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Dante Inferno - The Rap Translation - Canto 5

For mp3s visit www.reverbnation.com/hugo1/album/37944-dante-inferno-rap-translation-cantos

Virgil takes Dante through to the Second Circle, where he encounters King Minos - he of the labyrinth - who has become the judge of the sinners. Proceeding onward into the circle of the lustful, Dante observes sinners trapped in a violent whirlwind forever.

full text here: www.facebook.com/notes/hugo/dante-inferno-the-rap-translation-canto-v/10152643064010414


It's seven hundred years since Dante Alighieri penned his epic poem, Commedia, in which he describes in breathtaking detail a journey into three realms of the Catholic afterlife. So insanely inspired was this poetic undertaking, that swiftly after its completion its giddy readers added the epithet Divine to it, and 'La Divina Commedia' has never been surpassed in scope or style in seven centuries of poetry in any language.

Dante made use of a poetic form described as the 'Dolce Stil Novo' which translates as The Sweet New Style. He was determined to prove that the collection of unrefined dialects of the peninsula that we now know as Italy were just as appropriate for writing poetry as the Latin which all other writers of the time felt obliged to favour. He called this principle 'De Vulgari Eloquentia' - the Eloquence of Vulgar Languages (i.e. the eloquence of the vernacular). In exile from his beloved Florence, he set about writing the Commedia, and over the course of 100 canti, not only proved that the disparate dialects were up to the task, but effectively created the Italian language in the process, and immortalised himself to boot.

Over the epic journey, in effortlessly flowing and ingenious rhyme form, he shows the language's ability to run the gamut of tones from the brutal and disgusting tortures of Hell to high flown and awe-inspiring visions of Paradise. So great was his prowess with rhyme, that he effectively placed himself at the top of the all-time great rhymers that humanity has produced for seven centuries.

However, when in the latter half of the 20th Century, in New York, an upstart group of young musical innovators gave birth to a style of music and a subculture called Hip Hop, all of a sudden, in the form of Rap, there arrived poets who took the art of rhyming to obsessive extremes, finally presenting a poetic form that, in terms of rhyming at least, could hold its own alongside and perhaps even surpass that of history's greatest.

Immortal innovators of the art form such as Rakim, Talib Kweli, Eminem, KRS One, Mos Def, Nas, Notorious BIG, Tupac Shakur and Pharoahe Monch, took this rap rhyming to incredible depths, exploring all angles of their own vernacular, spitting intricate multi-syllable rhymed verses over irresistible hip hop beats and delivering their version of the Dolce Stil Novo to an insatiable world, and in the process proving, like Dante, that their Vulgar vernacular could have global relevance in its eloquence.

So, to this project. The basic agenda being simply to retranslate the Inferno using some of the forms of Rap - Multi-syllabic rhyme patterns, driving beats - to reengage with this epic medieval poem, and maybe contribute to garnering it a new audience. Of course, being a mere beginner in this art form myself, I have done my best to do justice to both the form and the source material. Any seeming deficiencies in either are in fact mine, and I apologise in advance.



As references to the original poem, I have used the following editions

The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri Volume I Inferno, edited and translated by Robert M. Durling (Oxford University Press, 1996) - an excellent side by side Italian/English translation with great commentary

The website Danteinferno.info which places the translations of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882), Henry Francis Cary (December 6, 1772 - August 14, 1844) and Charles Eliot Norton (November 16, 1827 - October 21, 1908) alongside each other for easy comparison. I have to admit I favour the Longfellow translation, and have made liberal use of his ideas for this piece.‪ www.danteinferno.info/translations/index.html

Finally, the superlative performance/lecture series 'Tutto Dante' from Roberto Benigni, in which he appeared night after sell-out night in the Piazza Santa Croce in Florence to deliver a commentary and reading (from memory) of the entire Inferno. It has been an indispensable resource, and is available on dvd.

lyrics

Inferno: Canto V

And so now Virgil urged me to descend out of the first circle
Down to the Second which though it encircles and girdles
Less space, is a place certainly worse still
Causing more pain, more curses, and is more hurt filled.

