Paradiso, Canto 3

Purchase Joe Carlson's translation of Paradiso

Summary

In the pale atmosphere of the moon a group of faces appears, pearly, faint and indistinct. They are souls who were inconstant to vows made on earth. Dante speaks with Piccarda dei Donati who tells him that she and all the spirits who share her lowly estate are content in the degree of bliss which it has pleased God to assign to them, for “His will is (their) peace.” Piccarda tells the story of her nunhood and enforced marriage and indicates the soul of the Empress Constance (the mother of Frederick II of Sicily) who was likewise compelled to leave her convent and enter into matrimony. Singing Ave Maria, Piccarda fades from sight and Dante turns once more to look on Beatrice. Her radiance, shining for an instant in its Empyrean glory, overpowers his vision and leaves him unable to frame the questions he would ask.

The Prepatory Lecture

Click here if video doesn't appear.

Questions for Reflection

• Why might Dante associate Beatrice with the sun (3.1)? Does this change the way we read Dante’s vision of the sun in Inferno 1?
• What relationship does Dante draw between “truth” and “sweetness” (3)? Is Dante threatened by his earlier errors or does being corrected by Beatrice bring about a renewed peace and desire for further knowledge? What might Dante be showing us about the nature of education and how we should approach our learning about divine matters?
• The pilgrim’s first sight of heavenly souls confuses him. Why might he associate his sight with the myth of Narcissus? Why might Dante be drawing our attention to the relationship between appearance and reality?
• Who is Piccarda and why does she appear to Dante in the moon? Why might Dante choose for the first person we meet in Paradiso to be someone who broke vows to God?
• Does Piccarda want to venture higher up in Paradise or is she content with her position? How does she narrate her feelings about her position as it relates to the proper ordering of the entire cosmos (3.64-90)?
• What assumptions about the ego does Dante seem to bring into his conversation with Piccarda? Why does she teach him about the nature of the heavenly arrangement and the relationship of the blessed souls toward each other’s good? How does this differ from both Inferno and Purgatorio?

Paradiso, Canto 3 © Jan Hearn

The Images

The Moon. See under Images to Canto ii.

Piccarda dei Donati, the sister of Corso Donati and of Dante’s friend, Forese (cf. Purg. xxiii and xxiv), entered the convent of St Clare in Florence while still a young woman. Her brother Corso obliged her to break her vows and marry Rossellino della Tosa, with whom he sought political alliance. Shortly after her marriage, Piccarda fell ill and died. Forese speaks tenderly of her beauty and virtue when questioned about her by Dante on the sixth cornice of Mount Purgatory. Her gentleness and sweetness of disposition, skilfully conveyed by her words to Dante, make her a fitting image in general of the nature that yields to the pressure of others and lacks the necessary steadfastness to remain constant to the will’s resolve. Specifically, both Piccarda and the Empress Constance, whom she names, are symbols of inconstancy to religious vows.

Tom LA Books