Finding Dante in a Novel by Joyce Carol Oates

Finding Dante in a Novel by Joyce Carol Oates

Written By: Joshua Voshell

Edited By: Devin Heck

After reading the novel Because it is Bitter, and Because it is my Heart, I noticed some striking similarities to Dante’s Divine Comedy. The Comedy is about Dante’s ascent from the Inferno to Paradise, and in in this novel, Iris follows a similar ascension trajectory. She ascends from low middle class to the upper echelons of society. Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart is both an illusion to the Divine Comedy and a rejection of some of its key precepts.

In Because it is Bitter, Iris fills the role of Dante, and her journey shares interesting similarities to that rough outline of his journey throughout the Divine Comedy. Because it is Bitter opens with the discovery of a dead body floating down a river. Although the body is not actually Iris’s, it does seem that this body is symbolic of Iris crossing the river Acheron. The way the reader can pick up on this is that the body belongs to Little Red, and when the reader looks back on this character's death, they see just how important this incident is to the rest of Iris’s story; it is the catalyst that propels Iris on her path through the book. The body of Little Red can be understood as the death of this little girl, and thus his body can be understood symbolically as her own body. It is also important to note that the person who first discovers the body floating down the river is not able to identify the body, furthering the idea that this corpse is meant as more of a symbolic device.

Throughout her life in Hammond, Iris’s life goes from bad to worse. When we see her as a young child, her parents are not very good at their duties but are passable; over time, the responsibilities of having a child is too much for them. This can be seen by the ever more absent father, which forces the mother to become the responsible parent. This inevitably causes the mother to become resentful, because all she wants to do is go to bars and mingle. She eventually does ignore her parental responsibilities so that she can paint the town red. After the father is completely absent and the parents are divorced, the two, mother and daughter, begin to sink into poverty as the alcoholism that plagues her mother makes its slow play for her life. Having moved many times as a child, Iris has been unable to take root in a group of peers and the secret of Little Red’s death helps to further alienate her from others her age. The secret also forms a strong bond between Iris and Jinx. The two feel close to each other, but also distanced due to period racial division. This forbidden love is never quite given a chance to be expressed, which has long-term effects on Iris, who feels she can love no one else.

The trials of Hammond climax with the death of Iris’s mother and the breaking of Jinx’s ankle. This climax ends the section of the book where Iris lives, endures the trials of Hammond, and begins her new life in New York, where she studies in college and climbs the social ladder. The climax and sudden shift in the book represent the same tonal shift Dante experiences when he passes through the heart of the Inferno to climb the mountain of Purgatory in order to reach Paradise. Her Paradise, unlike the Paradise of the Divine Comedy, is that of social status, wealth, and security. Her ascension is from the squalor of her family to the riches of the Savages.

Though both journeys of Iris and Dante begin with a death, they are different sorts of deaths and have different consequences. Dante’s death opens up for him the possibility of redemption because it is the death of the old self, giving the possibility for a new, better self. It is the purification of the soul, allowing him to reach the presence of his beloved, widely considered a symbol for righteousness, and therefore allowing him into Paradise. Iris’s story begins with a death but is that of another. This is not a story of purification of the soul: her soul rots and festers. But this festering personality leads her to Paradise. Little Red’s death inextricably connects Iris and Jinx for the rest of her journey, something that would not have otherwise happened in the society they lived in. Throughout the book, we see Iris mature very quickly, although this can be better understood as her growing cold and detached. The unfulfilled relationship with Jinx plays a large role in this process. She never feels able to open up to anyone else and this is what makes her heart so bitter: she knows that society would never accept the two together, but she also knows that black people are not inherently different from white people. While growing up in Hammond, she overhears her parents discussing how black people have different blood than white people. She finds this puzzling, and later she gets in a fight with a black girl and sees that her blood is red and the same as her own, it leads her to conclude that what she personally observes is more accurate than what other people tell her is true. This encapsulates her outlook on race and we can see that she has no problems with African Americans. Iris is at odds with a society she feels alienated from, but a big influence on this outlook is that Jinx saved her from the white boy who desired to rape her. His heroic actions color her view of him and extend to all those who look like him.

