Walking With Dante

Virgil has introduced Dante the pilgrim to the twinned souls in the tongue of fire: Ulysses and Diomedes. But there's a problem. Who will talk to them? Who is worthy to discuss such illustrious Greeks? Not Dante--that's for sure. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore this little back-and-forth between a very impatient pilgrim and his guide, who wins the battle and is willing to both abase and ag...

We're in the eighth circle of hell, INFERNO's vast landscape of fraud. And we're way down in the eight of the evil pouches (the malebolge) that make up this most mucky and disgusting place--which holds one of the most noble and revered figures from classical poetry: Ulysses. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we get our first glimpse of Ulysses, trapped inside a tongue of fire with his compatriot, Diome...

Our first glimpse into the eighth of the evil pouches (the malebolge) that make up the giant circle of fraud in Dante's INFERNO. Except nothing's as clear as it should be. Two complex metaphors, a bumbling pilgrim, and a useless Virgil: it all adds up to the sort of interpretive fun we expect from Dante. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we slow-walk with Dante across hell and beyond. We're gearing up...

Dante and his guide, Virgil, leave the seventh of the evil pouches (the malebolge) of fraud by means of a rocky scramble. Then the poet stops and drops into a short discussion of poetic theory. He's coming to understand how he has to write his own masterwork, COMEDY. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, for this short passage from INFERNO, sandwiched between two tour-de-force performances in the poem. Here a...

Hi, I'm Mark Scarbrough and we've been walking with Dante for a long time. We're doing it slowly, a passage at a time, and we've come through some of the roughest bits of INFERNO, passages that require a great deal of classical learning and poetic know-how. This episode is my attempt to step back and get our bearings again. Why are we taking this walk? Why should we wrestle with Dante's masterwork...

We have spent a long time with the thieves in the seventh of the malebolge or the evil pouches of fraud's eighth circle of hell. It's time for a retrospective! Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as I bring more questions than answers to this most curious pit of hell. What's going on with all these metamorphoses? Where's our pilgrim in all this? And our poet? And what's truth, what's made up, and what's the...

Dante the poet has finally wrapped up the pilgrim's time in the seventh of the evil pouches, the "malebolge" that make up the eighth circle of INFERNO, the great expanse of fraud. Our thieves have gone off stage and we're left with both an uncertain poet and a very certain prophet who sees Florence's destruction in the offing. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore the final passage among the thi...

We've already explored the source material behind the third metamorphosis in the pit of the thieves, the seventh of the malebolge in the great landscape of fraud. Now let's talk through the implications in this passage. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we run from the mundane to the meta-insane with this most complicated metamorphosis, in which Dante the poet finally busts up the camaraderie he's had...

We've reached the third and final metamorphosis in the seventh of the evil pouches, the malebolge that make up the eighth circle of hell in INFERNO. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore Lucan, Ovid, and Dante's own masterwork COMEDY to uncover the roots of this complicated yet clear passage among the thieves in hell. Identity theft is not just a modern problem. It's a medieval one, too. Here ar...

In the last episode of WALKING WITH DANTE, I helped you understand the sources and textual problems in this second metamorphosis from the seventh of the evil pouches (the malebolge) in INFERNO's great ring of fraud. Two become one, two beasts become one, and both become nothing. Now let's talk through the implications of the passage and follow out some of its premises and conclusions. We're about...

First, a guy burns up, turns to ashes, comes back to life, and prophesies the future. Then a centaur run by with snakes and dragons on his back. And if that wasn't enough, now one of the most daring metamorphoses of all. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we watch the second metamorphosis in the seventh evil pouch in the sub-circles of the thieves. This passage is so complex that this episode is the fir...

Vanni Fucci has run off, wrapped up in snakes. But he's now just prey for Cacus, a centaur who arrives toting lots of snakes and even a dragon. Can it get any more dramatic? Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore this strange passage in which we get a centaur who doesn't look much like his classical representations in Virgel, Ovid, and Livy--passages in which he's not even a centaur! This passage...

Vanni Fucci has given his big speech, complete with a clear statement of his crime/sin and an opaque statement of the future of Dante's friends and family (and even the poet himself) in Florence. But we're not done with Fucci. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, for his final moments in Dante's INFERNO. Fucci gives God a vulgar hand gesture, is wrapped up in snakes, and runs off, leaving our poet with the l...

