Cords, Leopards, Medieval Poets, And Medieval Pilgrims, All Straightened Out By Classical Poetry: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 106 - 123
Dante's COMEDY is about to shift gears. It's going to change its relationship to the poetry of the past. It's going to become more complicated in its symbolism (and yes, symbolism, not "just" allegory...
22 Sep 202118min
Tumbling Over A Simile About A Waterfall: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 91 - 105
We're going to slow up even more and take one long look at a very complicated fifteen lines that include a twelve-line simile about the waterfall ahead of us.Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we walk passa...
19 Sep 202122min
Civic Unity, Truth-Telling, And (Not) Making A Difference In Hell: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 79 - 90
We've come to the last passage on our three Guelph heroes, circling each other on the burning sands of the seventh circle of hell, the violent--and specifically, those violent against God. That is, th...
15 Sep 202114min
Stopping The Mouth Of History With The Words Of A Prophet: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 64 - 78
Dante the pilgrim is still looking down on the three Florentine, Guelph heroes, circling each other on the burning sands. They've got no forward momentum. But he does! The pilgrim is about to undergo ...
12 Sep 202121min
The Answer To Dashed Hopes Is Far Harder Than Anger: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 46 - 63
Dante the pilgrim has met and spoken with the very heroes he's always admired. These are the Guelph leaders he himself admits he has remembered with so much honor.But their rhetoric is empty. Self-jus...
8 Sep 202123min
When History Speaks, It Doesn't Always Tell The Truth: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 28 - 45
The three, naked, oiled, burned, hairless Florentines revolve in front of the pilgrim, Dante, and Virgil. One of them starts to speak.And what a speech! Such gorgeous rhetoric! The sort he used when h...
5 Sep 202126min
Brunetto Is Gone But Not Forgotten On The Burning Sands: Inferno, Canto XVI, Lines 1 - 27
Brunetto may have run off like the winner of a foot race but he's far from gone from the text. In fact, the next canto of INFERNO, XVI, is in many ways a mirror of Brunetto's canto, XV.Dante and Virgi...
1 Sep 202125min
An Interview with Kristen Hook, A Dantista Writing Her Dissertation On Inferno, Canto X
Join me, Mark Scarbrough, for this special episode of the podcast WALKING WITH DANTE. This episode is my interview with Kristen Hook, a Dantista who is writing her dissertation at UC-Berkeley on Infer...
29 Aug 202128min