One of the most important elements in the Divine Comedy is the Inferno, because is only through it that Dante can reach Paradise. The Inferno is made up of levels that can be understood as constructed in descending concentric circles. When beginning his journey, he rides the river Acheron to arrive at the first circle of the Inferno, Limbo. This is a place relegated to Virtuous pagans, those who fall just shy of what is required to enter Paradise. Beyond Limbo, the Inferno has many declining levels, but what is important lays at the heart of the Inferno. At its center drain three rivers into a frozen pond where Lucifer is trapped. Because It Is Bitter mirrors the world of the Inferno in that it can be viewed as existing in concentric circles. The first circle, Limbo, is represented by the town of Hammond. Hammond is not a particularly bad place to live, but like Limbo, it’s not Paradise. The scene where Little Red’s body is found floating on the river is analogous to Dante crossing over to Limbo by way of the river Acheron. The rest of Iris’s life in Hammond, from the day of the murder until the day she leaves for school, forms the rest of the circles. Dante's Inferno goes down, but Iris's Inferno goes inward. A rough outline of these circles would contain the small town she lived in, social pressures she experiences, her dysfunctional family, and her shared secret about the murder. She learns to withdraw and hide deep within herself to survive. Dante finds Lucifer at the heart of his Inferno, but Iris instead finds her dead alcoholic mother. She has not dealt with her problems up to Persia’s death, nor does she afterwards. Therefore, before leaving the Inferno her problems are not cleansed; instead, they solidify into ice. While Dante is able to reach Paradise by traveling through Cocytus- the icy lake at the heart of the Inferno- Iris is able to leave Hammond by forming her bitterly icy heart.

After Dante leaves through the icy heart of the Inferno, he ascends through Purgatory to reach Paradise. Iris leaves Hammond after the death of her mother to attend college in New York. Here, Iris excels at her schoolwork, just like in Hammond, only now her talents are noticed and rewarded. Doctor Savage, a professor of art and art history, becomes quite interested in her. He is of the upper echelon, where wealth and beauty flow like water. His family represents Paradise. Dante struggles to ascend the Mountain of Purgatory, while Iris gradually works her way into Dr. Savage and his wife’s good graces. She sees them and what they represent as an opportunity to rise above her old life, but it’s only because of her old life, the experiences she had, and the way they shaped her that she can be accepted by the Savages. It is her icy heart that allows her to so easily fill the role the Savages desire.  

In the Divine Comedy, Dante's love, Beatrice, requests Virgil guide Dante to Paradise. In Because It Is Bitter, Mrs. Savage fills the role of Beatrice. Mrs. Savage is unsatisfied by the way her own daughter lives her life, and desires a daughter who will live up to her ideals; Iris is just what the mother is looking for. So she calls forth her son, who is off in Paris, to come and marry Iris. This will graft Iris into the family and thus solidify her place in Paradise.  

In the Divine Comedy, Virgil leaves Limbo to accompany Dante through the Inferno and Purgatory, but not all the way to Paradise. This is because Beatrice represents theology and Virgil, the height of mortal wisdom. In our story, the part of Virgil is played by Alan. We can see the similarities between Alan and Virgil in a few different ways. Virgil resides in Limbo far away from Paradise, but it is the best place a virtuous pagan can reside, because they are outside the family of Christ. Alan is in Paris, far away from the Savage family. It’s only in this distant city that he can live without following the rules dictated by his family and their society. Beatrice calls Virgil to guide her love to Paradise. Similarly, we see Gwendelyn Savage call for her son to leave Paris and move back home, where he is coerced into marrying Iris. This marriage prompted by his mother is what finally brings Iris from her low class status to the wealthy status of the Savages. For Iris’s metaphor, Paradise is represented by high society and the Savages live within that space. We can see they live not only with wealth but also with beauty, as Mr. Savage is only concerned with art as beauty, and this is what he surrounds himself with. It is the marriage to Alan that grafts Iris to this stratum of society- but Alan, unlike Virgil, does not leave to go back to where he came from and is also brought into Paradise by being enfolded back into his family via Iris.

As Dante travels through the Inferno and Purgatory, he is forced to confront his sins and is then stripped of the characteristics that keep him from Paradise, leaving him with only the righteous, core elements of himself. As Iris travels in her life, she is slowly stripped of her own admirable characteristics. She escapes Hammond and her dysfunctional family, as well as the societal constructs that pertain to her social class, and is able to move to a seemingly better city, with a better family and a better social class. However, rather than positively purifying her, it serves to strip her of individuality and gives her the ability to wear the mask that the Savages want- she becomes a hollow, bitter person. The final act of her purification takes place just before her wedding, the signification of achieving Paradise. She is drawn to a dangerous neighborhood, where she is assaulted by a group of African Americans. Just as the actions of Jinx solidify her uniquely positive views towards blacks as whole, so does this collective action reverse this view. She is no longer comfortable with African Americans, and this is the last of her admirable characteristic that is stripped before she is able to ascend into Paradise.

In the Divine Comedy, Dante is brought through the Inferno with the guiding hand of Virgil, but Iris has no such guide. Dante's travels purify him while Iris’s journey makes her cold and strips her of her ability to empathize with African Americans, which is one of her earlier defining and unusual characteristics. She is guided by no wisdom, because not everyone can be saved by wisdom; some people are condemned by circumstance. Iris is lucky and ends up in a circumstance where she can rise above her social status, but she lives a joyless life of meaningless beauty in her newly found heaven, because that is what was necessary for her to achieve her idea of Paradise.