Heartfelt thanks to Me and some other guy . . .

Dante Was a Vampire?

My cyberpal Dario Rivarossa has recently published a study of Dante as a 'fantasy' writer, illustrating the book with images like the one seen above, which I've lifted from Dario's website, where he offers some thanks for assistance:

With heartfelt thanks to Prof. Carter Kaplan for believing in this project, and to Prof. Horace Jeffery Hodges for the editing.

I must profess to taking pleasure in being recognized . . . as a professor! My office door also calls me that. Perhaps Carter Kaplan's door does the same for him? Like me, he has blogged on this book, albeit with more to say! Anyway, you can order this book at Amazon.

Or you can simply fantasize about what it says and reveals . . .

Terrance Lindall: "Satan’s Peculiar Grace" in The Bottomless Bottle of Beer?

Terrance Lindall
'Peculier Grace'?

Wikipedia

My friend Terrance Lindall, artist and intellectual, has prepared a lecture, "Satan's Peculiar Grace," for the 14th Annual WAH Salon Art Club Show, which has its opening reception on January 26, 2013, from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. at the Williamsburg Art and Historical Center (WAH Center). In that reception, Lindall will offer a literary analysis of the character of Satan in John Milton's Paradise Lost and related literature, as we see here in his preliminary lecture notes:

Literature and art are fecund with the character of Satan. In Faust he inspires a scholar, who, in pursuit of knowledge, seems to be ensnared. In Balzac's The Fatal Skin, Benét's Devil and Daniel Webster, and Stoker's Dracula, we see that Evil incarnate has a peculiar, even attractive grace. Why are stories of these Satanic characters MORE interesting than stories about goodly characters? Milton had that problem. Paradise Lost was far more interesting than Paradise Regained and Dante's Inferno far more compelling than Dante's Paradiso. You can see at the WAH Center on January 26th where we discuss this issue one of the latest works of art revolving around an oily and persuasive Satan. They are my own illustrations for Horace Jeffery Hodges' BOTTOMLESS BOTTLE OF BEER that was just published two weeks ago. Indeed you will see that the devil therein has a peculiar grace as he attempts to ensnare a guileless naif.

Lindall's lecture is farther-reaching than just my story, but he'll have on display some of his illustrations for my story, The Bottomless Bottle of Beer, which can be seen in part here and can be ordered here.

The expression "peculiar grace" derives not from Jeffrey Lent's novel of that name, A Peculiar Grace, but from John Milton's Paradise Lost 3.183-4, where God declares:

Some I have chosen of peculiar grace
Elect above the rest; so is my will . . .

Those chosen of peculiar grace have a divinely selected role to play in God's purposes, a theme taken up by Stephen M. Fallon in Milton's Peculiar Grace: Self-Representation and Authority, in which Fallon argues that Milton applied the category to himself, considering himself "blameless" and "perfect" (page x). Those of us who are not John Milton might consider this a peculiar pride on Milton's part, a pride shared with Satan, so perhaps Milton really was "of the devil's party," as William Blake suggested.

Lindall draws specifically upon Fallon's book, at least for the lecture title, but takes up the other side of Blake's equation and applies "peculiar grace" to Satan himself, as though Satan has a divinely chosen role to play, a suggestion that leads into such debatable soteriological territory as that of felix culpa (i.e., happy fall).

Lindall seems to play with another meaning of "peculiar grace" with respect to my story. That 'peculiar' grace Lindall refers to wouldn't happen to be an allusion to something that I borrowed from Neil Gaiman, a Shoggoth's Old Peculiar, would it?

The complete lecture notes to Lindall's talk can be read here.

Poetry: Sight or Sound?

Poetry

Lee Chang-dong

(Image from Poetry: The Movie)

In yesterday's blog post, Dario Rivarossa and I briefly discussed the nature of poetry, partly sparked by a contrast that Dario sees between Dante and Milton, which he summarized:

Briefly: in Dante, words describe colors.

In Milton, words create them (so to speak).

Not knowing Italian, I can't judge about the validity of this contrast, here's how I stated my basic view:

Visionary poetry must be sounded to be poetry. Is there any poetry that is purely visual?

