In Chapter IX Love appears in abject form as the symbol of the protagonist-lover’s superficial dalliance with the screen-ladies. There are two details in the description of this figure which were passed over in the first discussion of Chapter IX and which are very important for establishing a link with the preceding vision. First, the pilgrim-Love is carrying the lover’s heart in his hand, taking it, he says to the new screen-lady. Now, in Chapter III it is clearly the Greater Love that comes on stage with the young lover’s heart in his possession; but I suggested that in the central episode of this vision the lover had given it over to the Lesser Love—who, in Chapter IX, still has it. The second link with the vision of Chapter III is of a different sort: in the second quatrain of the sonnet (“Caval-cando l’altrier …”)10 following the prose narrative, the figure of Love, who will advise the lover about the second screen-lady, is described as having suffered a change: “Ne la sembianza mi parea meschino,/ come avesse perduto segnoria.” The “segnoria” that has been lost is the majesty of the radiant figure who presented himself to the lover saying, “Ego dominus tuus,” in his first appearance. In the chapter that follows, the lover earnestly puts into practice the god’s advice: the first of two times he will carry out the suggestion of the Lesser Love.
Nine chapters after his first appearance the Greater Love returns to the stage of the Vita nuova, again waking the lover, again speaking Latin. This time there is no vague reference to “molte cose” spoken by Love which the lover did not understand. Apparently he said to him only two things in Latin, then turned to Italian to rebuke him sharply. The peremptory words, with the sudden shift from Latin to Italian, serve a purpose ultimately similar to the “lapses of time” indicated in Chapter III, only that whereas the latter allow for something unexpected to happen, for something to emerge out of the interval of time, the rebuke in Italian comes as a sharp announcement of change already on its way.
The obvious connection between the Lesser Love who will come to dominate the stage in Chapter XII, and the pilgrim-Love of Chapter IX has already been pointed out—a connection insisted on by Love himself (“… la donna la quale io ti nominai nel cammino de li sospiri”). I would add that there is also a connection between this figure in Chapter XII, now giving elaborate instructions as to the means of winning back Beatrice’s favor, and the one in Chapter III who, in the central episode, was intent on seducing Madonna: that Love who forced the lady with all his art to eat the lover’s burning heart.11 And it is the influence of the Lesser Aspect that continues beyond the vision described: in the ballata, concluding the chapter, which the lover dutifully wrote at this figure’s command. And it is surely in order that the influence of the Lesser Love should prolong itself beyond the vision that the poem closing the chapter represents this fulfillment of Love’s worldly advice rather than sets forth a “recapitulative” version of the vision—the only vision of Love’s appearance not described in verse, as was pointed out but not explained in the first part of this essay.
But it becomes clear in the following chapter that the first part of the vision, in which the Greater Love had spoken words the lover did not understand, had also made a strong impression on him. For this chapter is devoted to a “battle of the thoughts” about the nature of love:
Appresso di questa soprascritta visione, avendo già dette le parole che Amore m’avea imposte a dire, mi cominciaro molti e diversi pensamenti a combattere e a tentare, ciascuno quasi indefensibilemente; tra li quali pensamenti quattro mi parea che ingombrassero più lo riposo de la vita. L’uno de li quali era questo: buona è la signoria d’Amor e, però che trae lo intendimento del suo fedele da tutte le vili cose. L’altro era questo: non buona è la signoria d’Amore, però che quanto lo suo fedele più fede li porta, tanto più gravi e dolorosi punti li conviene passare. L’altro era questo: lo nome d’Amore è sì dolce a udire, che impossibile mi pare che la sua propria operazione sia ne le più cose altro che dolce, con ciò sia cosa che li nomi seguitino le nominate cose, sì come è scritto: Nomina sunt consequentia rerum. Lo quarto era questo: la donna per cui Amore ti stringe così, non è come Valtre donne, che leggeramente si muova del suo cuore. E ciascuno mi combattea tanto che mi facea stare quasi come colui che non sa per qual via pigli lo suo cammino, e che vuole andare e non sa onde se ne vada; e se io pensava di volere cercare una comune vìa di costoro, cioè là ove tutti s’accordassero, questa era via molto inimica verso me, cioè di chiamare e di mettermi ne le braccia de la Pietà. E in questo stato dimorando, mi giunse volontade di scriverne parole rimate; e dissine allora questo sonetto, lo quale comincia: Tutti li miei penser.
