Dante V Canto XIV Scene II

 Canto XIV

Second Terrace; Envious in the works

Scene II

“You fool, my nephew who was not to be King. You should have said, who is this that circles our mountain ere death have given him flight and opens and shuts his eyes at his own will?” One other told the one who spoke earlier.

“I know not who he is, but I know that he is not alone.” The earlier one spoke.

“As you did when you met your father and plotted against me?” The second one snapped at the one he called his nephew. “I was the rightful King and yet even in death he plots my downfall.”

“Aye, he appears before me. He was there at the ramparts, bellowing my name that I was to be King on his death.” The first one spoke out. “Maybe he whom we sought may tell us what was right?”

“Do thou, who art nearer to him, ask him, and sweetly, so that he may speak.” The second one spoke. Dante looked at the two who stood there, distance apart but with their blinded sight they look at each other. They have dressed alike in the coarse tunic but the posture spoke of them who once held high esteem of themselves and from others not in the rank. From what he heard of them, they must be of blood relations with one perhaps the uncle and the other his nephew.

“O soul, that fixed in thy body art going on toward heaven, for charity console us, and tell us whence thou comest, and who thou art; for thou makest us so greatly marvel at his thy grace, as needs must a thing that never was before.” The one who was the nephew spoke in great length.

Dante was to reply when he decided to do otherwise. He took his words carefully to describe himself.

“In Tuscany, there wanders a little stream that had its source ---” Dante was cut off then.

“Thou spoke of my realm. I am Hamlet of the Kingdom. And that is my uncle who took my throne until my ghostly father had turned on me to take back what was mine.”  The younger nephew was the one who cut in.

“I have not spoken ---” Dante was trying to explain.

“Envious I was off my Uncle Claudius and I plotted his demise.” The younger one went on after interrupting Dante. “He ---”

“The kingdom was not of yours anymore when I became King. The throne was will not fit not that the name of such contender for the throne like you. One whose source at which heaven shuns all, and what flows in them, virtue is driven away as an enemy to all men, even as a serpent, either through the ill fortune of the name or through evil habit that incites them.” The older one hit back.

“I am Hamlet, ado not condemned my father who was ---” The younger one defended his rightful place.

“I am not, for he bred from him the one that among foul hogs, more fit for acorns than for other food made for human use, its descendants into madness direct by its poor path. Then descending to find curs, more snarling than their power warrants and from them disdainfully it twists its muzzle. Thus, you become Hamlet, a mad hog.”

“Your words will not disdain me from my true inheritance, Uncle Claudius, and yet you plot against me as you did with my father. You married my mother to become King. Envy of me being one before you may.” The younger name named Hamlet accuses the other. “Envious you were. Then and now.”

It was then both souls stopped and looked away. The look of pain was in their expression, and the older one spoke.

“My blood was so inflamed with envy, that had I seen a man becoming joyful, thou wouldst have seen me overspread with the hue of spite. Of my sowing the straw I reap. Why dost thou set thy heart there where exclusion of companion is needful?” The older one then introduced the younger one.

“He is the prince named Hamlet and I am his uncle, Claudius. Both of us are the same blood stocks, yet we bred in us the poisonous stocks that slowly would they die through our culling. Where are the good ones in our life?”

“Marvel not, Tuscany. I weep when I remember Polonius, Ophelia, and my love, Queen Gertrude. I plotted with others due to my envy.” The older one sighed.

“And I feigned madness on my envy that you are King. I committed Ophelia to madness and challenge Laertes when I could have humbled my guilt instead of being envious of him. If only I had a better sense of my sins and I will not be standing here with you, Uncle.”

“And me, Nephew.” The older one reached out to the younger one. The older one then turned in Dante's direction.

“Go thy way, Tuscany. For now, it pleases me far more to weep than to speak, so much has our discourse wrung my mind.”

Dante was motioned by Virgil that they are to leave the two alone. They took their distance and then Virgil ever bewildered then asked Dante the pertinent question.

“Did I just see Hamlet in the play here? This is absolute madness.” Virgil was baffled. “Is it not a theatrical play and not ---real?”

“Hamlet is a play by the renowned Shakespeare whose works were made into many presentations form. Yes, we witnessed a play by two actors who may have been very immersed in their works to think they are who they played. Or rather made to think they were.”

“Actors in this---imprisoned here like --- this is madness even for the demented.” Virgil was struggling to find the words.

“Artisans for many reasons and over the age of time had been imprisoned on the grounds of inciting revolutions. I am not surprised if those two were the victims of such acts; they are not of the act but made believe to be in it. Their souls like the others were made to suffer here. It’s not madness but deviant workings of the mind. We must leave this place and make right of the works.”

 

Note: the original translated works at Canto XIV were of two characters who were talking of their lives in the era then. I decided to mold that into a play of Hamlet which was seen above. The Hamlet play display the sins of envy which led to fake madness and the counter plot to commit murder. Envy drove the uncle to take the throne and it was also envy; in my view that drove Hamlet to regain what was his. It may be selfishness but I felt envious was the more driving factor.

I hoped I got it right in the context here.