Some aspects are, of course . . . the shape of a poem on the page, which has even occasioned poems structured to look like butterflies, altars, and whatnot.

But poetry is fundamentally about sound, right?

After writing those words, I happened to read a New York Times movie review by Manohla Dargis of Lee Chang-dong's recent film Poetry: "Consider an Apple, Consider the World" (February 10, 2011). In this film, a teacher explains poetry to a classroom of aspiring poets: "he holds up an apple and talks about seeing":

The importance of seeing, seeing the world deeply, is at the heart of this quietly devastating, humanistic work from the South Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong. Throughout the story, the teacher, a bespectacled man with an easy manner, will guide the students as each struggles to write a single poem, searching memories and emotions for inspiration. "Up till now, you haven't seen an apple for real," he says in that first class, as the film cuts to a student, Mija (Yun Jung-hee), sliding into a seat. "To really know what an apple is, to be interested in it, to understand it," he adds, "that is really seeing it." From the way the camera settles on Mija it's evident that he could substitute the word apple for woman -- or life.

Isn't this serendipitous? Dario and I are discussing poetry in the context of Dante and Milton, whose two poems both stemmed from differing perspectives on a woman biting into an 'apple.' And the movie appears to speak for Dario's view, that poetry is basically about seeing . . . but I'll have to sound out the movie to see what I think about that. And more broadly, beyond poetry, about what it says concerning art:

At one point, Mija asks her poetry teacher with almost comic innocence, "When does a 'poetic inspiration' come?" It doesn't, he replies, you must beg for it. "Where must I go?" she persists. He says that she must wander around, seek it out, but that it's there, right where she stands. In truth, there is poetry everywhere, including in those who pass through her life, at times invisibly, like the handicapped retiree (Kim Hira) she cares for part time, a husk of a man whom she will at last also see clearly. The question that she doesn't ask is the why of art. She doesn't have to because the film -- itself an example of how art allows us to rise out of ourselves to feel for another through imaginative sympathy -- answers that question beautifully.

Is that what art is about? Aesthetics as the art of feeling for others through imaginative sympathy? Isn't that more to do with ethics? Or do the two intersect here?

Anyway, for those interested, the trailer for the film, along with relevant information about story and cast, is viewable here.

UPDATE: Dario informs me that I misread him, clarifying that his "view is that poetry is basically about sounds." Hence, he and I are closer than I had thought.

The Newer Model Geryon of 1902

Some readers will recall a series of posts on Dante's Geryon: 1. "Dante's Geryon and a 'Serpentine' Adam?"; 2. "Joseph Anton Koch: Geryon"; 3. "Speaking of Gustave Doré's Geryon . . ."; and 4. "Rivarossa's Jeffryon." Those who do recall will also perhaps recall that the image on the left is Gustave Doré's Geryon, borrowed from Wikipedia. But what of the image on the right? It comes to me by way of Dario Rivarossa, a translator and illustrator in Italy who continues to come across delightful finds and who tells us:

while viewing one of my books on sci-fi illustration, I found this drawing that -- in my opinion -- was surely inspired by Dante's Geryon. It refers to a book published in 1902, "L'automobile volante" (The Flying Car) by Luigi Barberis, whose name is absolutely no more remembered one century later. The artist was a certain Fortunino Matania, another 'unknown' guy. Since I haven't read the book, I cannot say whether any clear hint at Geryon was meant by the writer too.

And for those interested in pronouncing "Geryon," Dario tells us:

Btw, I just discovered that my dictionary includes the word "Geryon": it gotta be pronounced with a hard G, as you supposed.

Good to know. By the way, Dario is right about Luigi Barberis, for I've found only a handful of online references to this writer and his book, but my friend was surely speaking tongue in cheek about Fortunio Matania, for this artist has a Wikipedia entry. Since he was born in 1881, he would have been a young artist of merely 21 years when L'automobile volante appeared in in 1902. Was he inspired by Dante's Geryon? Several of his later works of illustration suggest an interest in the art and literature of earlier eras, as well as an interest in historical topics: Six Stories from Shakespeare, retold by John Buchan (1934); Raphael and Stella. A Baker's Delight Immortalised in Paint, by Matania (1944); Great Stories from History, ed. Edward Horton and Peter Shellard (1970). Since he died in 1963, that third book was either posthumous or a later edition.

