14 Oct The Divine Comedy of MY Life
Living in Florence, I am surrounded by such a tremendous amount of art and history. Florence is home to Michaelangelo’s David, Botticelli’s Venus and amazing medieval and renaissance architecture. Dante wrote The Divine Comedy here and poets like Petrarch and Boccaccio led the literary scene after Dante’s death.
Dante Alighieri holds a big presence in the city. There are numerous statues, a museum and references all over the city from restaurant names to street names. When my son was studying here, he studied The Divine Comedy and had a very big influence on his life. So I thought that I would read at least part of it. I went onto Amazon and downloaded the original version of The Inferno, a modern English version and the Cliff notes. After all, I didn’t have a professor to help me out with the hidden meaning and interpretations of the writings.
The Divine Comedy represents the journey of the soul toward God, with the Inferno describing the recognition and rejection of sin. Dante and his guide Virgil travel through the circles of hell which in Dante’s story represent things like gluttony, lust, heresy, violence and greed. For me, I didn’t really connect so much with the original religious and historical meanings of these levels but I began to find some deep connections with my personal and spiritual beliefs and how these things have shown up in my 21st century life. So I have decided to use the writings of Dante’s Inferno as a foundation for some of my writings. I found in each chapter or Canto, that there was one or two sentences that captured my attention and that I feel drawn to write about. There is a very small correlation to the true literary meaning of this amazing classic but it has inspired me to explore and ponder and do a little writing.
Writing is not something I do regularly. I have done a bit of writing for inspirational talks and sermons and have enjoyed the process. It helps me go deep to places that I really like digging around in – the spiritual realm or deeper meaning of life realm. One of my goals for this sabbatical, if you will, is to do some writing in an effort to dig deep into my life as part of the process of figuring out what is next in my life. I am not a professional writer so please forgive my grammatical faux pas, fragmented thoughts and sentences and writing style. My goal is to dig deep, wrestle with the thoughts and ideas, try to put life into perspective and see if I can make sense out of any of it. My writings are as eclectic as I am and as my life is and are as much therapy for me as it is a creative outlet.
