PURGATORIO, Episode 13. The First Angel Arrives In Purgatory With Lots Of Questions In Tow: PURGATORIO, Canto II, Lines 25 - 42

We knew a bright light was approaching fast--but now we find our that it's our first angel in Purgatory, standing at the helm of a ship, following the path Ulysses once took to get here.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore the implications of our first angel sighting in PURGATORIO. It's a moment of heavenly triumph. Or would be, were it not for all the questions the angel brings in tow.

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

[01:21] My English translation of the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto II, lines 25 - 42. If you'd like to read along, print off my translation, or drop a comment, please scroll down this page.

[03:28] Four infernal characters underneath this passage: first, Phlegyas.

[06:31] Second, Charon.

[07:42] Third, Ulysses.

[09:14] Finally, Francesca.

[11:12] Why are there so many references to INFERNO in the opening two cantos of PURGATORIO? I've got five possible answers.

[17:04] Virgil's position is complicated in this passage. How does he recognize the angel before Dante the pilgrim? And why doesn't Virgil bow down to the angel?

[23:38] Heaven has "officials" because it's a bureaucracy with eternal records.

[26:48] What happens when the truth is too bright?

And here’s my English translation of Purgatorio, Canto II, Lines 25 – 42

My master still didn’t utter a word.

But when that first whiteness appeared to be wings,

He then certainly recognized the boatman

And cried out [to me]: “Do it, do it, get down on your knees!

Behold the angel of God! Fold your hands!

From now on out, you’re going to see officials of this ilk.

“See how he disdains all human devices,

So much so that he won’t use oars or sails—

Nothing else except his wings, even though the shores are so far apart.

“See how he stretches his wings straight up toward heaven,

Beating the air with those eternal feathers

That won’t ever molt, as mortal plumage does.”

Then, as the heavenly bird came closer and closer,

Its radiance got so much brighter

That my eyes couldn’t take it up close.

So I looked down. And he came up to the shore

With a ship so fast and light

That its keel drew no water at all.