We have watched a sinner burn up from a snakebite and reconstitute right in front of the pilgrim Dante's eyes. But who is this damned guy? The answer to that question is as complicated as it gets. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore the revelation of the sinner (Vanni Fucci), the problems with the historical record, and his sin (theft, although maybe not). Vanni Fucci comes shrouded in histori...

Our pilgrim, Dante, and his guide, Virgil, have come down to a place where they can see into the darkness of the seventh of the malebolge, the evil pouches that make up the eighth circle of fraud in hell. And what a sight they see! A pit of writhing snakes, one sinner bitten, then incinerated and reconstituted, right before their eyes. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we slow-walk through Dante's mast...

Dante the pilgrim has wanted a good, close look into the seventh of the evil pouches, the seventh of the malebolge that make up the great landscape of fraud in the eighth circle of hell. And boy, does he get what he wants! Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as the pilgrim and his guide, Virgil, slip down the wall and catch a glimpse of a nightmare of snakes, a tangle of them--that almost rivals the tangle...

Dante is still out of breath because of the arduous climb out of the sixth of the malebolge of fraud. But he doesn't want Virgil to know it! Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as the pilgrim Dante hears something he can't understand and wants to get a lot closer to this unintelligible voice. He and Virgil cross the bridge to climb down a bit on the wall and peer into the seventh pit of the eighth circle of...

Dante the pilgrim has gotten up to the top of the crag and out of the sixth of the malebolge, the evil pouches that make up the giant eighth circle of hell, the landscape of fraud. The poor pilgrim is out of breath, but Virgil has got no sympathy for him! Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we find perhaps a new role for Virgil in COMEDY and discover that the poet is playing more games with our minds tha...

Dante and Virgil have to get out of the sixth evil pouch, the pocket of the hypocrites. And the only way out is up! Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we set out on this epic climb from the sixth of the malebolge in the giant landscape of fraud, the eighth circle of INFERNO. Virgil is a sure guide. But it's all Dante's effort. And that might say more about COMEDY than we first imagine. Here are the segm...

Poor Virgil, put in his place over and over again, ever since the fourth of the malebolge, the evil pouch of the fortune tellers, when he had to rewrite his own epic, THE AENEID. Four cantos of humiliation! He's now had his final humiliation (for now) as he's learned that he shouldn't have ever trusted those demons. But the journey must go on! How? In those dear footprints we saw at the end of Can...

Hi, I'm Mark Scarbrough and this is the podcast WALKING WITH DANTE. In most episodes of this podcast, we slow-walk passage by passage through Dante's masterwork, COMEDY. But this is an interpolated episode, brought about because of several conversations I've had online with people recently. The question is this: How can I, an atheist, read Dante's COMEDY? I thought I'd answer that problem as well...

We come to the end of Canto XXIII and the sixth of the evil pouches, the malebolge, that make up the subsets of fraud in the eighth circle of INFERNO. Virgil has already seen something that has left him gawking, maybe even a representation of his own fate. But Virgil's humiliations aren't over. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, for the final moments among the hypocrites in hell. There's more to come as th...

We finally arrive at a moment that even our guide Virgil cannot believe. Why is he caught slack-jawed? The answer is more complicated than you might think. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we find that the sixth pit of the subsets of fraud is not just about friars walking around in gilded, leaden cloaks. Rather, it's also about the punishment of figures from the New Testament. In other words, we've co...

Dante, our pilgrim, has slowed down to talk to two of the hypocrites, who are walking along in their gilded lead capes. But he gets more than he bargained for. He meets some guys who caused much of the chaos in Florence that ruined our poet's life. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we slow-walk with our pilgrim through the rings of hell. We've come to a new place, the "collegio" of the hypocrites, but...

Dante the pilgrim and his guide, Virgil, have come down to the bottom of the sixth evil pouch to escape the demons from the fifth. Here, they find a group of guys in cowls or capes that look sort of like the ones from the abbey at Cluny but that are in fact made out of gilded lead. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we settle into the bottom of the sixth of the malebolge of fraud in the eighth circle of...