Write An Essay On Dante's Inferno

Reading through the second half of this poem I have noticed a change. It was brought up in class, the passage where Dante the narrator explicitly addresses the reader. Again, on page 229, Dante stops to take a moment addressing the reader, “If, reader, you are slow now to believe / what I shall tell, that is no cause for wonder, / for I who saw it hardly can accept it.” (Canto XXV, 46-48) I am curious about Dante’s purpose. In these passages, Dante the author steps in and takes over the story from being told by his character. Is his purpose merely to highlight or is he trying to pull us as readers in deeper with this direct conversation? Could this switch to direct conversation be Dante’s method of noting importance to the reader?

Another thing I have noticed with this book is a size discrepancy. In the back of the book there is a drawing of the different circles in Hell, with each circle a little smaller than the one above. As I make my way through the rest of the book, the circles that Dante describe seem the be growing in size. Each new circle now has a division of sinners, with the eighth circle having ten pouches by Canto XXX. I have found it interesting that the deeper sins have this wide variation and subgroups. I am curious if this is mainly to tailor punishments to the specific sins. For example, in Canto XXVI the eighth circle, eighth pouch, Ulysses and Diomedes are receiving punishment. Virgil goes on the say, “Within that flame, Ulysses / and Diomedes suffer: they who went / as one to rage, now share one punishment.”
In Canto XXIV, when Virgil and Dante are climbing the mountain, Virgil responds to Dante with the line, “The only answer that I give to you / is doing it…A just request / is to be met in silence, by the act.” (Canto XXIV, 76-78) Virgil’s response is simple, but direct that there is no discussion required only action. I found this line interesting and wanted to share