Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
ROIT 40116
January 28, 2014
its exclusion from the divine, and was, as a result, sentenced to speak
in dreams.
Barkan then describes how Dantes dream of himself as
Ganymede fits the idea of the pagan being almost divine because it
parallels his actual experience, but is not completely accurate. Barkan
then describes how Dantes slumber has caused both the pilgrim and
his readers to miss the act of grace that allows the pilgrim access to
Purgatory proper. He suggests that this is, if nothing else, an exchange
of cultures because Virgil sees the Saint (Christianity) and Dante sees
the eagle (Pagan).
Barkan concludes by stating that the pilgrims experience is both
the Ganymedes story and its translation into sacred terms. It still
leaves the dream of pagan culture, but the erotic dimension of the
myth is suppressed with Dantes comparison of himself to Achilles
hidden on Skyros. He states that this end to the dream allows Dante to
avoid fusing the humanism of heuristic pederasty with the humanism
of cultural filiation.