Dante’s Dante’s InfernoInferno: An : An IntroductionIntroduction

Dante AlighieriDante Alighieri1265 – 13211265 – 1321

The Divine ComedyThe Divine Comedy

Dante AlighieriDante Alighieri

Born in Born in Florence, ItalyFlorence, Italy From an old, relatively From an old, relatively

distinguished familydistinguished family Throughout Dante’s Throughout Dante’s

lifetime, the stability of lifetime, the stability of the Italian city-states the Italian city-states was continually was continually disrupted by political disrupted by political factions.factions.

The Guelphs and the Ghibellines were rival parties which supported papal rule (governmental rule from the pope) and the Holy Roman Emperors respectively.

By 1300, the Florentine Guelphs were themselves divided into two rival factions: the Blacks, who favored papal authority over Florence, and the Whites(Dante’s group), who wanted independence from papal rule.

Dante was strongly opposed to the involvement of the Church in politics

When the Black Guelphs came to power in 1301, Dante, a White Guelph, was banished from Florencefrom Florence..

He traveled for many years, eventually He traveled for many years, eventually settling in settling in Ravenna, Italy.Ravenna, Italy.

The Divine ComedyThe Divine Comedy was written during was written during this period of this period of exileexile..

He died in He died in Ravenna in 1321.Ravenna in 1321.

Northern Italy at about the Northern Italy at about the End of the Thirteenth CenturyEnd of the Thirteenth Century

The Divine Comedy, written between 1308 and 1321, tells the story of an imaginary epic journey through the medieval perception of Hell.

.

Unlike the physical journeys in Homer’s Odyssey or Virgil’s Aeneid, Dante’s journey is symbolic, representing the spiritual quest for salvation.

Hell (Inferno)—where he recognizes sin and sees the horrors that await sinners

Purgatory (Purgatorio)—where he rejects sin and awaits redemption

Paradise (Paradiso)—where, having achieved salvation, he sees the light of God

Dante’s story of the soul’s progress toward redemption takes him through

The number 3 is especially important in The Divine Comedy.

---represents the Christian Holy Trinity—the union of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in one God.

Dante’s 3-day journey begins on Good Friday—the day Christ died—and ends on Easter Sunday.

The Divine Comedy has 3 sections, representing 3 places or stages of the journey.• Each section has 33 cantos (or “songs” /

chapters).

• Plus 1 introductory canto, for a total of 100 cantos.

•100 is the square of 10, regarded in the Middle Ages as the perfect number. •Dante is 35 years old during his journey- which means he is “halfway along life’s path”- half of the Biblical life expectancy of 70

• The rhyme scheme is terza rima, an interlocking 3-line stanza form with the rhyme scheme aba bcb cdc ded...

• Every stanza is a tercet, a 3-line stanza.

William Blake’s Virgil and Beatrice, wiith the 3 beasts, Canto I

3 women guide Dante’s journey:

• Jesus’ mother, the Virgin Mary

• Dante’s patron saint, Santa Lucia

• Beatrice, his muse, who leads him into Paradise

Dante and Beatrice

Dante met the real Beatrice in 1274, when they were children. He fell in love with her, but she married another man and died in 1290. Dante married Gemma through an arrangement made by his parents.

Heartbroken by Beatrice’s death, Dante vowed to memorialize her in his writing—The Divine Comedy.

Beatrice is Dante’s symbol of love and faith.

• Virgil - Roman poet who wrote the Aeneid, guides and instructs Dante

The Role of Virgil

• Revered by Dante as the ultimate symbol of what human reason can achieve

• Can never achieve salvation because he’s a pagan

• Represents the tension between emerging humanist ideals of the Renaissance and Christian beliefs

The Divine Comedy is considered the finest poetry ever written in Italian.

Instead of using Latin, Dante chose to write in the everyday language of his readers — the vernacular (similar to what Chaucer did for Middle English..

Dante’s language is also sparse, direct, and idiomatic — not the lofty, stylized language of most epics and tragedies.

Page from the Inferno

In an allegory, characters, settings, and events stand for abstract or moral concepts.

An allegory tells one story on a literal level . . .

. . . and another story on a symbolic level.

Dante’s journey through Hell and Purgatory to Paradise

the individual’s quest for spiritual salvation

Allegory

What’s next?What’s next?

We will look at We will look at Cantos I and III in class Cantos I and III in class on Thursdayon Thursday Off to the dark Wood Off to the dark Wood of Error we go…of Error we go…