Dante, the protagonist of the epic poem “Inferno,” wanders through a foreboding forest after straying from the path of moral truth. Just the beginning, my friends. The ghost of Virgil, the great Roman poet, and Dante’s hero, appears just in time to save Dante from an attack by three wild animals. Virgil explains that he came because Dante’s dead lover, Beatrice, asked the Virgin Mary and Santa Lucia, the rulers of Heaven, to send someone to help him. There you have it! Luckily, Virgil is here to help. Because he resembles the famous poet and writer Dante, he makes for an excellent tour guide. After this, Virgil guides Dante through each of Hell’s nine circles and back to Earth’s atmosphere in the rest of the Inferno. Christ cannot save those who lived before his time because they are already in the first level of Hell (also known as “Limbo” or “pre-Hell”). Poets like the Roman and Greek poet Virgil once called this area home. Storms that never end cast sinners with lust into the second circle. Francesca da Rimini’s ghost visits Dante to explain how she cheated on her arranged marriage with a dashing young man named Paolo.
The third circle is where Dante finally comes, and it’s raining cold, dirty water on gluttons. After Dante meets the notorious Florentine glutton Ciacco, Ciacco tells Dante that Florence is doomed. In the fourth circle, where the Avaricious and the Prodigal roll enormous weights in a never-ending circle, Virgil leads Dante. The fifth circle, where the Wrathful and the Sullen are submerged in the River Styx, is the next stop on tour. As they make their way across the Styx, a sinner named Filippo Argenti reaches out to Dante, seemingly in an attempt to beg for assistance, but Dante treats him with contempt. Virgil now plans to negotiate with the demons guarding the entrance to Dis. He has an abrupt failure. Dante and Virgil can only proceed with their journey once an angel comes to open the gates. After making their way through Dis, our daring couple reaches the sixth circle, where the Heretics’ tombs are located. Dante’s exiled companion, Farinata degli Uberti, warns him that returning to Florence will be difficult.
Virgil describes the topography of Hell as the condemned enter the seventh and final circle of punishment for their violent deeds. A quick categorization of sins reveals that they all fall into one of three broad categories: incontinence (or lack of self-control), violence, and lying. Dante’s recollections span only the first category. All violent sinners will be relegated to the seventh circle. In the outermost two circles, you’ll find all the people who have committed low-level, covert fraud.
Dante and Virgil have reached the eighth circle and are about to enter. Dante ties a cord around the beast Geryon’s waist at Virgil’s request and instructs him. Dante is warned to keep an eye out for the final violent sinner while Virgil stays to chat with the beast. Dante rides Geryon to the eighth circle when he returns. Every one of the ten sinners in the pouches around the eighth ring represents a unique category of sinner. With the encouragement of Virgil, Dante finally works up the nerve to speak to one of the simonists when they reach the third pouch, where sinners who use their money to move up in the Church are burned at the feet and buried headfirst. The soul of Pope Nicholas III assumes Dante is his successor because it cannot see Dante. Dante’s worst enemy, Pope Boniface VIII, is sent there to take his place as a form of divine retribution.
In the fifth pouch, Dante and Virgil witness corrupt politicians being thrown into a river of boiling pitch; Virgil musters the courage to approach the cruel demons and ask for safe passage across the river. God sent Malacoda, and once he realized it, he informed Virgil that the nearest bridge was gone. When Malacoda reaches the next bridge, he summons ten more demons to help him cross.
To escape the demons, Dante and Virgil retreat to the sixth pouch. They encounter hypocrites forced to take a public stand in their heavy lead robes. After chatting with a few of them, Virgil inquires about the location of the subsequent pouch. Thieves are particularly vulnerable to snake bites in the valley of the sixth pouch, where the venom will turn them to ash. One of the sinners, Vanni Fucci, tells Dante he is in Hell because he stole holy relics. Snakes kidnap Fucci after he spits on and insults Dante.
The eighth pouch is on fire and full of dishonest advisors, so our heroes rush in. Ulysses and Diomedes share a fiery tongue as Ulysses tells Dante his story of sin. Ulysses, whose epic quest is chronicled in Homer’s Odyssey, was understandably resentful toward his homeland and family upon his return. They were brave explorers who met their end in a raging whirlpool beneath Mount Purgatory.
Dante sees the scandal, and the schism sowers healed and punished again, forever, by a demon wielding a sword in the ninth pouch. Dante is so disturbed by the contents of the tenth and final pouch that he covers his ears to muffle the groans from within. In the tenth pouch, the counterfeiter will face four different consequences. As they leave, Virgil explains that the giants who had done wrong were imprisoned nearby. Nimrod, the man responsible for the Tower of Babel, is incapable of using comprehensible language. His words carry no weight. After the giants are freed, Virgil requests that Antaneus, one of the giants, hold them in his hand as they are lowered into the lowest level of Hell. The answer is yes, according to him.
In the ninth circle of Hell, four punishments are reserved for traitors. Caina, after whom it is named, depicts a family’s betrayers frozen to death. In the second zone, Antenora, where traitors are punished the same way, Bocca degli Abati provokes a fight with Dante. Then Dante does a bizarre and violent act. Then he travels to Ptolomea, the third zone, where the guests’ betrayers have been frozen, and their tears have become stuck in their eyes. One has promised to unfreeze Dante’s eyes if the other tells Dante his story. Dante learns that this sin is so great that the sinner’s soul goes to Hell before his body dies on Earth and that Fra Alberigo, himself a sinner, agrees. Dante finally confronts Lucifer, the giant with three heads who rules Hell, in the fourth and final zone, Judecca, where patrons’ traitors are punished. It’s safe to say that Judas, Brutus, and Cassius are three of the worst sinners in history. Lucifer automatically digests them.
Virgil tells Dante that they have seen everything there is to see in Hell and that it is time for them to leave. Dante clings to Virgil’s back as the two of them make their way to the southern hemisphere by descending the vast body of Lucifer, which is the diameter of the entire planet. Virgil and Dante return to Earth and stand outside under the night sky.
Dante’s “Inferno” can be seen as a metaphor for the struggles of aging in America. The nine circles of Hell in the poem represent the stages of aging and the various challenges one will face as one age. Each level of Hell is populated by people who have committed specific sins and are suffering the consequences of their mistakes; this is similar to how aging can be seen as a punishment for the errors and wrongs of our past. Additionally, the poem highlights the sense of isolation and loneliness that often comes with aging, as the characters are all isolated from each other and forced to endure the consequences of their actions alone. Finally, the poem serves as a reminder to be mindful of our choices and actions in life, as the effects of those decisions can have a lasting impact.
Works Cited
Dante, A., & Carson, C. (2013). Inferno. London: Penguin Classics.
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