Instead of leaving all the sinners of Hell to burn in the traditional flames of Hell, Dante successfully uses contrapasso to build a world with a unique psychological depth, and therefore a deeper potential for suffering. The Contrapass distinguishes each sinner by making his punishment uniquely appropriate to the sin so that each soul in Hell inhabits an individual Hell of different thoughts, desires and pains. As Dante moves into Purgatory and Paradise and still sees distinctions between souls based on their earthly characteristics, it is tempting to say that contrapasso continues to define the existence of a soul throughout the Comedy. But although contrapasso works so brilliantly in the Inferno, Dante does not use this separation technique as a central theme when constructing an effective Purgatory and Paradise. This move away from the human isolation of contrapasso and towards a unity of desire and purpose helps Dante create a vision of Purgatory and Paradise both extraordinarily peaceful and majestic. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The effectiveness of contrapasso in punishing the sinners of Hell is evident in the isolated position of Master Adam, for whom contrapasso creates an individual world unique to his sin. Dante meets Adam, a coin counterfeiter, in the Tenth Sack of the Eighth Circle, where the Fraudulents suffer together. Adam's body is unnaturally disfigured so that it appears "lute-shaped" (Canto XXX line 49) and he cannot move from his place. His immobility and deformity are appropriate 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 distorted but also psychologically affected: the two things he desires most. they are water and vengeance on his fellow forgers, both goals that require movement. He says: while I was alive, I had enough of everything I wanted; alas, now I long for a drop of water. . . I am torn apart by the memory, the image of their passing dries me up more than the disease that deprives my face of flesh. (Canto XXX, lines 62-69) Master Adam's world is eternally limited to his inner suffering, his mind forever set on revenge against his fellow sinners and his inability to satisfy his desires. His punishment forever isolates Master Adam from his peers. Another sinner who helps clarify the effectiveness of contrapasso is Brunetto Latini and his conversation with Dante in the Third Ring of the Seventh Circle of Hell. The Seventh Circle contains violent Sodomites against God and Dante even struggles to recognize Brunetto, his old mentor and teacher, among a group of souls running under a rain of fire. Brunetto has a badly burned face and has to keep the meeting short so as not to fall behind the group he is racing with. His sins continue to dominate his existence and serve as the instrument of his punishment. The humiliation of the old and respected master's position makes his punishment not only physically appropriate to the rain of fire akin to the homosexual passion he could not control on Earth, but also psychologically. Brunetto, in fact, never directly discusses his sin but instead discusses politics and earthly matters. with Dante. But Brunetto's only hope is earthly fame and to be remembered in the great encyclopedic work he left behind, the Treasure: "My Treasure, in which I still live, / may it be precious to you; and I ask for no more" (Canto XV , verse 119-120) are his parting words as he runs away to join his fellow sinners. Becauseof his homosexuality, Brunetto did not leave his name through his children, naturally, but instead wants his name to live on through his work. This pride in his work plays a crucial role in his punishment because fame and respect are things he can never gain with his humiliating action.position in Hell. These obsessions are unique to Brunetto, placing him alone in his torment and separated from the many other souls of Hell who each have their own private Hell of desire and pain. This severe isolation is alleviated in Purgatory, where the characters experience a transitory form of retaliation, one that takes them from the eternal punishment of Hell to the timeless unity of Paradise. In a certain sense, retaliation still exists in each of the terraces of Purgatory where souls purify their sins through punishments directly linked to their sins on Earth. However, retaliation does not define the center of their existence: souls are not consumed by their sin as the sinners of Hell are. Instead, all pilgrims to Purgatory want to abandon their earthly distinctions, wash away their sins, and move toward unity in God, a goal they share as they suffer together. It can be argued that retaliation still lingers in the suffering accorded them on every terrace, but their final and most painful punishment is the distance from God and the awareness of a Paradise they have yet to reach. Dante begins to observe this new harmony in Purgatory when he reaches the Second Terrace where the Envious purify their sins. Greet the souls with: «You who can be certain - I began then - of seeing that high light, which is the only object of your longing, may soon, in your conscience, every impurity be dissolved by grace, so that the flow of memory passes through