There stood King Minos, Judge of the sinners
Snarling, as his eyes lock and centre on each one that enters
He hears their line of transgressions at the entrance
And with a whip crack, decides and sends them off where his judgement delivers

What I mean is that whenever an evil born spirit
Enters and falls forlorn before him in the thrall of these limits
It cannot help itself at all, and completely confesses
And that king connoisseur of sinful deeds and transgressions

Listens, and judges which place in Hell is right
Then he whips his scaly tail around him as many times
As the number of the circle of Hell he then decides
This sinner should be confined to spend the rest of time.

At any time thousands upon thousands stand before him,
Then one by one they crawl down and present themselves to fortune
They confess, hear their judgement as Minos calls it
And then in the next instant are hurled downward, violently falling.

"You there, who've come to enjoy this miserable hospitality"
Said Minos to me, when he glanced at me
Pausing for a moment all horrid activity
Of his grand and grisly office of responsibility

"Beware of the means by which you enter this place and
Also in whom you place you trust and faith cos
Don't think you can escape just because the gates are spacious!"
But Virgil snapped back thus: "Why complain to us?

Do not impede or even conceive of getting in the way
Of his journey this day, for it is fate ordained
It has been willed where the power is instilled
To fulfil that which is willed, so now just be still."

And now I have reached the point of
Hearing the growing lowing of a multitude of screeching voices
Now I have arrived At the place where I
Am assailed by weeping and pained cries.

I came right into a place where all light is silent
Which bucks, strains and bellows with heightened violence
Like the sea does when tempests rise and strike it
When winds arriving from opposite tides are fighting.

This hurricane of the inferno never calms its assault
But hurls and assaults millions of spirits on through the vault
In pitch blackness, the captive souls roll in this madness
Being flung rapidly through the air and smashed upon rocks

And when they are about to drop and hit the ground,
The air all around is drowned out with the sound
Of shrieking, screaming, hoarse with the pain
As they curse the divine force for forcing them into this forceful whirlwind and torturing them this way.

I was able to order my thoughts and clearly comprehend
That into this terribly awful torture and torment
Were condemned the incredibly many sinners of carnal crimes
Who let their lustful desires take charge of their minds.

And just as starlings fly on their wings as one
Forming giant flocks in the winter months
Darting and weaving, their numbers infinite thus
Move the sinner spirits in that wind as dust.

It just blasts them here, there, downward, over and upward
And they have not the slightest hope of comfort
For eternity, Certainly no hope of unction
Not even that their seething pain could show slight reduction.

Yet there is another group of shades residing,
Who, gracefully like cranes are flying
Slowly, steadily, but plaintively crying
I saw them arriving Making a line across the horizon

Both types of soul are impelled by the stressful wind.
After a while I turned to Virgil and said to him
"Master, please tell me then
Who are these souls flung about with this black air molesting them?"

"Among the lusty, the first one we see there in the furious gale;
I can tell you must be curious as to her tale,"
He yelled this, "She was once Empress
Of a large empire which extended a vast distance.

By sensuousness, incestuous lustful vices,
She was so broken and corrupt minded
She just decided to make incest legalised and
Thus cover up her own transgressions against moral guidance.

Her name was Semiramis, and when her husband Ninus perished
She became empress instead and
When the people revolted, mistakenly thinking she could halt it
she disrobed and vaulted naked onto her balcony to be savagely and fatally assaulted

Those who more calmly fly above like doves died for love
Dido, who committed suicide cause she loved
Aeneas, having sworn on Sichaeus's ashes not to love
And there: Cleopatra for whom lust was love

There: Helen of Troy, for whose sake was embroiled
A Seemingly endless era of terrible toil
And the great Achilles flying above as well
Who was ambushed and killed due to love itself

And Helen's abductor Paris is with them, and Isolde's lover Tristan"
Virgil named and singled out with his finger
As We lingered
More than a thousand souls whose life had for love been extinguished

After I had listened to my teacher deliver
This list of dames and cavaliers - historic figures
Overwhelming pity took my attention thither
And I was bewildered, I had a fit of shivers

And I interrupted his flowing, by saying "o, poet,
I have a desire growing to know them;
Those two together there who seem to be floating with
Such lightness on the wing in this strongest wind."

