We've come to the bottom of the circle of fraud and to one of the most complicated, self-aware, and modern similes in all of INFERNO. Is it connected to fraud? Or to art? Or both?

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore Virgil's stern rebuke of the pilgrim, which brings out the poet Dante, who offers us a gorgeous simile about the divided, modern self, a self in contradiction with itself, narcissistic, if not Narcissus. Here are the bottom of fraud, we find the authentic self exposing itself as a fraud--which is about as fabulous as Dante can get.

Here are the segments of this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:

[01:38] My English translation of INFERNO, Canto XXX, line 130, through Canto XXXI, line 6. If you'd like to read along or offer a comment, please go to my website, markscarbrough.com.

[04:11] Why does Virgil rebuke Dante the pilgrim so aggressively? Three possible reasons.

[07:50] Dante the poet appears in the passage. Why?

[09:07] The poet gives us one of the most fascinating similes in INFERNO: the divided, dreaming, even "subconscious" self--which forces the pilgrim Dante into silence.

[14:12] Canto XXX ends with the best passage to justify the notion of Virgil as an allegory of reason.

[16:15] The progression in the passage: Virgil - the pilgrim - the poet - Virgil.

[18:55] Dante is playing a dangerous game: I am the great poet who went on the pilgrim's journey to become the great poet that I am.

[21:05] The tenth of the evil pouches (the "malebolge") ends with a full-on carnival of twinning.

[23:47] The difficult interpretive problem of Achilles, his father, and their spear.

And here’s my English translation of Inferno, Canto XXX Line 130 – Canto XXXI, Line 6

 

I was fully occupied in listening to them

When my master said to me, “Keep right on staring

And I’m just a little bit away from having a tiff with you!”

 

When I sensed he spoke to me in anger,

I turned back to him with such shame

That it still gyrates through my memory.

 

Like a guy who’s had a dream about being hurt,

And while dreaming, wishes he were only dreaming,

Longing for what is, even if it were not,

 

So it went with me, unable to utter a word.

I wanted to beg for his pardon, even though all along

I was doing the very thing I believed I wasn’t doing.

 

“A greater crime would get washed off with less shame,”

My master said. “Yours doesn’t even stand at that level.

So set down that burden that’s making you so sad.

 

“But know full well that I’m right by your side,

Especially if by fortune you should get into a spot

Where people are having a squabble like this.

The desire to overhear this sort of thing is a vulgar wish.”

 

----

 

One and the same tongue that had stung me,

Bringing the blush to one of my cheeks and the other,

Then supplied me with the cure.

 

So I’ve heard that Achilles’ spear,

The one that came from his father, could

First cause a bad wound, then the good gift of healing.