(After this last vision, when I had already written what Love commanded me to write, many and diverse thoughts began to assail and try me, against which I was defenseless; among these thoughts were four that seemed to disturb most my peace of mind. The first was this: the lordship of Love is good since he keeps the mind of his faithful servant away from all evil things. The next was this: the lordship of Love is not good because the more fidelity his faithful one shows him, the heavier and more painful are the moments he must live through. Another was this: the name of Love is so sweet to hear that it seems impossible to me that the effect itself should be in most things other than sweet, since, as has often been said, names are the consequences of the things they name: Nomina sunt consequentia rerum. The fourth was this: the lady through whom Love makes you suffer so is not like other ladies, whose heart can be easily moved to change its attitude. And each one of these thoughts attacked me so forcefully that it made me feel like one who does not know what direction to take, who wants to start and does not know which way to go. And as for the idea of trying to find a common road for all of them, that is, one where all might come together, this was completely alien to me: namely, appealing to Pity and throwing myself into her arms. While I was in this mood, the desire to write some poetry about it came to me, and so I wrote this sonnet which begins: All my thoughts.)
The problem he is struggling with is basically the eternal theme of the paradoxical nature of love. Still, it can be no coincidence that the only time he concerns himself with this topos is after the vision which contains conflicting aspects of Love. Perhaps the first of the four thoughts that comes to him, which stresses moral values, represents an attempt to think in terms of the Greater Aspect. The second thought, obviously, can apply only to the Lesser Aspect. The third merely describes the familiar oxymoric nature of love, with a touch of scholastic coloring. Whether the last thought is simply the conventional regret that the lady is unyielding, or whether it contains the recognition of the uniqueness of his lady Beatrice, is not too clear. But at least it is undeniable that the lover has been struggling with the problem of the nature of love after a second vision opposing Love’s two natures.
In my treatment of the vision in Chapter XXIV, a number of fine details were left undiscussed, since I was faced with the problem of establishing for the first time the identity of the figure of Love. To understand the full significance of this vision the reader should examine carefully the opening lines of the chapter, that set the stage for Love’s appearance:
Appresso questa vana imaginazione, avvenne uno die che, sedendo io pensoso in alcuna parte, ed io mi sentio cominciare un tremuoto nel cuore, così come se io fosse stato presente a questa donna. Allora dico che mi giunse una imaginazione d’Amore; che mi parve vederlo venire da quella parte ove la mia donna stava, e pareami che lietamente mi dicesse nel cor mio: “Pensa di benedicere lo dì che io ti presi, però che tu lo dei fare.” E certo me parea avere lo cuore sì lieto, che me non parea che fosse lo mio cuore, per la sua nuova condizione. E poco dopo queste parole che lo cuore mi disse con la lingua d’Amore, io vidi venire verso me una gentile donna, la quale era di famosa bieltade, e fue già molto donna di questo primo mio amico.
(After this wild dream I happened one day to be sitting in a certain place deep in thought, when I felt a tremor begin in my heart, as if I were in the presence of my lady. Then a vision of Love
came to me, and I seemed to see him coming from that place where my lady dwelt, and he seemed to say joyously from within my heart: “See that you bless the day that I took you captive; it is your duty to do so.” And it truly seemed to me that my heart was happy, so happy that it did not seem to be my heart because of this change. Shortly after my heart had said these words, speaking with the tongue of Love, I saw coming toward me a gentlewoman, noted for her beauty, who had been the much-loved lady of my best friend.)
