in the “heart” of the Trinity, that is, our image painted in Christ. The second of the three circumferences seen by the pilgrim at the end of Paradiso, the one that represents Christ, “parve pinta de la nostra effige [seems painted with our image]” (Par. 33.131): “pinta” goes all the way back to Giacomo da Lentini. The word “effige,” which derives from effingere (“to paint”), here replaces the word more typical of the lyric tradition – “figura” (“ ’nfra lo core meo / porto la tua figura [for in my heart I bear / the portrait of your form]” [Meravigliosamente, 8–9]) – and reinforces the importance of “pinta.” To emphasize the linearity of the path that brings the old lyrical topos to Paradiso, we note that the only other use of “effige” in the Commedia refers to the “effige” of Beatrice in Par. 31.77: that is, to the ultimate incarnation of the lyric lady.
Instead of “effige” or “figura,” the word that Dante employs in La dispietata mente is “imagine.” By connecting the Sicilian topos of the painted image of the lady to the theological concept of man made in the image of God, Dante already in his youthful canzone projects the Sicilian topos in a new and unexpected theological direction. We might better call it a “theologized” direction, because it has less to do with correct theology than with the young poet’s wish to impart a theological flavour.
In La dispietata mente the poet states that the suffering of his heart increases when he thinks about how the image of his lady is painted there. The lady ought to care for the heart on which her image is imprinted, exactly in the way that God cares for us human beings because He sees in us the image of Himself. In the verses in which Dante expresses this analogy, note the words “pinta” and “imagine,” words that go back to Giacomo on the one hand and that lead to Paradiso on the other:
E certo la sua doglia più m’incende
quand’io mi penso ben, donna, che voi
per man d’Amor là entro pinta sète:
così e voi dovete
vie maggiormente aver cura di lui,
ché Que’ da cui convien che ’l ben s’appari
per l’imagine sua ne tien più cari.
(La dispietata mente, 20–6)
[And more intensely is its pain inflamed
when I reflect, my lady, that it’s you
inside who’s painted by the hand of Love.
And so indeed you must
devote to its well-being much greater care.
For He from Whom we learn about the good
holds us more dear because we bear His image.]
This passage, in which the theology of the incarnation is grafted onto the Sicilian topos of the image of the beloved painted in the heart, is a distant prefiguration of the conclusion of Paradiso and bears clear testimony to the precocious originality of La dispietata mente.
We have already spoken about the elements in this canzone that anticipate the Vita Nuova. The courtly accents of the canzone go beyond the libello to the Commedia, to two cantos much informed by the courtly world: Inferno 2 and Inferno 5. The two lines that refer to the “cor che tanto v’ama,/poi sol da voi lo soccorso attende [my heart which loves you in its plight,/since it expects no help except from you]” (15–16) will be compressed into a single famous verse in Inferno 2: “ché non soccorri quei che t’amò tanto [why do you not help the one who loved you so much]” (Inf. 2.104). The idea that the lady ought to care for the heart in which her image is painted – “così e voi dovete / vie maggiormente aver cura di lui [And so indeed you must / devote to its well-being much greater care]” (23–4) – anticipates the “tre donne benedette [three blessed ladies]” who “curan di te ne la corte del cielo [who care for you in the court of heaven]” (Inf. 2.124–5). The use of the technical term “preso” in “saetta / ch’Amor lanciò lo giorno ch’io fui preso [the arrow shot by Love / the day that I was made his prisoner]” (57–8) will be recalled in Inferno 5. Continuing the courtly motifs, the fifth stanza elaborates a concept that overturns the central metaphor of the Roman de la rose (and so also of the Fiore), giving to the masculine figure the role that belonged to the lady in those texts: here it is the lover (not the beloved) who has the locked heart, which only she can penetrate.
Characteristic of a much more mature Dante is the vigour of the enjambments accompanied by strong caesuras that we find in the fourth stanza, in the lines “e quelle cose ch’a voi onor sono / dimando e voglio, ogn’altra m’è noiosa [and only things that bring you great renown / I want and need – all else I can’t abide” (44–5) and “ché ’l sì e ’l no di me in vostra mano / ha posto Amore, ond’io grande mi tegno [for Love’s placed in your hands the power to rule / my destiny – which makes me very proud]” (47–8).
One cannot conclude a discussion of La dispietata mente without focusing on the opening and its discourse of memory and desire. The “dispietata mente” of the incipit is the poet’s memory, pitiless (“dispietata”) in that it makes him suffer by “gazing back / on days that are forever lost in time.” Next to the pitiless memory that looks back, to the past, there is the erotic desire that “pulls” him forward, toward the future:
La dispietata mente che pur mira
di rieto al tempo che se n’è andato
da l’un de’ lati mi combatte il core,
e ’l disio amoroso che mi tira
verso ’l dolce paese c’ho lasciato
da l’altra part’è con forza d’amore.
(La dispietata mente, 1–6)
[Pitiless memory, still gazing back
on days that are forever lost in time,
assails my heart upon one side of me,
and love’s desire, which draws me ever toward
the lovely land that I have left behind,
has joined with Love upon the other side.]
