Introduction:
The Divine
Comedy
Dante’s Inferno
Dante Alighieri
Facts
• Written between 1308-1321,
by the Italian poet Dante
Alighieri
• Tells of an imaginary journey
Dante takes through Hell,
Purgatory, and Paradise.
• The journey is symbolic of the
spiritual quest for salvation.
• This work provides a portrait
of almost every aspect of
medieval human life.
• Dante is the first “Christian
Humanist”
Dante
Dante was a great medieval Italian poet. For
Dante, the journey through life meant staying on
the straight road to righteousness.
• In his Divine Comedy he constructed, by means of
literature, his vision of an afterlife, taking into
consideration possibilities for all choices of lifestyle.
• These included heaven, hell, and purgatory (a
place to “work off” sin before entering heaven).
•
The quest
• Recognizing sin (journey through Hell, or the Inferno)
• Rejecting sin and awaiting redemption (Purgatory)
• Achieving salvation through faith in divine
revelation (seeing the light of God in Paradise)
o We will just read from the first portion, when he recognizes sin in his journey
through Hell
Allegory
• Defined as: a work in which the characters and
events are to be understood as representing other
things and symbolically expressing a deeper, often
spiritual, moral, or political meaning.
o The symbolic expression of a deeper meaning through a story or scene
acted out by human, animal, or mythical characters
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29XBn3M6ZGs
An allegory
• Dante’s Divine Comedy is based on an allegorical
journey.
• WARNING!!!! THIS IS VITALLY IMPORTANT INFO
o The walk through a dark and confusing world
represents the life journey of men and women, who
often become entangled in daily affairs and lose their
way.
• The work assumes two levels of meaning:
Temporal (external) and spiritual (internal).
• Dante’s extensive literary treatment of death and
afterlife aims to both comfort and warn; he envisions
rewards for the righteous and doom for the unrepentant.
The characters
• On his journey, Dante meets many historical figures. Even
his guide, the poet Virgil, is an important historical figure.
o Virgil- Dante’s guide through the depths of Hell. Historically,
Virgil lived in the first century B.C., in Northern Italy. Scholars
considered him the greatest of the Latin poets (the Aeneid)
o Beatrice: One of the blessed in Heaven, Beatrice aids Dante’s
journey by asking an angel to find Virgil and bid him guide
Dante through Hell. Like Dante and Virgil, Beatrice
corresponds to a historical personage. Although the details of
her life remain uncertain, we know that Dante fell passionately
in love with her as a young man and never fell out of it.
Dante’s imaginary journey throughout the afterlife aims, in
part, to find Beatrice, whom he has lost on Earth because of
her early death. Critics view Beatrice as an allegorical
representation of spiritual love.
The characters
o Ancient Rome (Virgil would also fall under this category)
• Paolo and Francesca da Rimini - A pair of lovers condemned to the
Second Circle of Hell for an adulterous love affair that they began after
reading the story of Lancelot and Guinevere.
o Characters from classical Greek mythology
• Charon - A figure that Dante appropriates from Greek mythology,
Charon is an old man who ferries souls across the river Acheron to Hell.
• Minos - The king of Crete in Greek mythology, Minos is portrayed by
Dante as a giant beast who stands at the Second Circle of Hell, deciding
where the souls of sinners shall be sent for torment.
• Nessus - The Centaur (half man and half horse) who carries Dante
through the First Ring of the Seventh Circle of Hell.
o Political enemies from his own era
• Pope Boniface VIII - A notoriously corrupt pope who reigned from 1294 to
1303, Boniface made a concerted attempt to increase the political might
of the Catholic Church and was thus a political enemy of Dante, who
advocated a separation of church and state.
• Count Ugolino - Italian nobleman, politician and naval commander. He
was frequently accused of treason. Found in 9th and lowest circle of Hell.
• Archbishop Ruggieri – Betrayed his partner Ugolino. Trapped in 9th circle
while getting his head chewed on by Ugolino.
The form, numbers, &
symbols
• The poem contains 100 cantos (chapters/divisions in
long poems)
• Number 100 regarded as the perfect number in the
Middle Ages.
• Introductory Canto
• The text is divided into 3 sections of 33 cantos
Number
• The poem is divided into 3 parts:
o First- Inferno, focuses on the power of God, the
Father. Evidenced by the damned.
o Second- Purgatorio, focuses on the wisdom of
Christ, the Son, and the hope for salvation that
he offers to those awaiting final judgment.
o Third- Paradiso. Focuses on the love of the Holy
Spirit.
Number
• The number 3 is important because of its relation to
the Christian Trinity.
o The Christian doctrine of the Trinity defines God as three divine persons; the
Father, the Son (Jesus Christ), and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are
distinct, yet are the one “substance, essence, or nature.”
• 3 divine figures- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit-in One
God.
• The poem is divided into three parts:
o First- Inferno, focuses on the power of God, the Father. Evidenced by the
Time
• The journey takes place over 3 days
• Begins in Hell on Good Friday, the day of Christ’s
crucifixion, and ending symbolically in Paradise on
Easter Sunday.
Form
• A stanza is one of the divisions of a poem,
composed of two or more lines, usually
characterized by a common patter of meter,
rhyme, and number of lines.
• The Divine Comedies are composed in tercets,
three-line stanzas, and uses a rhyme scheme called
terza rima.
o The middle of one tercet rhymes with the first and third lines of the next
tercet, giving the poem a strong sense of unity.
Action
• The entire action of the poem
takes place under the
guidance of three ladies:
o The Virgin Mary, the mother of Christ
who mediates between God and man.
o Saint Lucia, patron saint of Dante and all
those without spiritual insight.
o Beatrice, Dante’s love, who leads him
into paradise.
Role of Virgil
• Dante’s guide for most of the journey is Virgil, the
Roman poet who died 19 years before the birth of
Christ.
• He explains and instructs
• The clarity of Virgil’s mind is contrasted with Dante’s
confusion.
o “my true master and first author”
o “the sole maker from who I drew breath”
• Virgil is consigned to the first circle of Hell because
he is un-baptized along with the other virtuous
pagans from Classical Greek and Rome.
A little song to
remember….
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyRaCwgRKXk
&feature=youtu.be
And now a little “fun”
(also see your hand out)
• After we view the segment from “Great Books: Inferno,”
you will form groups of 4 to create a personal
geography of Hell. (You can refer to your handout on
the nine circles of Hell so you do not create those!). Your
goal is to develop a geography of hell based on your life
experiences.
• Illustrate!
• Choose a guide: write a paragraph explaining why this
person was chosen and what are their special talents
that make them the perfect guide?
• The group must write a paragraph to explain each of
the 9 levels of Hell that they create. Include the
punishment and sin required for entry.