PURGATORIO, Canto 196. Virgil's Inadequacy on Full Display: PURGATORIO, Canto XXV, Lines 22 - 33

Virgil attempts to answer the pilgrim Dante’s question about how immaterial shades can take on material attributes (like growing thin on the sixth terrace of Mount Purgatory). Virgil tries two answers but ultimately has to give up and turn the discussion over to Statius as they ascend to the seventh terrace.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 195. Hesitancy Is The Deadly Sin Of Art: PURGATORIO, Canto XXV, Lines 1 - 21

As the pilgrim Dante, Virgil, and Statius begin to make their very fast ascent to the final terrace of Mount Purgatory, the pilgrim has a burning question about, yes, the cadaverous gluttons on the previous terrace but really about what’s been happening since almost the opening of COMEDY: How do unbodied shades experience physical sensations?

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PURGATORIO, Episode 194. A Read-Through Of PURGATORIO, Cantos XXV - XXVII

A read-through of PURGATORIO, Cantos XXV - XXVII, the final terrace of Mount Purgatory where the lustful do their penance in the flames. We find out more about Dante’s poetics, we hear a part of COMEDY actually in medieval Provencal, and we discover the great change in our pilgrim’s character after he walks out of the fire.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 193. The Compensations Of Contemplation: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 130 - 145

Virgil, Statius, and our pilgrim, Dante, walk along in deep contemplation, alone with their thoughts but still together. They are interrupted by a brilliantly shiny angel that points them up to the final terrace of Mount Purgatory. The pilgrim experiences a breeze without the help of his sight and the poet feels brave enough to rewrite one of Jesus’s beatitudes.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 192. Of Mythic Trees, Human Desire, And Ceremonial Solace: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 100 - 129

Our pilgrim Dante, Virgil, and Statius pass on along the sixth terrace of Mount Purgatory and come to a tree that's a seedling from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden. It shakes them up a bit and offers a classical and a Biblical example of the problems with gluttony.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 191. A Look Back Over The Entire Conversation With Forese Donati: PURGATORIO Canto XXIII, Line 40, to Canto XXIV, Line 99

The conversation between the pilgrim Dante and Forese Donati may be one of the most significant in COMEDY. It’s not only incredibly structured, it also moves from friendship to poetic craft and then out into social exaltation. It’s got three balanced prophecies and it may well be the poet’s attempt to find at long last some sort of personal reconciliation with the Donati clan.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 190. Forese Donati's Parting Apocalypse: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 76 - 99

Forese Donati ends his conversation with the pilgrim Dante on Purgatory’s sixth terrace of gluttony with an apocalyptic vision of the near future—that is, the ruin of his own brother, Corso Donati. He then morphs into a glorious knight as the pilgrim is left on the terrace with the grand marshals of this world, Virgil and Statius.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 189. The Daunting Problem Of This Sweet New Style: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 55 - 75

Dante claime to be the poet who takes love’s inspired dictation, but Bonagiunta has more to say about ut: He names this new poetry, perhaps minimizes its impact, and passes on content. The poet Dante enters the discourse to offer a classical simile that is hardly inspired, just lifted from Lucan. A most curious passage, the one that has caused the most commentary of any in PURGATORIO.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 188. Dante's Wild Claim For Love's Inspiration: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 34 - 54

Bonagiunta, a poet from the previous generation and one of the gluttons pointed out by Forese Donati on the sixth terrace of Mount Purgatory, offers the pilgrim an opaque prophecy and then wonders if this pilgrim is the same guy who wrote a long poem in the VITA NUOVA. The pilgrim replies that he is that poet . . . and then goes onto make a wild claim about poetic inspiration.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 187. Of Eels And Wine: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 16 - 33

Forese Donati continues his conversation with Dante the pilgrim by pointing out five of the penitent gluttons who surround them and by using culinary and gastronomical imagery to reinforce both the thematics and the irony of this terrace (and perhaps to add fuel to the fire of the rivalry between French and Italian cuisine).

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PURGATORIO, Episode 186. Virgil's Silence And A First Glimpse Of Paradise: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIV, Lines 1 - 15

Forese Donati and our pilgrim Dante continue their conversation from Canto XXIII of PURGATORIO on the terrace of the gluttons. We are met with three curiosities: Virgil’s on-going silence, Statius’s apparently very strong will (that can even slow down his ultimate desire), and our first glimpse of Paradise, a classical glimpse of Forese’s sister, Piccarda.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 185. Renegotiating COMEDY As PURGATORIO Nears Its Climax: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIII, Lines 112 - 133

Forese Donati has finished his screed against Florentine women and is ready to hear how the pilgrim Dante got so far up Mount Purgatory while still in the flesh. Dante obliges and also renegotiates the terms of the opening and even the plot of COMEDY as we near the climax of the second canticle, of PURGATORIO.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 184. From Lofty To Lyrical In The Prophetic Voice: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIII, Lines 91 - 111

Forese Donati launches into his screed against Florentine women by reaffirming his love for his wife, Nella. He vaults into the high style of a prophetic voice, referencing prophecies from Isaiah, all while using the vernacular Florentine to offer a lyrical subtext to his stern (and ultimately false) condemnation.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 183. The Heroic Nella Donati: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIII, Lines 76 - 90

Dante the pilgrim and his rival/friend/fellow poet Forese Donati go on talking about suffering and the nature of the ascent up the mountain. In doing so, they must speak about Forese’s wife, Nella. Dante has previously insulted her in the sonnet rivalry. Now, she’s a heroic figure who nonetheless brings us back to the problem of stating the higher truths in the vernacular.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 182. Pain, Solace, And Being Human: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIII, Lines 49 - 75

Dante and Forese, friends and poetic rivals, continue their conversation on the sixth terrace of Mount Purgatory among the emaciated, skeletal gluttons. Forese’s suffering is clear and present, which makes them both pause on the central crux of being human: how to interpret the pain we feel.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 180. Starved For Affection: PURGATORIO, Canto XXIII, Lines 1 - 27

Our pilgrim is still marveling at the mystical tree on the sixth terrace of Mount Purgatory—he has to be goaded on by Virgil, his “more than father.” As they walk along the terrace, they’re soon overtaken by skeletal, cadaverous penitents who find that the pilgrim himself is a source of marvel.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 179. Did Dante Think The Characters In Classical Poems Were Real?

Did Dante think the characters in classical poems like those by Virgil, Statius, and Ovid were real, historical people? The answer lies at the heart of our problem of reading Dante across the scientific-revolution divide. He may find texts more reliable than we do . . . and may find meaning less stable than we do.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 178. You Are What You Eat . . . And Read: PURGATORIO, Canto XXII, Lines 130 - 145

Statius and Virgil head out across the sixth terrace of Mount Purgatory. They’re stopped by an upside-down tree in the path. A voice in the tree warns them off, then admonishes them with examples of those who were moderate in their appetites . . . and the wonders of the classical age.

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PURGATORIO, Episode 177. Going In Circles To Go Forward: PURGATORIO, Canto XXII, Lines 115 - 129

Our pilgrim, Dante, arrives on the sixth, empty terrace of Mount Purgatory without a lot of fanfare. Instead, Statius and Virgil go ahead of him and talk about the craft of poetry. The passage is caught in the essential structural issue (and thematic one, too!) of COMEDY: circularity and linearity, fused into one state of being.

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