Dante sketches here a temporal dialectic in which memory (the past) and desire (the future) battle over the lover’s heart. But on closer inspection, the future and the past are not so divergent. Desire draws him forward, but where to? Precisely toward a future that is somehow also his past: “verso ’l dolce paese c’ho lasciato [toward / the lovely land that I have left behind]” (5). Here we find the idea of time in the form of a spiral – in the form of terza rima – in which beginning and end, past and future, are conjoined. These lines seem adapted to the Aristotelian definition of time that will inform the metaphysics and poetics of the Commedia, according to which time is “a kind of middle-point, uniting as it does in itself both a beginning and an end, a beginning of future time and an end of past time.”31
In this canzone one senses how Dante is already exploring human life from an existential perspective: life is the memory of time that is behind us, the hope that pulls us forward, and the present in which the two intersect. This existential meditation is emblematically distilled at the end of the canzone, in the congedo: “Canzone, il tuo cammin vuol esser corto,/ché tu sai ben che poco tempo omai / puote aver luogo quel per che tu vai [My song, your journey must be brief,/for you know well that little time is left / to carry out what makes you now depart]” (68). As will be the case in the Commedia, the poet of this canzone feels the yoke of time and articulates the link between time and narrative: the journey of the canzone must “be brief” since “little time is left” (66–7).
The existential journey so suggestively framed at the opening of La dispietata mente recalls the poet of the “cammin di nostra vita [journey of our life]” in the first verse of the Commedia. The congedo of the canzone returns to the existential note of the “nuovo e mai non fatto cammino di questa vita [new and never travelled road of this life]” (Convivio 4.12.15): the journey of life laden with memories and desire, the journey of time that on the one hand stretches behind us to the past and on the other pulls us forward to the future.
11 (B L; C 7; FB 13; DR 12)
La dispietata mente che pur mira di rieto al tempo che se n’è andato
Pitiless memory, still gazing back on days that are forever lost in time,
3
da l’un de’ lati mi combatte il core, e ’l disio amoroso che mi tira verso ’l dolce paese c’ho lasciato
assails my heart upon one side of me, and love’s desire, which draws me ever toward the lovely land that I have left behind,
6
da l’altra part’è con forza d’amore; né dentro sento tanto di valore che possa lungamente far difesa,
has joined with Love upon the other side. I feel that I retain so little strength that I am far from mounting a defence,
9
gentil madonna, se da voi non vene: però, s’a voi convene
my lady fair, unless it comes from you. So if you find it apt
ad iscampo di lui mai fare impresa, piacciavi a lui mandar vostra salute
to undertake the rescue of my heart, would you please send along your salutation,
13
che sia conforto della sua vertute.
so it may serve to strengthen my resolve.
Piacciavi, donna mia, non venir meno a questo punto al cor che tanto v’ama,
My lady, may it please you not to fail my heart which loves you in its plight,
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poi sol da voi lo soccorso attende; ché buon signor già non ristringe freno per soccorrer lo servo quando ’l chiama,
since it expects no help except from you; an honest lord will never hesitate to aid his servant when he calls for help,
19
ché non pur lui, ma ’l suo onor difende. E certo la sua doglia più m’incende quand’io mi penso ben, donna, che voi
since he defends his honour, not just him. And more intensely is its pain inflamed when I reflect, my lady, that it’s you
22
per man d’Amor là entro pinta sète: così e voi dovete
inside who’s painted by the hand of Love. And so indeed you must
vie maggiormente aver cura di lui, ché Que’ da cui convien che ’l ben s’appari
devote to its well-being much greater care. For He from Whom we learn about the good,
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per l’imagine sua ne tien più cari.
holds us more dear because we bear His image.
Se dir voleste, dolce mia speranza, di dare indugio a quel ch’io vi domando,
If you were now, sweet hope, to seek delay in granting me the substance of my wish,
29
sappiate che l’attender io non posso, ch’i’ sono al fine della mia possanza.
please understand I can no longer wait, for I have reached the limit of my strength.
E ciò conoscer voi dovete, quando
And this you ought to know, since I’ve begun
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l’ultima speme a cercar mi son mosso;
my final quest to gain my hope’s reward:
ché tutti i carchi sostenere a dosso de’ l’uomo infino al peso ch’è mortale
a man must bear all burdens on his back, unless the weight should pose the risk of death,
35
prima che ’l suo maggiore amico provi, poi non sa qual lo trovi;
before he places trust in his best friend, not knowing what he’ll find.
e s’egli avien che gli risponda male, cosa non è che tanto costi cara,
For if his friend should turn his plea aside, there’s nothing that could come at greater cost,
39
che morte n’ha più tosto, e più amara.
since death comes quicker and has greater gall.
E voi pur siete quella ch’io più amo e che far mi potete maggior dono
And yet you are the one I love the most, the one who offers me the greatest gift,
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e ’n cui la mia speranza più riposa,