Critical Review on Dantes Divine Comedy (inferno) - Essay Example

“Dante’s Divine Comedy (inferno)” by Dorothy Sayers in “The of Dis”. In Introductory papers on Dante. Eugene: Wipf and Stock Pub, 2006. Print.IntroductionThe article candidly and comprehensively indicates how Dante found himself lost and in a shady wood and engraved with anxiety. Out of frustration, Dante sees a sun-drenched mountain and decides to climb it only for his move to be curtailed by three beasts that force him to return to the forest. Fortunately, Dante meets the spirit of Virgil, who volunteers to be Dante’s leader and protector as they journey through hell and ensure that Dante enters paradise.

They enter the vestibule of hell where souls belonging to the uncommitted are beleaguered by stinging insects and existence is generally intolerable. They enter the first circle, which is Virgil’s residence, where Dante gets to see other poets and meets great philosophers upon entering the citadel. Dante and Virgil goes through various circles and rounds where they meet people being punished because of their sins including courtly love, chasms, the realm of the violent, blazes that disguise the souls of the sinful and Satan having 3 heads each chewing a traitor.

The author indicates that Dante found himself weeping whenever he saw people in anguish in his hell journey an indication of the sufferings that humanity was undergoing during the then society. Dante wrote the Inferno after his exile from Florence and recounts the overwhelming events that he had observed in his life. SummaryThe essay asserts that Dante was only 35 years when he was trying climbing the hill on a Good Friday, a correlation with the Christian emblematic time. Dante could accurately make prediction of events which had occurred prior to 1301.

The dark forest connotes everything that Dante thought was wrong during his time including political corruption, the Pope’s unbecoming behavior, inner confusion, nonexistence of true authority and the indispensable imperfection of the world. To recover from such actions and behaviors, the world needed people who could struggle, but their struggles are curtailed by the temptations to sin. Hell is not simply the underworld where the dead reside, but is a place where sinners are punished in accordance with their sins.

According to the article, Dante’s journey through hell is a heroic exploration, a numinous spiritual experience, and a way of venerating humanity to which Dante was so much in touch with. Mercy is portrayed as a feminine attribute while justice is masculine. The saving of humanity posthumously requires committed individuals who approach the problems surrounding humanity from all its perspectives and bear its ramifications. Critical evaluationThe article offers an elaborate explanation of Dante’s journey through hell by making use of appropriate vocabularies that makes the article interesting and bolsters understanding of the Inferno.

I believe that the author is right in suggesting that Dante was revealing the challenges that were threatening to engrave the then society. The use and explanation of allegories is perfect. However, the author should have gone ahead and pinpoint how the challenges in the 1300 society could be solved rather than simply indicating that the problems direly needed the attention of authorities and civilians as well. ConclusionThe article is quite successful and apparently persuasive in offering an interpretation and elucidation of Dante’s Inferno.

It bolsters its arguments by drawing from the background of Europe and Italy to make it easy for the audience to understand the challenges faced by the 1300 society and the excruciating challenges that Dante went through as a poet. Work citedSayers, Dorothy L. “Dante’s Divine Comedy (inferno)”. In Introductory papers on Dante. Eugene: Wipf and Stock Pub, 2006. Print.