And he replied then, "Keep your eyes clear and thus
You can espy when they fly near to us.
Divine love leads them, thus beseech them with such,
And they will come near and speak with us, trust."

Within a brief instant, the wind shifted
And between us and them diminished the distance.
Therefore I addressed them both "O, weary spirits!
Come! Speak with us, if no one here forbids it."

And just like two doves, inspired and beckoned
By desire, with wings open to the highest extension
And obeying instincts their own prime volition connects
Fly through the air to rest in the sweetness of the nest,

Thus, In this manner they arrived to us next
Flying down from the sky where Dido is kept
Approaching through the air in that malignant zone
So effectively my affectionate appeal had hit home

"O, living soul, so gracious and benign
Who goes visiting through this air the shade of wine,
We who reside within this blustery wind
Who have stained the world with our lustful sin

If the king of the universe were our friend
We would pray to him from now on without end
For peace to be showered on you, for the pity you've shown
To us, miserable souls, and our perverted woe

So, whatsoever you need to find out
Whatever pleases you to speak of or hear about
Is what we will speak and hear when the wind has died down
As it appears to be doing right now.

The town where I was born sits down low
On the coast, on the river mouth of the Po
Where that river descends to its home
And comes to peaceful rest with its tributaries in tow.

Love! Love, which pounces upon a gentle heart
Swiftly, grips it and rips it apart, Seized the heart
Of this man, who was torn from me
And murdered so horribly it still haunts my dreams.

Love! Love, which is so powerful that it's a proven fact
No one beloved can prevent themselves loving back,
Attacked me with such a passion for this man that
As you see, nothing has diminished the attraction

Love was the force that tempted us together and then
It has brought us together to one death
An eternity dwelling with Cain when he's dead
Awaits the one who extinguished our breath."

As I paused to reflect on the evident depth
Of torment of these two souls, I bowed my head
So low and for such a long time
Until the poet beside me said "What's on your mind?"

And then, after a time I spoke and stated
"My goodness! How many knowing gazes
Sweet thoughts, what desire and longing state
Must have led these two to this woeful fate?"

Then I turned myself towards them to speak
And I began, "Your agonies are so awfully deep,
Francesca, so filled with such maddening grief that
They provoke me to compassionate weeping

But, tell me, at that deep time
Of burgeoning emotions and sweet sighs
By what discreet signs did love realize
To make you both concede the design of your secret desires?"

And she replied: "No more tender pain
Exists than to remember a blessed day
Full of happiness and pleasurable escapades
When in misery, as your teacher is well acquainted.

Nevertheless, if you truly desire
To recognise the earliest root of the fire
Of that love which conspired to pass between us
I will speak of it like one who speaks while weeping.

We were reading together for our pleasure one day
The story of Lancelot, how he was swept away
And enthralled by love, as the text explained.
We were alone in the room, and never afraid.

We were sitting side by side and on many occasions
While set on the page, our eyes together came, as
Steadily the colour eventually drained from our faces.
But on only one occasion desire overcame us

When we came to the page which described
The moment of the long craved smile
And the passionate kiss which from a noble lover arrived
This one here beside, from whom I'll never be divided

Kissed me fully upon my trembling lips
Passionately embraced me, caressing my hips.
But we read no more of the chapter which was the catalyst of our passions
For my husband caught us in the act and stabbed us."

And while Francesca delivered this sorrowful talk
Paolo floated next to her so distraught with remorse
That out of pity I started to feel lightheaded and fall
As heavily as a recently dead corpse

credits

from Dante's Inferno - The Rap Translation by Hugo The Poet - Cantos 1​-​6, released January 6, 2013
The beats respectfully used are
Insides - Jon Hopkins

Weather Storm - Craig Armstrong

Fallin (Prelude) - Blue Daisy

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