Matania became very popular in the English-speaking world, as he settled in Britain and grew famous for his early depictions of the Great War, among other works of art. According to Wikipedia, he began contributing to the British woman's magazine, Britannia and Eve, soon after it was launched in 1929 and continued contributing for nearly 20 years! There's an amusing anecdote about his work for this magazine:

Generally he managed to include one or two voluptuous nudes in each picture. "The public demanded it," says Matania. "If there was no nude, then the editor or I would get a shower of letters from readers asking politely why not."

I infer from this that British women weren't the only ones looking through Britannia and Eve. Their husbands must have furtively perused its pages and secretly sent those disappointed 'fanny' letters.

Rivarossa's Jeffryon

Jeffryon

Dario Rivarossa

Inspired by my posts on the creature Geryon from Dante's Inferno, Dario Rivarossa has drawn a creature that he calls "Jeffryon" and made it available for viewing on ImageShack, but somebody must have objected, for it was removed with the message:

403 Forbidden
This file removed due to violation of ImageShack Terms of Service or by user request.

I suppose that Dario didn't realize that as with the Muslim Prophet Muhammad, depictions of my image are objectionable. Dario wasn't very happy:

huh... are they crazy??!! they removed the picture from ImageShack because of a "violation" or "by user request"!

Even the Vatican has restored the original Judgement by Michael Angel...

Dario therefore sent me the image, which you see above (courtesy of approval by me for nonprofitable use), along with a description:

Geryon + manticore + Sin + Lilith, and a clear quotation from a painting by Magritte.

The Magritte allusion might imply that "This is Not a Jeff" in which case, the image is merely a depiction of me, not the genuine article (especially since the "quotation" is from a different Magritte). That's comforting, I guess, but I have to admit that Mr. Rivarossa is an artist who has looked deeply into my unfumigated soul -- or my nephesh, as he might put it:

the Jewish word that is usually translated as "soul" was nephesh, that literally refers to "throat, breathing."

At any rate, I'm flattered to have been immortalized in this 'nephetishistic' work of art.

Speaking of Gustave Doré's Geryon . . .

Sea Robin

(Image from Seabird Sport Fishing)

I believe that I've located the inspiration for Gustave Doré's depiction of Geryon! As we see in the image above, Virgil and Dante have just encountered this winged, serpentine creature, which can apparently vary its size, much like the fallen angels, for compared to the Doré illustration, it seems to have miniaturized its enormous bulk . . .

I learned of this denizen of the deep, the sea robin -- also known as the "gurnard" (Geryon - gurnard, mere coincidence?) -- in yesterday's hard copy of the International Herald Tribune, but we find it online from two months ago in a New York Times article, "The Ugliest Catch" (August 14, 2010), by Lawrence Downes:

For the unfamiliar: A sea robin is a rusty-colored fish with a skull-helmet of a head, bulging eyeballs, a maw like a wide-mouth jar, winglike fins and whiskery appendages that it uses to prowl the bottom, where it snaps up baited hooks, earning a very short visit to the boat or dock. The visit is short because fishermen take one look and throw it back.

The article describes the "second annual Garbagefish.com fishing tournament," which Downs informs us is "run by some rude and witty New Jersey fishermen . . . dedicated to the proposition that all edible fish are created equal -- that the way to salvage the dignity of catching sea robins and not striped bass is to pretend you meant to do that."

I guess we now know what to do if we actually catch the genuine Geryon . . .

Joseph Anton Koch: Geryon

Geryon

Joseph Anton Koch

(Image from LCM)

In yesterday's blog entry, I posted an image of a creature rather like a manticore, except that the face is more human than leonine and the body lacks hind legs. This creature, called "Geryon," is described by Dante in his Inferno 17.1-18 and later illustrated by Gustave Doré in the image borrowed yesterday, but drawn incorrectly by Doré through his addition of bat wings, a flaw pointed out by Dario Rivarossa, who the supplied the link for today's image, an illustration by Joseph Anton Koch, who drew it without those webbed wings, thank goodness.

