[lit-ideas] Speranza, "Lasciate Ogni Speranza Voi Ch'e Entrate"
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 3 Jan 2010 15:42:09 EST
In a message dated 1/3/2010 12:19:37 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,
lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes in "abandon hope"
"Dante in his “Inferno” wrote: Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate.
This is usually translated into English as “Abandon hope, all ye who enter
here.” But it could as well be translated “abandon expectation” or “
abandon prospect” according to Babylon 8."
Right. Indeed the 'ogni' is crucial, since it makes the thing a 'countable'
noun, perhaps. Abandon all hopes, or abandon every hope. It's clearer in
your preferred 'expectation": abandon all expectations. "Ogni" is a
cultivated Latinism: no such thing, for example, in much vulgar Spanish. Even
in
English, 'ogni' does not translate easily. "All men are mortal", of the
scholastics, is best rendered "Every man is mortal", to stick to the Subject
being still singular, yet with a plural sense. The fact that "Speranza" is
originally a vulgar Latin neuter plural confuses things slightly. The correct,
non-vulgar, Italian, is "speme" (Latin spes, rather than *sperantia, which
is Provencal in origin, cfr. 'allegranza', joy).
Helm:
"I wondered about whether speranza might be preserved, searched the
internet and found http://www.kan.org/steven/hell.html which after warning us
to “
Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate” goes on to tell us that “
styrofoam and cardboard are active ingredients in a hydrogen bomb.” We are
further directed to open an electronic door in order to see frightening photos
but I was too frightened to open it, not having Virgil to advise me as to its
nature, nor even Speranza who would have advised me in an intricate way
such that all progress would have been precluded."
Exactly. Steven is who I call, friendly, a 'psycho', so I would have
advised "Speranza" and all my kind to stay out of the gate. It's odd that such
an ancient place as hell should bear an inscription in Provencal, though.
"I did another search and found
http://www.viztaview.com/blog/Lasciate-ogni-speranza-voi-chentrate-Upgrade-to-Vista-.html
which is a blog with the
title, “Lasciate ogni speranza voi ch’entrate: Upgrade to Vista!” The
poster tells us, The . . . title of this blog is from Dante's Inferno, and is
usually translated as "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." Like many
others, until I looked this up I was under the misapprehension that the
Inferno
was written in Latin."
Well, it is. There is a porn, or arty porn by Derek Jarman called
"Sebastiane" which is Latin for the vocative, "O Sebastian". It's in Latin, and
the
script by a friend of Jarman's at Oxford: a Lit. Hum. graduate. Yet you
find for amazon.com's description of the film and it goes, "Language:
Spanish". So there. It's best to avoid referring to those vernacular Romance
things
as _languages_: Latin was a language, or 'lingua'. The Italians mark the
derogation on Italian by calling it a "little lingua", i.e. a linguaggio.
Lingua is tongue, so linguaggio is little tongue, even forked one, as the
serpents have. Not classy.
"It's not: It's in Tuscan which, at the time it was written (between 1308
and 1321 AD), was a more or less separate dialect of the modern language we
today call Italian."
Right. And 'Tuscan is highly overrated. I have the History of Florence, in
Latin, in the I Tatti Series (Harvard) and the myth went that the Tuscans
hated the Romans so they avoided any continuity between, say, Romulus and
theirselves (sic). Hence, Tuscan was said to derive directly from Etrurian, a
non-Indo-European lingo even. So there.
"But this phrase conveys the fear and trepidation inherent to going certain
places where we've all been told, often many times, that it's best to stay
away from.” The poster goes on to describe the horrors of upgrading to
Vista which are too horrible to dwell upon beyond this mention. I did another
search and found http://aupadenis.com/ The author tells us he tried to
think of a more original greeting to his web page than “Lasciate ogni
speranza, voi ch’entrate” but couldn’t. He wanted to distinguish himself from
Dante’s description of the devil."
