The Divine Comedy And Divine Comedy In Dante's Inferno

Often, we cannot see the good until we have experienced the bad. Dante Alighieri, a poet who makes himself the main character in his Divine Comedy, finds himself lost in a dark wood at the start of The Inferno. Though he sees a safe path out of the wood towards an alluring light, he is forced to take an alternate route through an even darker place. As the ending of the pilgrim Dante’s voyage is bright and hopeful, Alighieri the poet aims to encourage even the most sinful Christians to hope for a successful end. Thus, Dante the pilgrim goes to hell in The Inferno to better understand the nature of sin and its consequences in order to move closer to salvation; his journey an allegory representing that of the repenting Christian soul.

Dante and Virgil have just left limbo, the first circle of hell, and are now on their way into the second circle of hell, where hell really begins. It is here that Dante first witnesses the punishment brought upon the sinners. They encounter Minos, the beast-judge who blocks the way into the second circle. He examines each soul as they pass through and determines which circle of hell they must go to by winding his tail around himself. Minos warns Dante of passing through but Virgil silences him. Dante encounters a dark place completely sucked of any light and filled with noises more horrible than a tempest and sees the souls being whirled around in a

When Dante first begins in this story he was lost and clueless physically and mentally.  Dante was located in a forest with his life ruined and not knowing what was in store for him. Dante had given up on his future and had given up on finding the correct path of life for himself. However, when he sees a sunset and a very important mountain that represent Heaven he will soon change. Dante is given an opportunity to change and turn his life around but to do so he must first experience the darkness of Hell with the assistance of Virgil who helps him and guides him through what is right and wrong.

Robert Herrick, an English poet, once said, “Hell is no other but a soundlesse pit, where no one beame of comfort peeps in it.” Picture any type of Hell with relief, happiness, or even the smallest crack of a smile. There is no place. In fact, one can only think of the complete opposite, whether it is a Hell filled with neglect, pain, disgust, or a never-ending life of horror. This is the place created by Dante Alighieri; The Inferno is exactly the type of Hell where no person would want to be. Even those who acted upon the lightest of sins suffered greatly. While each realm contained a different sinner, the punishment that each were forced to face was cruel, repulsive, and sometimes rather disgusting. Through grieving tears without an

The story begins with stage one which includes “the call to adventure”, “supernatural assistance,” “crossing the threshold,” and “the belly of the whale.” Dante wakes up lost in the middle of the dark woods, and wonders around fearfully in a strange place. He sees a figure named Virgil approach him which demonstrates the call to Adventure as she tells him to go with her to see those in Hell, the sight of the people in Purgatory, and the blessed realm that is Paradise. In Hell, Canto 1, Virgil states this by saying, “it is best, as I think and understand, for you to follow me, and I will be your guide, and lead you from here through an eternal space where you will hear the desperate shouts, will see the ancient spirits in pain… and then you will see others at peace in flames, because they hope to come, whenever it may be, among the blessed” (17-18). With the assistance of Virgil guiding him throughout his journey, Dante and Virgil are able to cross the threshold to Hell. They approach the entrance of Hell and go inside. As they cross the multitude of thresholds in the Inferno, they meet many “sinners” such as Minos, Francesca, Cerbeus (the three-headed monster), Plutus etc. Each experience helps Dante to recognize the unknown world. However, he is still afraid that he cannot actually fulfill his journey. He is reassured by Virgil and has courage to lead on

Often, we cannot see the good in something until we’ve experienced the bad. Dante Aghileri, a poet who stars in his Divine Comedy as a pilgrim, finds himself lost in a dark wood. Though he sees a safe path to the light and out of the wood, he is forced to take an alternate route through an even darker place. The Divine Comedy is an allegory representative of the Christian soul. As the ending is bright and hopeful for Dante, Aghileri spreads that the ending for even the most sinful Christians can be as hopeful as dante’s, provided that they take the steps needed to achieve salvation. Thus, Dante the pilgrim goes to hell to better understand the nature of sin and its consequences in order to move closer to salvation, his journey an representing that of the repenting Christian soul.

Dante’s “Inferno” is a pandemonic story told through the eyes of Dante as he travels through the nine circles of hell with the spirit, Virgil. Dante, being a mortal, was sent to visit hell by God for he had “lost his way” through life; and Virgil, the spirit, was to be his guide. As Dante travels through the first section of hell and ends at the city of Dis, it becomes known that the journey is only beginning for Dante and his moral compass is in desperate need of this experience to place him back on the way of life. Dante faces many challenges through hell as he experiences immense fear, pity, sorrow, and guilt. These emotions are adamantly shown through his reactions to his environment and the way he handles the complications of each circle

Dante's character in The Inferno has come across many terrifying sights and creatures on his journey through Hell. Hell is filled with an abundance of sinners who have done wrong towards God, others, and natures cycle. The lost souls of Hell have no way of escaping their fate of being doomed to treacherous conditions for the rest of eternity. Once a person is sent inside the gates of Hell there is no escaping. The sins that are committed are matched up with a specific punishment that mirrors their wrong doing.

