Dante in Milton

Title: Comus, a masque at Ludlow Castle (Masques were extravagant theater productions)

Link: Level B at Rush Rhees Stacks

The story begins with the Attendant Spirit narrating his purpose, the setting, and the main villain.  The newly crowned king’s children return to their father after time away in study, but they have to travel through a forbidding forest.  By Jove’s command, the Attendant Spirit guides travelers of the forest to safety because Comus, the main antagonist, is the son of Circe and Bacchus, the former known to waylay sailors and the latter known to drink excessively, and he is just as powerful and devious as his mother.  The children search for water separately, and Comus tricks the sister into following him.

Like Canto 1, the dreary forest contains dangers that confuse and harm travelers, and the children fear what may come.  The Lady, who mirrors Dante, speaks of the danger that may befall her, and the terror she feels in the starless night.  

Comus, who lures travelers with wine, bewitches drinkers into beast/man chimeras that cause the drinkers to forget their identity.  Like the cowards in the Inferno, the transformation signifies corruption of their God-given appearance, and the transformed only live for themselves.  Milton, in a nod to Dante, uses the wolf and a lynx, which resembles a leopard, as the beasts that drinkers become.  The she-wolf and leopard in Dante represent greed and fraud respectively, which are the two traits that Comus represents as the son of Bacchus and Circe. 

Like Virgil, the Attendant Spirit rushes to the aid of the lost because a higher power commanded him.  He resides in the afterlife, but unlike Virgil and more like Beatrice and other blessed spirits in Paradiso, the Attendant Spirit resides in the spheres of the sky.  

Milton’s mastery of his predecessors is arguably as great as some scholars who study Dante, Homer, or Vergil today because Milton synthesizes and repurposes elements as a vehicle for his own ideas.  I find that exhilarating because, like Dante, Milton’s writing has vertigo-inducing depth that takes years, if not decades, to unravel.  As a history enthusiast and reader, tracing the line of succession fascinates me because each successor pays homage to his or her predecessors.