Humility Essays

No reader can fail to feel the constant pull of the vertical and horizontal axes in Dante’s Comedìa. A cycle of readings alive to the vertical, then, is as welcome as it is stimulating. The poem’s comic trajectory moves upwards, from asperitas to prosperitas, from a beginning that is horribilis et fetida, to an end…

In The Red Badge of Courage Henry Fleming, the main character grows up in a small town and signs up for the army against his mother will because he dreams of being a hero. Henry enlists in the 304th Regiment of New York Volunteers. However, after Henry joins the regiment he finds that his emotions…