Blog Post 13 (Troubadour Poet & Dante)

By comparing “When the Sweet Air Goes Bitter (Descant on a Theme by Cercamon) by the troubadour poet, Cercamon, and the narration of Dante XVI in his work of Vita Nuova, I was able to find a similarity in terms of praising each poet’s beloved. As Cercamon states in his fourth stanza, “For in her is all my delight / And all that can save me”, he compares his beloved to a refugee-like figure that could “cure” him from his “ache”, which he mentions earlier and elaborates in the latter part of the poem. He also uses “delight” in order to describe his joy of loving. In Dante XVI, he writes the phrase, “I approach such abundant graciousness” to describe the overflowing charms of Beatrice, Dante’s beloved. Therefore, It is evident that Both Cercamon and Dante are able to find great pleasure of loving their beloveds.

            However, a more vivid parallel between Dante and Cercamon could be drawn in their descriptions of heartbreaking conditions. Cercamon writes, “If she won’t have me now, Death is my portion, / Would I had died that day I came into her sway” in order to display his desperate willingness to choose “death” if his beloved continues to be unattainable. In fact, Cercamon wishes the time of death to be when he first started to serve for his beloved, to show his desire to avoid such painful experiences by eliminating any possibility of falling in love.

            In the narratives of Dante XVI, similar descriptions of devastating stage of love are evident. Dante writes, “Love, many times without warning, attacked me so violently that no part of me remained alive except one thought that spoke of this lady” and “it ultimately annihilated my little remaining life” to display scarcity of life from loving Beatrice. Moreover, the only living portion of Dante is a thought of continuous praise of his beloved. Therefore, Dante describes the remainder of himself as “death”, which Cercamon also uses to portray his broken heart.