Dante’s descent into Hell in Inferno, the first part of his Divine Comedy, tells of the author’s experiences in Hades as he is guided through the abyss by the Roman author, Virgil. The text is broken into cantos that coincide with the different circles and sub-circles of Hell that Dante and Virgil witness and experience. Inferno is heavily influenced by classic Greek and Roman texts and Dante makes references to a myriad of characters, myths, and legends that take place in Virgil’s Aeneid, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, and Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Some of the most important references, however, are the most obvious ones that are easily overlooked simply because of the fact that they are so blatant. Dante is being escorted through Hell by the

Dante Alighieri cleverly uses his character Dante’s development throughout The Divine Comedy to describe his views and judgement on sin and love. In the literal interpretation of Alighieri’s allegory, Dante begins his journey lost in a wood but soon finds a guide, Virgil, who explains that he will lead Dante back to where he needs to be. Virgil leads Dante through the 9 circles of Inferno, showing him where the sinners reside, the levels of Purgatorio, for those who sinned but turned to God, and Paradiso, the eternal paradise for the blessed. Alighieri ends the story abruptly with Dante finally seeing God. There is, of course, the metaphorical and deeper meaning that Alighieri portrays through Dante’s actions, learnings, and revelations which are meant to enlighten and teach the reader. As Dante grows and learns from Virgil and his journey, the readers are taught what Alighieri wants us to learn about sin and love.

In The Inferno of Dante, the second part of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, shows the main protagonist, Dante, exploring Hell. Throughout his time in Hell, Dante experiences the multiple layers of it and the people within each layer. Dante describes the conditions people are in by expressing it as contrapasso; the punishment of souls by a process either resembling or contrasting with the sin itself. In the second circle of Hell is where the lustful reside. Lust is one of the seven deadly sins in the Catholic religion.

However, Dante’s view of sin is that it is all punishable, but there are levels of punishment with varying degrees of penalty. This is the wrath and judgement of God being administered by Satan, through the 9 levels to Dante’s hell. For instance, Dante describes the first circle as Limbo, “where the sad shades of the virtuous non-Christians dwell...without hope of seeing God” (Musa, p. 97). The second circle is Lust, “whose punishment consists in being forever whirled about in a dark, stormy wind” (Musa, p. 109).

During the initial steps of his journey into Hell on the evening of Maundy Thursday before dawn on Good Friday in the year 1300, Dante the pilgrim encounters this ghastly statement found inscribed on the gates of Hell. It is within this first portion of his soul’s journey to Heaven that Dante the pilgrim confronts the antonym of hope – despair, and the inhabitants damned to suffer its hopelessness in perpetuity. This Hell, filled to the brim with sinners of all transgressions, is composed of nine concentric circles representative of the descent of the increasingly sinful; the further Dante the pilgrim’s journey descends into the circles of Hell, the more horrendously sinful people he encounters, ultimately

When you think of Hell, what do you see, perhaps a burning pit full of criminals and crazed souls? Or maybe you’re like Dante and have a well organized system of levels in correspondence with each person’s sins. In Dante Alighieri’s epic The Inferno, Dante and his real life hero, Virgil, go on an adventure through a rather elaborate version of Hell. In this version of Hell numerous thoughts and ideals are brought to the attention of the readers. Through Dante’s use of both imaginative and artistic concepts one can receive a great visual impression of how Dante truly views Hell, and by analyzing his religious and philosophical concepts the reader can connect with the work to better understand how rewarding this work was for the time period.

Around 1314, Dante Alighieri completed the Inferno, the first section of what would make up The Divine Comedy, a collection of three poems reflecting Dante’s imaginative journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. In these poems, Dante the poet describes the pilgrimage that Dante the pilgrim must complete to attain salvation. With the Roman poet Virgil as his guide, Dante the pilgrim must purge himself of his own sinful nature, which can only be achieved by observing and learning from those that have landed themselves in either Hell, Purgatory, or Heaven. Described in Inferno, his excursion begins in Hell where Dante learns about the stories and the sufferings of many sinners. As Dante the pilgrim progresses through Hell it is clear that he assumes different personas. In some instances, Dante the pilgrim is portrayed as an empathetic man who pities the sinners while on other occasions, Dante the pilgrim is portrayed as a callous and indignant being in regard to the sinners. While Dante the pilgrim is depicted in these two completely different ways, it is the insensitive portrayal that more precisely depicts Dante the pilgrim, as that is his true identity when he leaves Hell. His journey affected him so greatly that by the end of his pilgrimage, Dante the pilgrim has transformed from a compassionate man into an impervious and even cruel individual.