Ingentes

Nov 13, 2020, 05:34 PM

Flatterers created by Marco Furlanetto.

"Flatterers are found in Malebolge, one very unique area in Dante's Inferno: according to the poet, here are among the worst sinners, those who made very bad use of the human highest virtues. Flatterers' words were meant to provide benefits, prestige, but at the same time they were full of lies, without limits in the way they were told. So Dante condemns them to lie in excrement, moaning and slapping themselves with dirty hands. Not a painful, but a very humiliating punishment.

"Dante describes flatterers with words he would never use again in the whole Commedia: he's vulgar, raw, rhythmic, unpleasant sounds, piercing.

"So I tried to convey all of this in my piece, and the title is taken from the prostitute Taide's story: it seems she would have used that word - which means "very much!" - in a context where it was simply too much, so not being a moderate person (even if the story is not very clear, meaning that maybe it was not Taide who spoke that word).

"My piece is made only with recordings (ambiences and foley) of mine and the way of processing them reflects my immersion in reading the Flatterers section and imagining what the soundtrack for the flatterer could be, when (s)he thinks at who (s)he was in life, what (s)he did, and what present is living in hell, what infinite future awaits.

"I suggest to listeners to read (loud) the Flatterers section, in order to understand how Dante wrote about them, understand his deep feeling about them... and then simply close their eyes and immerse themselves in  listening to the piece."

Part of the Inferno project to imagine and compose the sounds of Dante’s Hell, marking the 700th anniversary of The Divine Comedy. To find out more, visit http://www.citiesandmemory.com/inferno