For Those in Italy or Who Know People There...


One of my leisure activities during this community quarantine is to re-read The Divine Comedy.  Part of what inspired me to do it was seeing the current plight of Italy, which is the worst-hit by Covid 19 in Europe. I have fond memories of Italy, especially my trip to Dante's hometown Florence. I was thinking that by re-reading Dante's fictional travelogue through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, I could bring back happy memories both of Italy and of studying Dante...and be in solidarity with the Italians as I re-read the most popular work of their most celebrated writer.

Barely have I started reading when I found a message of hope for Italy.

In the story, Dante found himself lost in a "shadowed forest". He tried to get out but his path was blocked sucessively by three beasts: first a leopard, then a lion, and then a she-wolf. Then Virgil appeared to him. Dante begged Virgil to save him from the she-wolf. Virgil told Dante that to get out of his predicament, journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise.

Virgil then explained the vicious nature of the she-wolf, who can only be defeated by a Greyhound, who symbolizes Christ (according to the footnote in the Esolen translation which I am using). About the Greyhound, Virgil says,

"Not land, not lucre will he feed upon,
But wisdom, love, and strength shall be his meat..."

Then Virgil says,

"He will bring health to humbled Italy,
The land for which the maid Camilla died,
And Nisus, Turnus, and Euryalus."

Yes, the word used was "health". In the Italian, "salute".

Reading these lines at a time when Italy is "humbled" and in need of "health -- and with the Philippines facing the same fate -- gives me hope.

Indeed, there is a way out of the "shadowed forest". And the journey does not end with the lowest circle of Hell.


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