This perhaps has little to do with the putative serpentine Adam in Paradise Lost, though it might have some connection to the figure of "Sin" in Milton's epic, but I'm caught up in grading and have too few moments for scholarly investigation this morning . . .

Dante's Geryon and a 'Serpentine' Adam?

Geryon

Gustave Doré

(Image from Wikipedia)

In a couple of recent posts, I've suggested that not just Eve, but Adam himself is somewhat 'Serpentine' in Paradise Lost. The first post was on September 27, 2010:

Milton also portrays Adam as serpentine. Early in the passage where Eve is being tempted by Satan, she is told by the 'Serpent':

Amid the Tree now got, where plenty hung
Tempting so nigh, to pluck and eat my fill [ 595 ]
I spar'd not, for such pleasure till that hour
At Feed or Fountain never had I found. (PL 9.594-597)

(Thomas H. Luxon, ed. The Milton Reading Room, September, 2010.)

Now in fact, the 'Serpent' possessed by Satan never did take even a single bite from the Tree of Knowledge, but note the Devil's claim: "I spar'd not" to "eat my fill." As with the verbal parallel between the 'Serpent' being "sated at length" and Eve being "satiate at length," a verbal parallel links "eat my fill" with Adam in his own temptation scene, specifically, when he is described as eating:

. . . Adam took no thought,
Eating his fill . . . (PL 9.1004-1005)

(Thomas H. Luxon, ed. The Milton Reading Room, September, 2010.)

Adam is thus precisely as 'serpentine' as Eve, for this verbal parallel from PL 9.595 comes just in advance of the verbal parallel to Eve in PL 9.598. Milton is implicating both Adam and Eve as Satanic in the same foreshadowing passage of PL 9.594-601, for the Fall has parallel effects upon both of them, as the second eating of the fruit 'iterates' the first (cf. PL 9.1005-1006) and thereby 'completes' the original, deadly sin (cf. PL 9.1003-1004).

The second post was from October 2, 2010, a commentary on an article by Christopher Eagle:

Professor Eagle's point is that Satan had first learned to misuse language by exploiting a 'fallen' disjunction between appearance and reality, that Satan had then used the Serpent to mislead Eve through this disjunction, and that a Satanic Adam is now acting like the 'Serpent' in his verbal abuse of Eve by means of this disjunction. The result is that words now "assume this covering-over of their proper and primary signification . . . , not only by meaning figuratively, but by meaning obscurely."

As noted there in that latter post, I shall need to think about this argument. Here's a thought to consider: we ought to distinguish between becoming 'Serpentine' and becoming 'Satanic', at least in principle, though the two can coincide. More on that some other time.

Fellow Miltonist Dario Rivarossa read the remarks on Eagle's article and suggested that I look at the figure of Geryon in Dante's Inferno 17.1-18 for a possible source of Adam as 'Serpentine', so I've checked it out:

"Ecco la fiera con la coda aguzza,
'Behold the beast with pointed tail, that leaps

che passa i monti e rompe i muri e l'armi!
past mountains, shatters walls and weapons!

Ecco colei che tutto 'l mondo appuzza!"
Behold the one whose stench afflicts the world!'

Sì cominciò lo mio duca a parlarmi;
was how my guide began.

accennolle che venisse a proda,
Then he signaled to the beast to come ashore

vicino al fin d'i passeggiati marmi.
close to the border of our stony pathway.

E quella sozza imagine di froda
And that foul effigy of fraud came forward,

sen venne, e arrivò la testa e 'l busto,
beached its head and chest

ma 'n su la riva non trasse la coda.
but did not draw its tail up on the bank.

La faccia sua era faccia d'uom giusto,
It had the features of a righteous man,

tanto benigna avea di fuor la pelle,
benevolent in countenance,

e d'un serpente tutto l'altro fusto;
but all the rest of it was serpent.

due branche avea pilose insin l'ascelle;
It had forepaws, hairy to the armpits,

lo dosso e 'l petto e ambedue le coste
and back and chest and both its flanks

dipinti avea di nodi e di rotelle.
were painted and inscribed with rings and curlicues.