Indeed, for the Italians love the devil. There is this well-loved opera by
Arrigo Boito, now on DVD, called "Mefistofele". We Italians find the Devil,
as a literary character, much sexier than Jesus, and indeed Zeffirelli was
criticised when he made his "Jesus of Nazareth" too sexy for American
audiences. The Virgin Mary was played by Argentine Olivia Hussey, a pin-up
girl
if ever there was one.
Helm: "He says “I see myself as a bit more laid-back & hands-off than the
Devil, and I want my site to be more dude-friendly than Hell. Easier to
navigate than those Hellish circles, not to mention a lot easier to escape
from. Plus, my site’s got a chill out lounge, and Hell hasn’t.”"
Inferno is a lovely topic. J. L. Borges used to lecture on Hell often. A
majestic site in Buenos Aires, for which there must be good online sites is a
building, "The Bartolo", on Avenue of May, built strictly on Dantean
lines. The groundfloor and the first six floors belong to Hell, and you move
upstairs to Purgatory ending up in the terrace, where good coffee is served,
of Paradise. It is Majestic. And not far from my haunt, The Tortoni.
Helm: "I scrolled down and found a photo of three fellows in British
looking uniforms under which was written “. . . my mates might sort of, well,
visit you in the middle of the night, like, and erm, you know. . .” Well
that was enough for me and I skedaddled out of his site; which, as promised, I
was able to escape. I discovered, as many of you knew without this effort,
that being speranza is harder than it looks."
Well, yes. The Latin then is *sperantia. This has a passive voice to it. So
the stem, really is
"spero"
as in the well-known motto
cum spero spiro
As I wait, I breath. Or, while there is hope there is life.
Spero is nothing too obscure to conceptualise. But I remember I was at the
British Arts Centre once and got into a conversation with an American about
the meaning of English 'wait' vs. 'hope'. In Spanish we don't make that
distinction. It's all "esperare". Italian, 'sperare'. The psychoanalyst tried
to explain to me that 'wait' has a bad ring to it. You wait for the bus,
but not Death. We hope _that_ death will be the entrance to Paradise, rather
than Hell. You cannot Hope Mary. But in Spanish you can say, "Espero a
Maria" (Italian, *Spero Maria).
"Wait for" Spaniards find otiose seeing that they already have "esperar".
They hope that the bus will come, and things like that.
In any case, the neuter plural, -ntia, is Provencal and includes a passive
sense and a present continuous. The neuter plural is either derived from
the feminine or the other way round. In this case I prefer to think that the
neutral sense is prior. THINGS to be waited for. Things to hope for:
sperantia. Literally, "things which are hoped" (by who -- is left implicit).
Later, however, the Provencals, who love a lady, personified this neuter
plural into a feminine. There is the 'anchor of hope', which as L. Helm does
yachting he may be able to provide the English for. It's 'ancora della
speranza' in Italian. The idea is that it's the big anchor _just_ in case --
when all other hopes are lost.
When Spenser wrote "The Faerie Queane" he kept "Speranza" as one of the
Queane's companion _sic_ in Italian, for some reason. And she is reprented as
carrying an ancora della speranza in her lily-white hand. As such, it has
entered the OED2, "Speranza".
"Speranza" is _not_ too common a surname. There is one contributor to the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, one "Ugo Speranza" who wrote on Italian
architecture. Wherever the origins of the surname (apparently one Riccardo,
and the
coat of arms carrying the colour associated with Hope, GREEN, and the
aforementioned anchor) I only associate myself with Liguria.
Dante does use 'speme' other than 'speranza' in various lines. But he does
use "Speranza" in lines other than the famous one, too. In Opera, both
"speranza" and 'speme' are used. I used to collect, and still do, operatic
lines featuring 'speranza'. One good one is Villazon, in the newly released
film, "Boheme", where 'stanza' is made to rhyme with 'speranza' in a very high
tone, which destroys Villazon really.
Cheers,
J. L. Speranza
The Villa Speranza
etc.
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