Chapter one of Song of Solomon

How is the reader meant to interpret the many symbols?
What is the significance of the biblical names?
What is the symbolic significance of the velvet roses?
Given her name, is Pilate Dead a positive or negative force in the story?
What, exactly, is the setting of this story?

"Downtown the firemen pulled on their greatcoats, but when they arrived at Mercy, Mr. Smith had seen the rose petals, heard the music and leapt into the air." (9)

This passage is significant because it incorporates all of the main symbols in the story thus far into one scene. The rose petals, the music and flight are all incorporated. Not to mention the ulterior symbology in the passage: firemen, who, like the petals, are red, and "Mercy" used as a noun, as opposed to "Mercy Hospital" or "the hospital."

"Mr. Smith's blue silk wings must have left their mark, because when the little boy discovered, at four, the same thing Mr. Smith had learned earlier – that only birds and airplanes could fly – he lost all interest in himself. To have to live without that single gift saddened him and left his imagination so bereft that he appeared dull even to the women who did not hate his mother." (9)

It's important because this passage identifies the major conflict in the story – Milkman's attempts to learn how to fly.

"Mrs. Bains let her hand fall to her side. 'A nigger in business is a terrible thing to see. A terrible, terrible thing to see.' The boys looked at each other and back at their grandmother. Their lips were parted as though they had heard something important." (23)

This passage is significant because the author tells us it's significant: "...as though they had heard something important." The passage also alludes to what seems to be a major theme in the book, and that is the amalgamation of the black man into white society.

"Surrendering to the sound, Macon moved closer. He wanted no conversation, no witness, only to listen and perhaps to see the three of them, the source of that music that made him think of fields and wild turkey and calico." (29)

This passage is fascinating because up until this point, Macon has only been portrayed as cold, heartless and hateful. Here, we see his softer side. He has been particularly hateful toward his family, especially Pilate, his sister. But here, we see another side of him, a side that seems to be drawn to the "common-street"-ness that Pilate represents.

"As Macon felt himself softening under the weight of memory and music, the song died down. The air was quiet and yet Macon Dead could not leave. He liked looking at them freely this way. They didn't move. They simply stopped singing and Reba went on paring her toenails, Hagar threaded and un-threaded her hair, and Pilate swayed like a willow over her stirring."

As a continuation of the previous passage, in this passage we see a very different picture of Macon Dead. No longer the cold money-collecter, he now seems to be filled with childlike wonder at the sight of this domestic scene of peculiar blissfulness.

The central idea developed in this passage is the cursed Dead family line, and the various members of the family, each of whom has their own special ailment. The central character thus far is Macon Dead, and we get conflicting impressions of him. He seems to the be the classic fish out of water, a black man in white society who has become cold and heartless because of it. At the end of the chapter, he invisibly observes a snatch of his ancestral culture in the home of Pilate, Hagar and Reba, where "progress means walking a little bit farther up the road." Chapter 1 kicks off the tale with a fairy tale of sorts – Mr. Smith going splat on the concrete – which in itself is a subversion of another, older folk tale – one told by slaves in which the people really could fly, instead of just hitting the ground and dying. After the tale of Mr. Smith, we are brought in a little closer, into the world of Southside and the Dead family. We are introduced to Macon Dead, who, on the face of it, is the archetypal tyrannical patriarch. However, the contradictions in his character are revealed at the end of the chapter when he eavesdrops on his sister's home. Here it is revealed that Macon Dead's cold exterior may really be just a mask forced upon him by society, a mask that conceals his ties to a rich and flavorful culture.

Canto 12-20

To fail him, he stopped and hunched against a bush
As if to make himself and its branches one.

Behind them, eager as greyhounds off the leash,
Black bitches filled the woods, avid and quick.
They set their teeth on the one who stopped to crouch,

And tore his limbs apart; and then they took
The wretched members away. then my escort
Led me by one hand to the bush – which spoke,

Grieving in vain through places where it was hurt
And bled: "Jacopo da Santo Andrea," it cried,
"What did you gain by shielding me? What part

Had I in your sinful life?" [Canto XIII]

This passage is fascinating because we see, in the pits of hell the very human characteristics of compassion, empathy and self-sacrifice. One would think that these virtues would be all but extinct in hell, but apparently not. This passage reflects the greater notion that the beings in hell, whether they be bush, tree shade, or just plain homo sapien, were all once humans, and their human minds are still intact. So, for all intents and purposes, they are still human inside. For one, their memories stay intact. Several of the beings Dante encounter ask him to comfort their memories in the human world, to speak positively of them and tell the people that they have since repented for their wrongs. Again, I believe that, for the most part, these humans don't deserve the punishment being bestowed upon them – even the most sinful of them. In the above-quoted passage, we see humans banding together and showing compassion in the face of unspeakable catastrophe. Is this not indicative of a basic good in man?

The passage also raises the logistical question of what exactly happens to Jacopo Da Santo Andrea when his limbs are torn off and dragged into different corners of the woods. I mean, you're in hell, where else can you go when you die again? For all intents and purposes, the inhabitants in hell are immortal; they can still feel physical pain, but their existence can never be threatened, as they are already dead. In such an existence, does physical pain not eventually lose all meaning? When eventually you realize you'll never die no matter how much pain you're in, wouldn't you eventually be able to slough off the pain, drawing on mental reserves and the knowledge that the pain cannot kill you? It seems to me that Dante's conception of hell was not fully thought through, given the logical fallacies inherent in his creation.