Con più color, sommesse e sovraposte
So many vivid colors Turk or Tartar never wove

non fer mai drappi Tartari né Turchi,
in warp and woof or in embroidery on top,

né fuor tai tele per Aragne imposte.
nor were such colors patterned on Arachne's loom.

The Italian text is from Divina Commedia edited by Giorgio Petrocchi and published by Mondadori (Milan, Italy, 1966-67), which I've borrowoed from the Princeton Dante Project, which supplies the English as well.

Is this a source for Milton's hints of a 'Serpentine' Adam? The emphasis upon "fraud" would fit the misuse of language noted by Eagle, and Geryon is certainly serpent-like. There are similarities as well to Milton's depiction of "Sin," for which Milton drew on the depiction of "Error" in Edmund Spenser's Fairie Queene, though both "Sin" and "Error" are both feminine in these depictions. At any rate, I don't find clear dependence of a 'Serpentine' Adam, so I leave it as a mere possibility.

Back to grading . . .

Wave from the Grave?

"Pope John Paul II waving from beyond the grave"

But isn't the Pope supposed to be in Heaven?

(Image from Daily Mail, 10/15/07)

According to a report by Nick Pisa for Britain's Daily Mail, some of the pious are convinced that the fiery image above is the late pope, John Paul II, waving from beyond the grave:

This fiery figure is being hailed as Pope John Paul II making an appearance beyond the grave.

The image, said by believers to show the Holy Father with his right hand raised in blessing, was spotted during a ceremony in Poland to mark the second anniversary of his death.

Details appeared on the Vatican News Service, a TV station in Rome which specialises in religious news broadcasts.

Service director Jarek Cielecki, a Polish priest and close friend of John Paul II, travelled to Poland after hearing an onlooker had photographed the image.

Father Cielecki said he was convinced the picture showed the former pontiff.

"You can see the image of a person in the flames and I think it is the servant of God, Pope John Paul II," he said.

The pictures were being broadcast continuously on Italian TV and also posted on religious websites, some of which crashed as thousands logged on to see for themselves the eerie figure formed by the flames.

The bonfire was lit during a service at Beskid Zywiecki, close to John Paul's birthplace at Katowice, southern Poland, on April 2 -- the second anniversary of his death.

Hundreds had attended the ceremony. Gregorz Lukasik, the Polish man who took the photographs, said: "It was only afterwards when I got home and looked at the pictures that I realised I had something.

"I showed them to my brother and sister and they, like me, were convinced the flames had formed the image of Pope John Paul II.

"I was so happy with the picture that I showed it to our local bishop who said that Pope John Paul had made many pilgrimages during his life and he was still making them in death." (Nick Pisa, "Is this Pope John Paul II waving from beyond the grave? Vatican TV director says yes," Daily Mail, October 15, 2007, h/t Wonderdog)

The photo is certainly eerie (though I wonder if the image would have looked humanlike from other angles), and the 'apparition' appearing on the second anniversary of the pope's death is certainly an interesting coincidence, but if I were one of the pious believers, I'd be a bit troubled by the iconography of a fiery pope flaring up from beyond the grave in the flames of a bonfire.

After all, isn't Dante said to have put a pope or two in the flames of Hell?

Personally, I don't think that Hell is where Pope John Paul II ended up, and on this point, I assure you that I'm not being ironic, so I'll just take this fiery image as a trick of the flames from a particular perspective.

Far more eerie and difficult to explain is the image below, taken by a local resident of Wem, England, Tony O'Rahilly, on the 19th of November, 1995, as Wem Town Hall burned to the ground:

"Photo of the Wem Ghost?"

Copyright: Tony O'Rahilly / Fortean Picture Library

(Image retrieved from BBC, 10/18/07)

In the BBC article, "Is this a photo of the Wem ghost?", Dr. Vernon Harrison, former president of the Royal Photographic Society, is quoted as stating that "The negative is a straight forward piece of black-&-white work and shows no sign of having been tampered with." He remains skeptical, however, and has "suggested that the image of the girl may just be a convenient trick of the light -- with smoke, flame and shadow creating an optical illusion at the moment the photographer took his picture." A different online article, by Val Hope of The Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena, backs up Dr. Harrison's view in stating that when "a photo was obtained of the same spot taken from another angle it was clear that a random collection of burning debris was making up a simulacrum" ("ASSAP History: 'Research'"). The photograph does not appear on their website, unfortunately, so I have to take Hope's word for it, but I wonder how the other photo was proven to have been taken at the same instant.