him clearly". (Canto XIII, lines 85-90) After seeing the eyes of the Envious sewn shut (because it was through their vision that they envied others), Dante feels compassion for them but realizes that their unitary desire is to forget their sin through this physical pain and experience the love of God. While in Hell contrapasso works by forever trapping sinners with their painful memories, Dante recognizes that these souls desire only a "clear" memory of their past. The souls in Purgatory not only share contempt for their personal past, but also the desire for unity with God and with other souls. Guido del Duca, one of the souls of the Second Terrace, cries out against the isolated heart of the sinner when he confesses his earthly envy to Dante and begs him: "O humanity, why do you place your hearts / where our sharing cannot have a part?" Dante later questions Virgil on what Guido meant by this "sharing" and Virgil explains that: when your desires focus on things sins that need to be purified. . . then envy shakes the bellows of your sighs. But if love in the Highest Sphere directed your desires towards the sky, the fear that lives in your chest would disappear; because there, the more there are those who would say "ours", the greater the good possessed by each one, the more love burns in that cloister. (Canto The inhabitants of Purgatory do not suffer in a private Hell for their sins on Earth as we saw in Inferno, but instead focus as a united group on God and their desire to unite their free will with that of God. Although Dante witnesses of manybrutality punishments in Purgatory that attract his pity and compassion, the souls do not seem to care as much about contrapasso-like pain as the souls in Hell did. Their greatest punishment is that the sins they must cleanse prevent them from fully receiving God's love and delay their entry into Heaven. While in Inferno each sinner expressed their desires, be it earthly fame or revenge, the characters in Purgatory ask the same thing: only for Dante to pray for them when he reaches Paradise or to remind family members to pray for them in Purgatory. .This contempt for earthly pain is seen in Dante's meeting with the poets Guido Guinizzelli and Arnaut Daniel in the Seventh Terrace of Purgatory where the Lustful (heterosexuals and homosexuals) are punished. Their sin of excessive lust and their fame on Earth make this scene a striking parallel to Dante's encounter with Brunetto in the Hell. Just as with Brunetto, Dante sings his appreciation for Guido Guinizzelli's work after recognizing him, but Guido's reaction immediately separates him from Brunetto. He casually ignores Dante's compliments, declaring the greater talent of Arnaut, another soul of the Seventh Terrace, and asks Dante to pray for him in Heaven as he escapes with his group. Dante speaks immediately afterwards with Arnaut, who also refuses to speak. of his work on Earth as if it were irrelevant, declaring that: with sorrow, I see my former folly; with joy I see the long-awaited day approaching. Now, by the Power that leads you to the top of the ladder, I beg you: remember, at the right time, my pain! (Canto XXVI, lines 143-147) While Brunetto suffers alone wishing only for his work to gain earthly fame, both Arnaut and Guido wish to forget their past writings and sins in the fervor of reaching God. The last words of each master artist cement further the difference between the retaliation of Hell and the new unitary vision of Purgatory. Brunetto's existence and all his desires relate directly to his personality and individual qualities on Earth: retaliation requires that he will always be trapped and consumed by his sins. Guido and Arnaut, on the contrary, share the same desire to get closer to God, just like all the other numerous characters that Dante encounters in Purgatory: despite their current purge and their different realizations as human beings, their existence is no longer defined from their sins but from their growing ability and devotion to God. As Dante leaves Purgatory and moves to Paradise, he once again sees a separation of the inhabitants in their placement in different spheres depending on their defects and assets on Earth. Despite this distinction, however, this is not the contrapasso that Dante uses in the Inferno. Dante's guide, Beatrice, explains that the spheres are not a reality as the circles of Hell were because all those souls grace the Empryean; and each of them has a kind life, although some feel the Eternal Spirit more, others less. They have shown themselves here not because this is their sphere, but as a sign to you that in the Empryean their place is lower. (Canto IV, lines 34-39) Although souls have different places in Heaven, their relative positions do not dictate their happiness nor constitute the focus of their existence; it simply symbolizes their different capacities for the love of God. An example of this apparent paradox, in which all souls are united and happy despite their higher or lower position in Dante's eyes, is Piccarda, who appears on the sphere of the Moon in a lower position in the Empryean due to its inconstancy on Earth. Dante immediately asks her if she wishes to be.