It’s finally October, and I’m not sure about you, but I take the calendar change as a sign that it is now officially acceptable to fully immerse myself in the autumnal energy. It’s time for Halloween, sweaters, warm drinks, scary movies and pumpkin flavored snacks, and, of course, to switch over to the fall playlists. My first stop for the last few years, if I’m looking for some good fall ambiance, is Hozier’s 2023 album Unreal Unearth. This 16-track album, crafted during the pandemic and released just in time for a moody autumnal debut last August, was written based on Dante’s Inferno, a novel in which a fictionalized version of Dante himself makes his way through the nine circles of hell. As an English major with an interest in gothic literature, Unreal Unearth is like my very own catchy, moody puzzle to figure out and break apart the same way I would a sonnet or a Shakespearean drama. In honor of October, here’s my official breakdown of this album, and how it’s connected to Inferno and other literary legends. I invite you to walk with me through these nine circles that Hozier took from Dante and expanded upon through his music.
Circle One: Limbo
The first circle of Hell, as decided by Dante, is called Limbo. Limbo is, as its name implies, a sort of in-between place, for people who are good, but who cannot be let into Heaven, i.e., virtuous pagans and the unbaptized. Those in Limbo are fated to stay there forever, caught up in an endless cycle of in-between that never hurts them, but never relinquishes. Hozier plays with the idea of a never ending cycle in one of my favorite tracks from the album, “First Time.” In “First Time,” he cycles through the process of a relationship, beginning with the lyrics:
“Some part of me came alive
the first time that you called me baby
but some part of me must have died
the first time that you called me baby”
He continues through the song, repeating this chorus almost exactly, but moving from the “first time,” to “each time,” to the “last time.” He plays with this process of constantly dying and being brought back to life by the person he loves — caught in the limbo state of a relationship that simultaneously brings one down and lifts one up. He also toys with the idea of this constant cycle of life and death by taking a unique view on flowers. He describes how flowers live most of their life underground, just to grow up and then be “ripped out by the stem.” The flower, living as its brightest self and finally blooming above ground for all else to see, is also simultaneously dying, having been plucked at its prime, to stay vibrant and beautiful as it lives its last moments. Hozier writes of these moments:
“Sensing only now it’s dying
drying out then drowning blindly
blooming forth its every color
in the moments it has left”
The flower is reflective of this limbo state, caught between beauty and the brightness of life, but also deeply entwined in death and suffering.
Circle Two: Lust
Hozier’s most obvious nod to circle two is through track four, “Francesca.” The name Francesca is taken directly from Dante (and history). The real Italian noblewoman, Francesca da Polenta, was slain by her own husband after he discovered her in bed with his brother, Paolo. Francesca and Paolo were lovers during the course of Francesca’s whole marriage, and Dante placed these characters in the second circle, lust, as punishment. In the song, “Francesca”, Hozier takes on the narrative of Paolo, expressing no regrets for the affair with his brother’s wife:
“If someone asked me at the end
I’ll tell them, put me back in it
darling, I would do it again
if I could hold you for a minute
darling, I’d go through it again”
He, as Paolo, expressed that although it led to tragedy, his love for Francesca perseveres. He likens their love to a cancer that takes hold of “each piece of your body.” Towards the end of the song, he even makes the point that such a love as theirs couldn’t exist in Heaven anyways, saying:
“Heaven is not fit to house a love
like you and I”
Circle Three: Gluttony
“Eat Your Young” is our obvious tie to the third circle, gluttony. “Eat Your Young” encompasses the idea of taking up all of something at the expense of others around you. He starts the song saying:
“I’m starving, darling
let me put my lips to something
let me wrap my teeth around the world”
This illustrates that the speaker in this song would eat the world in order to satiate his own hunger, taking it all for himself with no consideration of everyone else around him. His hunger is all encompassing, and he will do anything to satisfy it, without a second thought. Similarly, in the second verse of the chorus, Hozier writes:
“Come and get some
skinning the children for a war drum
putting food on the table selling bombs and guns
it’s quicker and easier to eat your young”
The speaker describes doing anything -– even skinning and eating his own children -– in order to eat, and not caring about, or considering, the consequences it may entail.
Circle Four: Greed
Hozier’s take on the fourth circle, greed, is somewhat unique. Instead of singing as someone who partakes in this sin, he writes from a diagnostic perspective of what many would call “corporate greed.” It accounts for the damage that gets done in society, although the young are often blamed for it. Aptly named, “Damage Gets Done (featuring Brandi Carlile), this song states how being “reckless and young / is not how the damage gets done.” When we’re young, we have so little stake in the world -– we’re just starting to establish who we are and who we want to be. So why, as Hozier writes, are we “being blamed for a world we had no power in.” This illustrates the greed that often befalls the older generations, who control things such as the economy, politics, etc. and hold all of the control in the world, but who tend to blame problems on the younger generation.
Circle Five: Wrath (Styx)
Circle five is the circle of wrath. Again, Hozier takes a unique approach to this circle with “Who We Are.” “Who We Are” deals with the speaker’s struggle to uncover their identity beyond their seemingly, “unattainable” dreams and life goals. The song, quite pessimistic in tone, talks about being born in the dark, not knowing who we are or what we are, in terms of identity and life’s purpose. Hozier’s narrator feels angry and like they’ve been deceived,kept “in the dark” about the true nature of life and identity since they were born. He’s enraged that he’s put so much of his life into working towards something he doesn’t believe in.
“You and I burned out our steam
chasing someone else’s dream
How can something be so much heavier
but so much less than what it seems?”