The “vana imaginazione” mentioned in the opening line is the prophetic vision of Beatrice’s death. That a connection exists between that vision, described in terms suggesting the Crucifixion, and this one in which Beatrice is indirectly compared to Christ, is obvious. In fact, the lover might not have been capable of having this last vision of Love until after having experienced the one prophetic of her death; this is surely suggested by the words of Love himself that describe the significance of the name of Beatrice’s companion, Primavera. He tells the lover:
“Quella prima è nominata Primavera solo per questa venuta d’oggi; ché io mossi lo imponitore del nome a chiamarla così Primavera, cioè ’prima verrà’ lo die che Beatrice si mostrerà dopo la imaginazione del suo fedele.…”
(“The one in front is called Primavera only because of the way she comes today; for I inspired the giver of her name to call her Primavera, meaning ‘she will come first’ (prima verrà) on the day that Beatrice shows herself after the dream of her faithful one….”)
Thus Love had planned this vision in advance, a plan which involved his inspiring one of Giovanna’s friends to give her the nickname Primavera—intending this vision to take place after the vision of Beatrice’s death, after the “vana imaginazione.”
We are also told, in the opening sentence of the chapter, that the lover’s heart began to tremble just before the appearance of Love; the fact that this tremor was of the sort he was accustomed to have when in the presence of his lady, prepares the way for the assimilation of Beatrice to Love at the conclusion of the vision. But this assimilation had already been suggested by degrees: the figure who appears in Chapter III, enveloped in a flame-colored cloud, will reappear in Chapter XII clothed in a garment of purest white; thus, Beatrice’s two colors, red and white, belong to the god of Love.
Finally, there is the remarkable fusion between the god and the lover-protagonist, a fusion that takes place almost immediately: he sees Love only briefly, coming from a certain direction; when he hears him speak, the words of Love come from the lover’s heart. In the three visions preceding that of Chapter XXIV the Lesser Aspect of Love had been represented: Chapter IX was exclusively concerned with this Aspect, while Chapters III and XII contained a shift from the Greater to the Lesser. And in all three cases this Aspect had been taken as being identical with the lover’s feelings at the moment, so far below the level of the Greater Aspect that he could not understand him in the two cases when this being spoke to him. Here, in Chapter XXIV, as we have seen, there is no shift from the Greater to the Lesser; at the same time, however, there is no contrast between the mood of the god and that of the lover-at-the-moment. He has understood him completely, for now the god is speaking from within the lover’s heart. For the first time the lover’s feelings of the moment have been raised to the height of the Greater Aspect.12
And after this high point reached in Chapter XXIV we shall not see the figure of Love again. But surely the young lover does. In that final vision which he withholds from us, which inspired him to stop writing about his love for Beatrice until he could do so more worthily, he must have seen Beatrice in glory; already in Chapter XLI he had caught a glimpse of
… una donna, che receve onore
e luce si, che per lo suo splendore
lo peregrino spirito la mira.
(… a lady held in reverence,
splendid in light, and through her radiance
the pilgrim spirit looks upon her being.)
And if he sees, at the end, the celestial radiance of Beatrice, how could the figure of Love be absent from his imagination—Love who had proclaimed the Christlike nature of Beatrice and her likeness to himself. And this time, too, the lover must have been raised to the level of the Greater Aspect, never again to sink below it.
* * *
In the preceding chapter of this essay, when Dante’s predilection for “mathematical thinking” was discussed, the importance of the number 9 was mentioned, its significance being due to the fact that it is the square of 3 which itself represents the Trinity. Because of the symbolic value of this number and the fact that in Chapter XXIX it is made to explain the miracle of Beatrice, one might have expected to find a pattern of “three’s” in the structure of the Vita nuova. But apart from the three “spiriti” of the lover, mentioned only once, and the three canzoni, devoted to Beatrice at different stages of her apotheo sis (Beatrice desired by Heaven, Beatrice ascending to Heaven, Beatrice in Heaven), there is no suggestion of such patterning.13 This is likely to be particularly surprising to the reader of the Vita nuova who comes to it from the Divine Comedy, where he is invited so often to think in terms of “three” (and always in terza rima). What we do find in the Vita nuova is an overwhelming emphasis on “two.”
Two ladies ask the lover for some of his poetry, toward the close of the book, two ladies at the beginning accompany the eighteen-year-old Beatrice on her first important promenade into the story. In Chapter IX a pilgrim appears, and in Chapter XL, a group of pilgrims. The lover chooses two screen-ladies. There are two persons who are brought on stage to address the lover: one to answer the lover’s question (the friend who takes him to the wedding feast in Chapter XIV), the other to question him (the lady in Chapter XVIII who pins him down about his love)—and in both these chapters the young lover is mocked.
