Just as Dante knows Virgil only through his own poetic creation, so does the speaker of Fort Red Border know the actor Robert Redford: "The 'Redford' persona that I invent for the series is completely imaginary, and that project of imagination is essential to understanding the series," Petrosino says. "It was in this course that I first read the beautiful language that Dante uses to describe the bond that exists between the two figures," she says. She first studied The Inferno as an undergraduate at UVA. Petrosino's appreciation of Dante and the relationship he shares with Virgil figured largely into this creative endeavor. "My Redford represents a cure for loneliness," she says. She realized she could explore certain elements of the speaker's emotions by putting the Redford muse in her poems. It was more like Redford wandered into some of my poems and seemed to want to stay," she explains. "It was not really a conscious decision on my part. Petrosino is quick to clarify that the Redford in her poems is a muse and not the living Hollywood celebrity. Poet Kiki Petrosino (Col '01) uses Robert Redford as an inspiration in her book of poems, Fort Red Border (which is an anagram of "Robert Redford"). Two alumni are following in Dante's footsteps by taking as their muses people who exist (or once did) in the real world. The artist draws inspiration from the muse, while the muse achieves fame, or even a kind of immortality, through the artist's works. Though Dante barely knew Beatrice in the actual world, she became "the glorious lady of mind." From Dante and Beatrice to Andy Warhol and Edie Sedgwick, artists and muses have maintained a mysteriously symbiotic relationship for nearly as long as art itself has been around. Both appear in literary form in The Divine Comedy to lead Dante through hell, purgatory and heaven.ĭante was one of the first poets to invoke real people rather than mythical figures as muses. But he also found new muses in Virgil as well as Beatrice Portinari, a childhood acquaintance. Dante called on the Classical muses-the nine goddesses of artistic inspiration. Invoking the muses at the start of a poem dates back to Homer and the Roman poet Virgil. Yet the first concern is “Mans First Disobedience”, and the piece, as Milton proclaims, is being written for humanity’s benefit."O Muses, O high genius, aid me now!" writes Dante Alighieri in The Inferno, the first section of his epic poem, The Divine Comedy. The invocation establishes that this is his intention straight away as he refers to the “Forbidden Tree” and the “loss of Eden” other names from the Bible like Oreb and Sinai are also prominently included here, alongside true Classical terms like Chaos and “th’ Aonian Mount”. The true significance of this invocation, as with the significance of the whole text, lies in the fact that Milton is appropriating the features of the Classical epic, and replacing the heroes, pantheons and legends of its typical narrative with figures and events from the scripture of Christianity – as the actual religion of his culture, in the ideologically tumultuous period following the English Civil War, the Interregnum and the Restoration, this undertaking is certainly as daring and profound as he appreciates in this opening passage. Such introductory invocations are typical of the Classical Greco-Roman epic poetry that Milton was emulating in writing Paradise Lost: as an extensively educated writer of his era, he was thoroughly familiar with the history, mythology and literature of Ancient Europe, and well-versed in this particular form. Milton’s command is for this Muse to “Sing”, to instruct, inspire and support him in his composition, devised for the purposes of asserting “th’ Eternal Providence” and justifying “the wayes of God to Men”. John Milton’s epic poem ‘Paradise Lost’ begins with an invocation to a “Heav’nly Muse”, specifically one with the knowledge of the beginnings of the Heavens and Earth according to the Judeo-Christian account. What is the significance of Milton’s invocation in ‘Paradise Lost’? Answer
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |