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THE
DIVINE COMEDY
THE INFERNO,
THE PURGATORIO,
AND THE PARADISO

DANTE ALIGHIERI

Anaque, Gardo O.
Discussant

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I. POET’S BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY

 DANTE ALIGHIERI, or simply Dante (c. May 21, 1265
– c. September 13, 1321)
 Born in Florence, Italy to a family with a history of
involvement in the complex Florentine political scene
and this setting would become a feature in
his Inferno years later.
 His mother, Bella degli Abati, died when he was 7
years old.
 He had 2 other siblings: Francesco and Gaetana,
children of his dad, Aligheiro di Bellincione and his step
mom.
 When he was around 12 years old, it was arranged that he would marry Gemma
Donati, the daughter of a family friend. Around 1285, the pair married.
 He was a medieval poet, writer, political thinker and a moral philosopher whose
poetic trilogy, The Divine Comedy, made an indelible impression on both literature
and theology.
 He is one of the greatest poets in the Italian language; with the comic storyteller
Boccaccio and the poet Petrarch, he forms the classic trio of Italian authors.
 He was in love with another woman—Beatrice Portinari, who would be a huge
influence on Dante and whose character would form the backbone of Dante’s Divine
Comedy.
 He met Beartrice at the age of 9, and he had apparently experienced love at first
sight.
 He died in 1321 at the age of 56 while returning to Ravenna from a diplomatic
mission in Venice, perhaps of malaria contracted there.
 The front of his tomb in Florence reads Onorate l’altissimo poeta – which roughly
translates as “Honor the most exalted poet.”

SHORT HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE PIECE

In his exile, Dante traveled and wrote, conceiving The Divine Comedy, and he withdrew from
all political activities. In the spring of 1312, Dante seems to have gone with the other exiles
to meet up with the new emperor at Pisa (Henry’s rise was sustained, and he was named
Holy Roman Emperor in 1312), but again, his exact whereabouts during this period are
uncertain. By 1314, however, Dante had completed the Inferno, the segment of The Divine
Comedy set in hell, and in 1317 he settled at Ravenna and there completed The Divine
Comedy (soon before his death in 1321).

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LEGACY

Dante’s Divine Comedy has flourished for more than 650 years and has been considered a
major work since Giovanni Boccaccio wrote a biography of Dante in 1373. (By 1400, at least
12 commentaries had already been written on the poem’s meaning and significance.) The
work is a major part of the Western canon, and T.S. Eliot, who was greatly influenced by
Dante, put Dante in a class with only one other poet of the modern world, Shakespeare,
saying that they ”divide the modern world between them. There is no third.”

II. STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

SETTING
The setting of the poem is centered on the three (3) special locations where the spirits may
reside after their death according to Roman belief: Hell, Purgatory and Heaven.

POINT OF VIEW
1st person point of view

TYPE OF POETRY
Narrative poetry, Epic Poetry in particular.

TYPE OF CONFLICT
Person vs. Fate

PLOT SUMMARY OF THE POEM

The Divine Comedy is an allegory of human life presented as a visionary trip through the
Christian afterlife, written as a warning to a corrupt society to steer itself to the path of
righteousness: "to remove those living in this life from the state of misery, and lead them to
the state of felicity." The poem is written in the first person (from the poet’s perspective) and
follows Dante's journey through the three Christian realms of the dead: hell, purgatory, and
finally heaven. The Roman poet Virgil guides Dante through hell (Inferno) and purgatory
(Purgatorio), while Beatrice guides him through heaven (Paradiso). The journey lasts from
the night before Good Friday to the Wednesday after Easter in the spring of 1300 (placing it
before Dante’s factual exile from Florence, which looms throughout the Inferno and serves
as an undercurrent to the poet’s journey).

The structure of the three realms of the afterlife follows a common pattern of nine stages
plus an additional, and paramount, tenth: nine circles of hell, followed by Lucifer’s level at the
bottom; nine rings of purgatory, with the Garden of Eden at its peak; and the nine celestial
bodies of heaven, followed by the empyrean (the highest stage of heaven, where God
resides).

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Virgil guides Dante through hell and a phenomenal array of sinners in their various states,
and Dante and Virgil stop along the way to speak with various characters. Each circle of hell
is reserved for those who have committed specific sins, and Dante spares no artistic
expense at creating the punishing landscape. For instance, in the ninth circle (reserved for
those guilty of treachery), occupants are buried in ice up to their chins, chew on each other
and are beyond redemption, damned eternally to their new fate. In the final circle, there is no
one left to talk to (as Satan is buried to the waist in ice, weeping from his six eyes and
chewing Judas, Cassius and Brutus, the three greatest traitors in history, by Dante’s
accounting), and the duo moves on to purgatory.

In the Purgatorio, Virgil leads Dante in a long climb up the Mount of Purgatory, through
seven levels of suffering and spiritual growth (an allegory for the seven deadly sins), before
reaching the earthly paradise at the top. The poet’s journey here represents the Christian
life, in which Dante must learn to reject the earthly paradise he sees for the heavenly one
that awaits.

Beatrice, representing divine enlightenment, leads Dante through the Paradiso, up through
the nine levels of the heavens (represented as various celestial spheres) to true paradise:
the empyrean, where God resides. Along the way, Dante encounters those who on earth
were giants of intellectualism, faith, justice and love, such as Thomas Aquinas, King
Solomon and Dante’s own great-great-grandfather. In the final sphere, Dante comes face to
face with God himself, who is represented as three concentric circles, which in turn
represent the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The journey ends here with true heroic and
spiritual fulfillment.

VERSE AND STANZA

The poem is composed of 100 cantos, written in the measure known as terza rima (thus the
divine number 3 appears in each part of the poem), which Dante modified from its popular
form so that it might be regarded as his own invention.

Divine Comedy, a work in 100 cantos, divided into three (3) books of thirty-three cantos each
with a single introductory canto.

IMAGERY

MIDWAY upon the journey of our life

I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.

Ah me! how hard a thing it is to say

What was this forest savage, rough, and stern,
Which in the very thought renews the fear.

So bitter is it, death is little more;

But of the good to treat, which there I found,
Speak will I of the other things I saw there.

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I cannot well repeat how there I entered,

So full was I of slumber at the moment
In which I had abandoned the true way.
(-Canto 1, Inferno)

FIGURE OF SPEECH/FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE USED

APOSTROPHE
Ah! servile Italy, grief’s hostelry! “O thou sweet light! with trust in whom I
A ship without a pilot in great tempest! enter
No Lady thou of Provinces, but brothel! Upon this novel journey, do thou lead us,”
(Inferno) Said he, “as one within here should be
led.
“O Sun, that healest all distempered (Purgatorio)
vision,
Thou dost content me so, when thou O Muses, O high genius, now assist me!
resolvest, O memory, that didst write down what I
That doubting pleases me no less than saw,
knowing! Here thy nobility shall be manifest!
(Inferno) (Canto 2, Inferno)

ADJUNCTION
“Lift up thine eyes,” I to the Master said.
(Purgatorio) Of which this courteous priest shall make
a gift
Then touched he me, and said: “This one To show himself a partisan; and such gifts
is Nessus, Will to the living of the land conform.
Who perished for the lovely Dejanira, (Canto 9, Paradiso)
And for himself, himself did vengeance
take. (Canto 12, Inferno)

ANTICLIMAX
My Master, and myself, and all that people
Which with him were, appeared as satisfied
As if naught else might touch the mind of any;

ASSONANCE
For reason which thou sayest, departeth hence
Tow’rds the Septentrion, what time the Hebrews
Beheld it tow’rds the region of the heat.

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SYMBOLISMS

 Panther/Leopard, Lion, and the She-Wolf

These wild animals represented the 3 images of sin. Panther/Leopard represents self-
indulgence/incontinence, which are often the sins of the youth. The lion represents the
sins of bestial violence which are often the sins of adulthood. The wolf represents the
sins of malice.
 Virgil
-represents human reason, guides Dante out of Inferno towards Purgatorio.
 Beatrice
-symbolizes heavenly wisdom.
 Dante
- Dante represents the every man who has become inattentive to his sinfulness and
need for repentance.
 Levels of Hell/Inferno
-corresponds/represents the sinners particular sin/transgressions committed and the
intended punishment they should be met out.

THEME

 From the beginning of Canto I, three main themes are evident. The first and most
important of Dante’s main themes is the picaresque (or journey) theme; Dante’s
journey to the nether regions is vital to The Inferno. With pilgrimages being common
in the 1200s and 1300s and with the influence of Virgil’s writings on Dante, it is not
surprising that Dante uses the picaresque theme. A second theme in The Inferno is
the survival of the unfittest; a weak, lost Dante encounters three wild animals and
even manages a trip to the depths of Hell and back. A third main theme is the reversal
of fortune; Dante is lost at the beginning of Canto I, but by the end of The Inferno,
he has found his way.

 The Path to Salvation

Purgatory is the road to salvation. It is the place where condemned souls still find the
opportunity for repentance of their souls and resurrection of their hopes to avoid
eternal damnation in the inferno of hell which was previously outlined and describe by
the author.

 History and Politics

The purgation of one’s sins on the terraces representing the Seven Deadly Sins is
achieved through narrative representations of the exhibitions of those sins throughout
history. While the Bible supplies a health helping of these visual lessons in morality,
for every reminder that of Cain killing Abel is a reminder from human history like King
Charles of II of Naples pimping his daughter. The choices made by Dante of which
historical figures to include are not random and reflect the vital important of having

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great political sensibility when writing epic poetry in an era of cruelly authoritarian
theocratic rule.

 THE COLOR BLACK/DARKNESS IN INFERNO AND COLOR GREEN IN

PURGATORIO
Inferno was predominantly introduced by pitch black colors such as the bottomless
pits, the river of Styx and to each of the levels of Hell. This color signifies the weight of
evilness and sins that man have made all throughout his life while on earth. Purgatory,
on the other hand, was introduced with so much greeneries; from women dressed in
green appearing while the character was along their journey to the green flowers and
leaves representing hope was manifested in the poem.

 ASCENSION AS THE PATH TO HOLINESS

The narrator's journey is one of upward moment. Beginning with his summoning by
the guide Beatrice, he learns the sin is the barrier separating the heavens from Earth
but also preventing the free, unhindered ascension of all souls. The soul naturally is
weightless and rises of its own accord, but sin prevents this in the living body. Since
he's been privileged to receive a tour of the heavens, the narrator is instructed to set
is attention upward. He rises through all the levels of heaven until he reaches the
Ascension in Emporium, the highest of places. Here once more he is instructed, this
time by Saint Bernard, to look upward. There he sees the most pure, bright light ever.
This directional association with holiness is a common theme of the Christian religion,
so it is unsurprising that Dante chooses to run with the idea.

References:

https://www.biography.com/people/dante-9265912

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5031312.Dante_Alighieri

https://www.enotes.com/topics/dantes-inferno

https://www.enotes.com/topics/dantes-inferno/chapter-summaries/canto-34-summary-analysis

https://dantesthedivinecomedy.wordpress.com/ideas/meditations-on-pergatory/

https://www.gradesaver.com/divine-comedy-purgatorio/study-guide/summary

http://www.supersummary.com/paradiso/summary/

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