Instead of letting all of Inferno's sinners burn in the traditional flames of hell, Dante successfully uses the contrapasso to construct a world with a unique psychological depth, and therefore a deeper potential for suffering. . Contrapasso distinguishes each sinner by making their punishment uniquely suited to the sin, so that each Inferno soul inhabits an individual hell of different thoughts, desires, and pains. As Dante enters Purgatory and Paradisio and still sees distinctions between souls based on their earthly characteristics, it is tempting to say that the contrapasso continues to define a soul's existence throughout the Comedy. But although the contrapasso works so brilliantly in Inferno, Dante does not use this technique of separation as a central theme when constructing an effective Purgatorio and Paradisio. This shift from the human isolation of the contrapasso to a unity of desire and purpose helps Dante create a vision of Purgatory and Paradisio that is both uniquely peaceful and awe-inspiring. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayThe effectiveness of the contrapasso in punishing the sinners of Inferno is evident in the isolated position of Master Adam, for whom the contrapasso creates an individual world unique to its sin. Dante meets Adam, a coin forger, in the tenth pocket of the eighth circle, where the fraudsters suffer together. Adam's body is unnaturally disfigured so that it appears "shaped like a lute" (Canto XXX line 49) and he cannot move from his place. His immobility and deformity are suited to his sin, the warping of metals, an occupation that allowed him everything he desired on Earth. In the Eighth Circle, he is not only physically deformed but also psychologically affected: the two things he craves most. are water and revenge on his fellow falsifiers, both goals that require movement. He said: alive, I had enough of everything I wanted; alas, I now want a drop of water. . . I am torn by the memory, the image of their flow [of the streams of the Arno] dries me more than the illness which deprives my face of flesh. (Canto XXX, lines 62-69) Master Adam's world is eternally limited to his inner suffering, his mind forever stuck in vengeance against his fellow sinners, and his inability to fulfill his desires. His punishment forever isolates Master Adam from his peers. Another sinner who helps elucidate the effectiveness of the contrapasso is Brunetto Latini and his conversation with Dante in the Third Ring of the Seventh Circle of Hell. The Seventh Circle contains Sodomites who were violent against God and Dante even has difficulty recognizing Brunetto, his former mentor and teacher, among a group of souls running in a rain of fire. Brunetto's face is badly scratched and he has to keep their encounter brief so as not to fall behind the group he is running with. His sins continue to dominate his existence and serve as an instrument of punishment. The indignity of the old and respected master's position makes his punishment not only physically appropriate to the rain of fire similar to the homosexual passion he could not control on Earth, but also psychologically. Indeed, Brunetto never directly discusses his sin and instead discusses politics and earthly matters. with Dante. But Brunetto's only hope is to have earthly fame and to be remembered in the great encyclopedic work he left behind, the Tesoro: “May my Tesoro, in which I still live, / be precious to you;and I ask no more” (Canto XV, lines 119-120) are his parting words as he flees to join his fellow sinners. Due to his homosexuality, Brunetto did not leave his name through his offspring, in a natural way, but wants his name to live on through his work. This pride in his work plays a crucial role in his punishment, as glory and respect are things he will never be able to achieve thanks to his humiliating position in Inferno. These obsessions are unique to Brunetto, placing him alone in his torment and separated from the many other souls of Inferno who each have their own private hell of desire and pain. This severe isolation is alleviated in Purgatorio, where the characters experience a transitional form of contrapasso, one that takes them from the eternal punishment of Hell to the timeless unity of Paradisio. In a sense, the contrapasso still exists in each of the terraces of Purgatory where souls purge their sins through punishments directly linked to their faults on Earth. However, the contrapasso does not define the center of their existence: souls are not consumed by their sin as are the sinners of Inferno. Instead, all the pilgrims in Purgatory want to abandon their earthly distinctions, cleanse themselves of their sins, and move toward a unity in God, a goal they share when they suffer together. It can be argued that the contrapasso still remains in the suffering inflicted on them on each terrace, but their ultimate and most painful punishment is their distance from God and the awareness of a paradise they have not yet reached. Dante begins to observe this new harmony in Purgatory when he reaches the Second Terrace where the Envious purge their sins. He greets souls with: “You who can be certain, I began then, of seeing this high light which is the only object of your desire, that, in your conscience, all