I recall seeing the original O'Rahilly photo not long after it was taken. I was living in Australia in 1996 and read an article in The Australian that took the same skeptical position as Dr. Vernon Harrison and explained how the optical illusion could have occurred. I was persuaded by the writer, but even he admitted that the image was eerie to see.

And as my elder brother once punningly, if imprecisely, reminded me: "There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy, Horatio."

O felix culpa!

Dante's Purgatorio 18

Gustave Doré

O felix culpa?

(Image from Wikipedia)

I'm still reading Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy's tome, Out of Revolution, and occasionally lurking at the discussion at Spengler's website.

Recently, I read something that Rosenstock-Huessy wrote about All Souls' Day. Now, having grown up Baptist in the almost-entirely-Protestant Ozarks, I didn't experience -- or even encounter -- many traditional Christian Holy Days, but I've gotten more interested in them as I delve further into Medieval things.

My understanding is that on All Souls' Day, Christians offered up prayers for those dead who were undergoing the purging fire of Purgatory and that while the practice of such intercession dates back very far, only in the 11th century was a general intercession by the Church established, specifically by St. Odilo of Cluny (c. 962-1048/9), the fifth Benedictine abbot of the powerful Medieval Abbey of Cluny, in what is now in east-central France, near Mâcon, in the region of Bourgogne.

The Abbey of Cluny, commonly referred to as "Cluny," was responsible only to the pope and played an important role in the 11th century reform of the Church that increased the papacy's power.

Anyway, here's what Rosenstock-Huessy wrote:

The day of All Souls, proclaiming purgatory to be the stage for all contemporaries, has separated us forever from the jubilant glee of the ancient church. In a minute correction, this change was expressed most strikingly by the Cluniacs: At Easter time, everybody was happy in the experience of resurrection, and evil itself was redeemed since God can make use of evil as well as of good; in recognizing the restoration of the world, the old church sang: "O happy fault that produced this redeemer!" Cluny resented this slighting of our human guilt: the prayer "O felix culpa" was suppressed. (Rosenstock-Huessy, Out of Revolution, pages 513-4)

For this bit of information, Rosenstock-Huessy cites Cardinale Schuster, O.S.B., Liber Sacramentorum, Vol. IV (1930), p. 49, and p. 18, Note 1 ... just in case anybody's interested (Rosenstock-Huessy, Out of Revolution, page 514, note 4). Rosenstock-Huessy considers this Cluniac reform to be one of those revolutions through which the modern West has developed. He seems to regret it, though.

On the felix culpa, Rosenstock-Huessy cites an old Medieval poem found in Middle English (one about which I've previously blogged):

Adam lay ybounden
bounden in a bond;
Four thousand winter
thoughte he not too long;
And all was for an apple,
An apple that he took,
As clerkes finden
Written in their book.
Nor had the apple taken been,
The apple taken been,
Nor had never our Lady
A-been [of] Heaven Queen.
Blessed be the time
That apple taken was.
Therefore we moun singen
"Deo Gratias."

He tells us that he has quoted this poem "with the spelling modernized, from Sloane Ms. 2595 (according to Bradly Stratmann early 14th century) as printed in Early English Lyrics, E. N. Chambers and F. Sedgwick, p. 102, London, 1907" (Rosenstock-Huessy, Out of Revolution, pages 513-4, note 3).

Rosenstock-Huessy italicizes the line "Blessed be the time" to emphasize the happy fault appealed to in the old belief of our felix culpa.

Cluny may have been powerful in its purifying efforts, but old ideas die hard, as demonstrated by this 14th-century poem, recorded some 300 years after St. Odilo of Cluny had 'officially' established All Souls' Day.

And its influence has never quite been completely lost, for even that great Protestant poet Milton felt its influence...