Cantos 6-12

"Shaking his head, "I was alone:
One, who defended her before them all."
"Ah, pray you (so may your seed find peace again)

Unravel a knot that makes my reason fail,"
I said. "If I hear you rightly, you seem to foresee
What time will bring, and yet you seem to deal

DIfferently with the present." He answered me:
"Like someone with faulty vision, we can behold
Remote things well, for so much light does He

Who rules supreme still grant us; but we foiled
When things draw near us, and our intelligence is useless when they are present. So of your world

In its present state, we have no evidence or Knowledge, except if others bring us word:
Thus you can understand that with no sense

Left to us, all our knowledge will be dead
From that moment when the future's door is shut."

Canto X

It's interesting that the inhabitants of hell seem fixed upon their past lives. It suggest that the ultimate torment of those living in Hell is regret – regret that they lived their lives according to their own rules and not God's. This man that Dante speaks to – whomever he may be – is obsessed with his past; he's paid the final price for his crimes and now must live with his regrets for eternity. I believe at the end, where the man refers to the light that "He who rules supreme has granted us" he is referring to the light of logic. When things are evaluated from afar, with the coldness of logic, they are simple and make perfect sense. It is when things draw near that we abandon logic and go with our instincts, which are derived from the animal side of humanity, rather than the divine side. This reminds of a quote in Owen Meany pulled from (I believe) Thomas Hardy: "Nothing bears out in practice what it promises incipiently."

Anyhow, I find it interesting that, in my view, the ultimate torment of Hell is not the fires, it's not cerberus or the demons or the endless rain or the rivers of mud, it's being stuck for eternity pondering what might have been, had I only lived my life differently. The pondering, of course, leads nowhere; you are trapped in hell forever, left only with memories of mortal life.

"Heaven's hatred is Injustice"

Canto XI

I was thinking about this and I realized that it seems to be an almost hypocritical point of view, because, in my view it is unjust to send people to hell. If we believe that mankind is inherently good (and I do), then why should they be punished for the mistakes they make? Why can't everyone go to Heaven? Oh right, because it's not enough for people to be good, God also wants them to believe in him. You could be the greatest, nicest person ever, but, without believing in God it's still straight to hell with you. This seems to be a kind of skewed state of affairs, in my opinion. The main motivation for believing in God is because we won't go to heaven otherwise. It's almost God's twisting our arm, or blackmailing us to make people believe in him. Potentially, if man is basically good and sin comes from the imperfections in man, then why shouldn't we all go to heaven? There's no good reason not to, except that God is on some ego-trip and wants people to believe in him before they are granted access to those golden gates. The counter to this argument is the point that certain sins are worse than others, and, despite being due to "imperfections," man should still be punished for them. I'm talking sins like the engendering of mass violence. But, in the face of an eternity in Hell, it matters less what your punishment is, because the ultimate punishment is the eternity itself. So, after a million years or so, the unbaptised philosophers in limbo and the poor bastards boiling in the river of blood are no different. So, this system of weighted punishments fails, because, no matter how bad a punishment is, you will adapt and get used to it. I mean, we're talking eternity here, which is more than a long time. It's infinite time. So is it really fair to sentence somebody to such a punishment merely because they weren't baptised, through no fault of their own. If Heaven hates injustice, why is it committing such a grave injustice?

Cantos 1-5

"When I had heard those afflicted souls, I lowered/my head and held it so till I heard the voice/Of the poet ask "What are you thinking?" I answered,
"Alas – that sweet conceptions and passions so deep/Should bring them here!"

This passage is fascinating because it shows how even someone whose only crime is purity of love can still be doomed to the third ring of hell. I actually did a little research and found out that the two lovers – now in shade-form – came together in an adulterous love affair, which explains considerably more about why they are now spending their days in Hell. But it is still interesting. I suppose Dante is somewhat of a stickler for rules, and since in the Bible it says something to the effect of "thou shalt not commit adultery" he felt is necessary to send even the purest of adulterous lovers straight to hell. Another interesting twist is the fact that the narrator, whom we get all of our information from, actually sympathizes with the damned lovers, which would appear to be in contrast with the opinion of the writer himself, who either did not pity them or shelved his pity in the face of a greater authority – God's commandments.

Page 33 – "I saw Lucretia, Julia, Marcia, Cornelia;/And sitting at a distance separately/ I saw lone of Saladin of Arabia.//I raised my eyes a little, and there was he/Who is acknowledged master of those who know,/sitting in a philosophic family//Who look to him and him do honor. I saw/Nearest him, in front, Plato and Socrates./I saw Democritus, who strove to show//That the world is chance; Zeno, Empedocles,/Anaxagoras, Thales, Heraclitus,/Diogenes. The collector of qualities/Of things, Dioscorides. And Orpheus,/Cicero, Linus, Seneca the moralist,/ Euclid the geometer, Ptolemy, Hippocrates."

In a vein similar to the previous passage, this passage depicts a group of people who ostensibly made great contributions to humanity during their mortal lifetimes, and yet they were still damned to hell, albeit one of the more cushy sections of hell. It just goes to show that, in Dante's eyes, everyone is a sinner, and no one is eligible for forgiveness unless they accept God. It's a rather strict outlook. Someone like Euclid, who did so much foundational work in Geometry in his lifetime, and how is he repaid? By spending eternity in the first circle of hell. It is significant that their hell is merely a "green meadow," which is not bad, all things considered. This suggests that God still holds some reverence for the intellectuals of humankind – just not enough reverence to give them free tickets to heaven.

In the process of researching, I came across this ----> article on the translator, Robert Pinsky. It was kind of interesting. Basically, he's tried to make Dante as accessible as possible, and, in addition to that, retain the rhythm of the original words. It's funny because, as I was reading, I had music playing, and I could feel the words complementing the music, moving in a similar rhythmic pace. So I guess he did a good job. Random thoughts.