impurity will soon be dissolved by grace, so that the a flow of memory flows through him limpidly." (Canto XIII, lines 85-90) After seeing the eyes of the Envious close (because it was through their vision that they envied others), Dante feels compassion for them but realizes that their unified desire is to forget their sin through this physical state of pain and experience the love of God While the contrapasso works in Hell by forever trapping sinners with their memories. painful, Dante recognizes that these souls only desire a "clear" memory of their past. The souls in Purgatory share not only a contempt for their personal past, but also a desire for unity with God and other souls. Duca, one of the souls of the Second Terrace, cries out against the isolated heart of a sinner when he confesses his earthly longing to Dante and begs him: “O humanity, why do you put your heart / where our share you can't get a role? » (Canto XIV, lines 86-87). Dante later questions Virgil about what Guido meant by this "sharing" and Virgil explains that: when your desires are focused on things, sins must be purged. . . then desire stirs the bellows of your sighs. But if the love within the highest Sphere turned your desires heavenward, the fear that dwells in your heart would disappear; because there, the more there are who would say “ours”, the greater the good that each one possesses, the more love burns in this cloister. (Canto XV, lines 49-57) Therefore, we see that the greatest goal of the characters in Purgatory is to leave behind and purge their distinctive sins and human qualities in order to become one with God and with their similar. The inhabitants of Purgatory do not suffer in a private hell for their sins on Earth as we saw in Inferno, but ratherinstead focus as a united group on God and their desire to make their own free will one with God's. Although Dante witnesses many of the brutal punishments of Purgatory that draw his pity and compassion, the souls do not seem to care as much about contrapasso-like pain as the souls of Hell did. Their greatest punishment is that the sins they must purge prevent them from fully receiving God's love and delay their entry into Paradisio. Whereas in Inferno each sinner expressed his own desires, whether for earthly glory or revenge, the characters in Purgatorio ask the same thing: only that Dante pray for them when he reaches Paradisio or remind the members of his family to pray for them in Purgatory. .This contempt for earthly pain can be seen in Dante's encounter with the poets Guido Guinizzelli and Arnaut Daniel in the Seventh Terrace of Purgatory where the Lustful (heterosexual and homosexual) are punished. Their sin of excessive lust as well as their fame on Earth makes this scene a striking parallel to Dante's encounter with Brunetto in Inferno. Just as with Brunetto, Dante sings his appreciation for Guido Guinizzelli's work after recognizing it, but Guido's reaction immediately separates him from Brunetto. He carelessly brushes aside Dante's compliments, declaring Arnaut's greatest talent, another soul on the Seventh Terrace, and asks Dante to pray for him in Heaven as he flees with his group. Dante soon after speaks with Arnaut, who also refuses to speak. of his work on Earth as if it were of no consequence, declaring that: with sorrow I see again my former madness; with joy, I see the hoped-for day approaching. Now, by the Power that leads you to the top of the stairs, I beg you: remember, in due time, my pain! (Canto XXVI, lines 143-147) While Brunetto suffers alone wanting only his work to gain earthly fame, Arnaut and Guido long to forget their past writings and sins in their fervor to reach God. The final words of each master artist further cement the difference between the contrapasso of Inferno and the new unified vision of Purgatorio. Brunetto's existence and all his desires are directly linked to his personality and his individual qualities on Earth: the contrapasso requires that he always be trapped and consumed by his sins. Guido and Arnaut, on the other hand, share the same desire to get closer to God, just like all the other numerous characters Dante encounters in Purgatorio: despite their current purge and their various realizations as humans, their existence is no longer defined by their sins but by their growing capacity and devotion to God. As Dante leaves Purgatory and settles in Paradisio, he again sees a separation of the inhabitants in their placement on different spheres based on their faults and strengths on Earth. Despite this distinction, it is not the contrapasso that Dante uses in Inferno. Dante's guide, Beatrice, explains that the spheres are not a reality like the circles of Hell were because all these souls thanks to the Empryean; and each of them has a sweet life, although some feel the eternal Spirit more, others less. They have presented themselves to you here, not because this is their sphere, but as a sign to you that in the Empriean their place is the lowest. (Canto IV, lines 34-39) Although souls have different places in Heaven, their relative positions do not dictate their happiness or constitute the center of their existence; it simply symbolizes their different abilities for goodness sake. An example of this apparent paradox, in.