Why have they been bred to become a cog in the machine? How can he even know who he is, if he’s always been tricked into being a pawn in someone else’s game?
Circle Six: Heresy
The sixth circle of Hell is heresy. Heresy, in Dante’s context, referred to losing faith in religion and cursing God’s name. Clearly, as it’s the sixth circle, Dante held heresy in great contempt —more so than any of the previous circlese. Hozier chooses to see this devotion to “faith” in the context of a relationship that has ended. “All Things End” is a ballad about how learning to let go of something that no longer serves you is a fact of life, no matter how uncomfortable that may make us. Contrary to Dante’s viewpoint concerning religion, Hozier is encouraging acceptance and personal reflection to leave something behind if we need to, rather than stay steadfast and loyal to a situation, person, or belief that we no longer feel connected to. He sees the inevitable end to phases in our life as an opportunity, and as a reason to not be discouraged or think less of ourselves.Again,very different from Dante, who saw the abandonment of certain beliefs as damning for all time. The chorus goes:
“And just knowing
that everything will end
should not change our plans
when we begin again”
This is a reminder of the constantly shifting tides of life, and offers a hopeful message to keep moving forward.
Circle Seven: Violence
Circle seven is violence. Hozier’s interpretation of violence, again, comes from the end of a relationship. In “To Someone From A Warm Climate (Uiscefhuaraithe),” the speaker sings about a relationship that has left him feeling cold, bereft, and isolated. In the seventh circle, souls are doomed to one of three categories: violence against others, violence against self, and violence against God, art, and nature. In each category, they are doomed to isolation, left to reflect on the violence they’ve caused in life and ruminate on their sins forever. Hozier frames the grief of mourning a relationship in a similar way –– longing for warmth, both literally and figuratively, and for the presence of another to save him from the sudden isolation of being alone. He compares isolation and company to an empty bed on a cold winter’s night, beginning the song with, “A joy, hard learned in winter was the warming of the bed,” and continuing in the chorus by saying that the previous state of being in love was “as natural as another leg around you in the bed frame.” The ripping of one away from this warmth, plunged into becoming “uiscefhuaraithe,” which is Gaelic for something that has been “cooled by water,” left shivering and alone.
Circle Eight: Fraud/Betrayal
This circle is one of the more difficult ones for me. However, after doing some more research (i.e. listening to the album all over again), I think that track 14, “Abstract (Psychopomp),” is representative of this level. In “Abstract (Psychopomp),” Hozier appears to describe a bad memory that he has, of someone hitting an animal with their car and seeing it struggle afterwards. The themes that Hozier is exploring here is the feeling of betrayal, naivety and trust being abused. The animal, trusting of the world and unaware of the road, was just trying to cross the street in the rain, never seeing what was coming or even knowing there was something to fear. I think that Hozier is creating a likeness between the animal, and someone mourning a relationship in which their partner made them feel safe — only to betray them in some way at the end. Like the animal in the street, this person was carrying on through life, holding trust and faith in their partner, until they were suddenly struck with the dishonesty and knowledge that their partner was a fraud, ending their relationship. He sings,
“The speed that you moved
the screech of the cars
the creature still moving
that slowed in your arms.
The fear in its eyes
gone out in an instant
your tear caught the light
the Earth from a distance”
This expresses the sudden shock and pain of the creature (i.e., the speaker in the relationship) and the sense that what’s done is done. There is no possible retribution.
Circle Nine: Betrayal
While, I think that the argument for betrayal is present in “Abstract (Psychopomp),” I think that the most notable tie to this last circle is in “Unknown/Nth.” In the ninth circle of hell, souls are left frozen and alone. They are cursed to infinite isolation; they will stay there forever, doomed to remain unknown by their loved ones because they surrendered their right to anyone’s trust, love, and acknowledgement in life. In “Unknown/Nth,” Hozier seems to be seething, as a result of betrayal by a loved one. He portrays the pain of losing someone he knew so intimately and held in such high regard, only to turn around and be stabbed in the back. He writes:
“You called me ‘angel’ for the first time, my heart leapt from me
you smile now, I can see its pieces still stuck in your teeth
and what’s left of it, I listen to it tick
every tedious beat going unknown as any angel to me”
In this verse, he describes willingly handing over his love and admiration for someone, and that person abusing and destroying it, leaving only the reminders of the speaker’s own foolishness –– his betrayal towards himself –– behind. Throughout the song, the speaker describes how he would have done anything for his love. Near the end, he admits that, even still, he would probably give anything to know his partner truly and fully.
“Do you know, I could break beneath the weight
of the goodness, love, I still carry for you?
That I’d walk so far just to take
the injury of finally knowing you”
He remarks that what hurts him most isn’t that he’s now alone, without a lover, but that it turns out, he and his lover were both truly unknown to each other.
Wow, what a depressing way to end an album.
If those were your thoughts after the ninth circle explanation, fear not, because Hozier wraps up his album with an upbeat and optimistic ballad about emerging from the darkness, like Dante did from the circles of hell, with “First Light.” This song expresses that without the darkness, and the parts of life that we see as our own in the nine circles, we would not know how to see and appreciate the light. “First Light” feels like a sunbeam on a cool fall day, or the light filtering through the bright yellow leaves of an aspen tree. It reminds us that, even after the world shuts down and becomes dark for winter, brightness and love will come again. After an album that’s fit for spooky season, moody fall evenings and curling up with some gothic literature, “First Light” serves as a reminder that the world is always changing, and there can be light found even in the darkest corners of the darkest seasons of life.