The Divine Comedy: Part 2 Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri
1472 / 181 pgs Classic

The Divine Comedy isa very long poem broken into 3 parts Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso.  Dante and his guide Virgil, another poet who wrote the classic Aeneid, travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven to reunite Dante with his dead girlfriend, Beatrice in Heaven.  Essentially, The Divine Comedy is a love poem full of horror, brimstone, and punishment. 

Purgatory is part of the passage that Dante needs to transverse to eventually find Beatrice.  He must go through each Circle.  Purgatory, in Dante’s vision, is broken into seven Circle’s.  Purgatory’s Circles are themed after the deadly sins.  For each sin, there is a punishment designed to symbolically represent the sin they committed in the flesh.  However, unlike Hell, ones soul eventually rises to Paradise.

Note:  Date has many, many side conversations with many people to talk about each sin and how it’s represented.  There are 33 Chapters and only seven circles.   It takes the first nine chapters just to get to the mountain to start the climb   

To get the first Circle, They travel across the large frozen lake and are challenge by Cato of Utica.  They are guided to the circle by an angel and meet with those who had presentence right before they died.  These Sinners have to wait until they can walk the path of Bismantova (the Mountain).

Virgil and Dante are told they can travel only during the day.  They wait and eventually got to the first circle after a lot of talks with Angels and people.

Circle I. The Proud: The condemned arebent over holding large stones. 

Circle II. The Envious: Their Eyes are sown shut.

Circle III. The Irascible: Walk around in a blinding smoke. 

Circle IV. The Slothful: Engaged in ceaseless activity. 

Circle V. The Avaricious and Prodigal: Forced to lie on ground face down.

Circle VI. Gluttonous. Food just out of their reach and they are emaciated.

Circle VII. The Wanton.  Standing in a wall of Fire.

Circle VII is in chapter 25, at this point Dante walks into the Terrestrial Paradise and finally is reunited with Beatrice.  Sadly, Virgil must leave because he has to go back to Hell.  Dante get’s talked to by Beatrice for the next 8 chapters and then finally they enter the garden and start into Paradise.

Enjoy a good cup of coffee and a good book!

Lopaka