There are two roles for the author of the Vita nuova: scribe and glossator, and there are two Beatrice’s: Beatrice alive and Beatrice dead. Twice we are reminded of the two Beatrice’s when, at a time she is still living in the story, she is referred to in terms that could apply only to Beatrice dead.14 Two colors are mentioned: red and white. Twice in the visions the color red is associated with her; twice the color white is connected with her: once in the story, once in a vision. There are only two concrete objects in the Vita nuova: a bed and some “panels” (certe tavolette) on which the lover is drawing the figures of angels. Twice in the story a stream of water flows alongside the lover’s path.
There are two languages in the Vita nuova. The three “spiriti” speak in Latin as does the god of Love, and Latin is used in quotations from the Bible. There are exactly two quotations from the Bible in the narrative proper, and there are two visions in which Love speaks in Latin. And whether the god of Love is speaking in Italian or Latin, he always makes two speeches to the lover. There are, of course, two styles in the Vita nuova: that of prose and that of poetry. There are two positions for the divisioni: up to Chapter XXXI the divi-sione follows the poem; from this point on it precedes. And there are exactly two periphrases for the city of Florence.
Two chapters of the forty-two are composed of essays; two chapters contain a didactic interpolation; two chapters contain not one but two poems. Two chapters, and only two, contain no reference to Beatrice. There are two chapters in which the protagonist’s liver (“lo spirito naturale”) is mentioned and two chapters containing visions in which his heart, as an object, is mentioned. In one chapter there is a poem with two beginnings, in another a canzone composed of only two stanzas. In two of the visions Love shifts from the greater to the Lesser Aspect.
One must wonder at the meaning, if any, of this apparently completely heterogeneous list. It is surely not to be explained by any Christian symbolic value adhering to the number two; still, within the Vita nuova, this number has its own significance: it must reflect the twofold nature of the God of Love. Does this mean that each of the pairs represents somehow the two Aspects? This is obviously true in one case: the pair mentioned last on our
list involves the two shifts from the Greater to the Lesser Aspect. It is also true of the poem with two beginnings in Chapter XXXIV. The lover began the sonnet with a calm and reverent allusion to Beatrice’s soul in Heaven:
Era venuta ne la mente mia
la gentil donna che per suo valore
fu posta da Valtissimo signore
nel ciel de l’umiltate, ov’è Maria.
(Into my mind had come the gracious image
of the lady who, rewarded for her virtue,
was called by His most lofty Majesty
to the calm realm of Heaven where Mary reigns.)
Then he shifts to a new theme, suggesting his own grief over Beatrice’s death, and goes so far as to predicate Love’s grief:
Era venuta ne la mente mia
quella donna gentil cui piange Amore,
entro ’n quel punto che lo suo valore
vi trasse a riguardar quel ch’eo facia.
(Into my mind had come the gracious image
of the lady for whom Love still sheds his tears,
just when you were attracted by her virtue
to come and see what I was doing there.)
There is no question but that here we have a movement from the Greater to the Lesser Aspect, reminding the reader of the dramatic exchange of roles on the part of Love himself in Chapters III and XII. Again, of the two hearts mentioned in Chapters III and IX, the first was in the possession of the Greater Love, the second was carried by the Lesser Love. Also, though this may verge on the pedantic, the double role of the author (narrator, glossator) may be seen as reflecting the same duality: the narrator who records, mainly, the imperfect love of the protagonist, and the glossator who has come to understand what love for Beatrice must be. The most striking pair of oppositions is that of the two quotations from the Bible, both from Lamentations. In Chapter VII the protagonist writes a poem of sham grief beginning with the words, “O voi che per la via d’Amor passate,” telling us in the divisione that it is a modification of Jeremiah’s words: “O vos omnes qui transitis per viam…”. Chapter XXVIII, announcing the death and ascent into glory of Beatrice, begins with the words of the same prophet: “Quomodo sedet sola civitas plena populo!”
Dante’s Vita Nuova, New Edition: A Translation and an Essay Page 13