Paradiso
(Dante)

The Divine Comedy, including Paradiso, was written in fourteenth century Italy. Medieval Florence, Dante’s home town, has long been in political turmoil. There was fighting between the Blacks (those that supported the Pope) and the Whites (those that didn’t support him). Dante was not a supporter of the Pope, so when Pope Boniface VIII schemed to help the Blacks take over Florence in a military coup, Dante and his family was exiled.

So, the entire Divine Comedy was very much a story that reflected the time it was written in. It was about political vengeance. But it was also about a man who found himself far from home (in exile and having a middle-age crisis, perhaps?), trying to find purpose in his life again.

It’s a good idea to note, also, that these epic poems were originally written in Italian. At a time that Italy was is such turmoil, Dante’s writing actually helped unify the Italian language. Dante used many interesting words, here, and several Italian words were actually introduced to Italian through the Divine Comedy, some of which words are still used in the modern language in Italy. This is just like how “catch a cold” and “it’s all Greek to me” are common English expressions that came from Shakespeare. In fact, we can say that Dante is Italian’s Shakespeare, both men considered among the greatest poets/writers for their language.

About the Author

As we said, Dante was the Shakespeare of Italian literature, a major Italian poet of the middle ages. The Divine comedy is often considered the greatest literary work in the Italian language; it’s even considered a masterpiece of world literature.

Dante was born in Florence, Italy, around the mid-to-late 1600s. His family was part of the Whites, a political faction. During a time of political turmoil, Dante actually fought in the Battle of Campaldino.

All in all, Dante was an extraordinarily philosophical and religious man, a man that stood behind his political and moral convictions, no matter who didn’t agree with him.

Introduction

Dante’s Paradiso is the third and final part of Dante’s epic Divine Comedy poem. The word Comedy in the title doesn’t mean the epic poem is meant to be funny. It means it’s not a tragedy. In other words, in classical literature, the word comedy means the story has a happy ending.

This third part of the Divine Comedy certainly is the happy ending of the trilogy. After working his way through the horrors of Hell and the trials of Purgatory, Heaven is a place of blessed souls and chosen children of God. Here, Dante meets angels and saints, as well as God himself.

Before we look deeply into the characters and individual “cantos” of this poem, let’s take a brief look at Paradiso, just to catch up with the story, and then we’ll see a general summary of the plot of Paradiso.

Previously in the Devine Comedy

So let’s review what’s happened up to the beginning of Paradiso.

The Story of Inferno

In inferno, Dante is guided by Virgil the Latin Poet through the various circles of Hell. Each new circle was deeper than the last and dedicated to a certain kind of sinner. The first circle was Limbo, dedicated to good men and women that lived before Christ. Virgil was from Limbo.

The second circle held the lustful, tormented by great storms. The third was for the gluttonous, who suffered under freezing rain. The fourth circle was where both the greedy and the wasteful had to eternally push giant weights around. The wrathful and the sullen suffered in the muddy river Styx in the fifth circle.

The travelers reached the city Dis and needed an angel’s help to get in through the hostile residents. When the crossed the gates, they also entered the sixth circle, where heretics were trapped in fiery tombs. The seventh circle was where the violent were punished, and the eighth and ninth circle were dedicated to different kinds of fraud.

When they finally got to the bottom of the ninth circle, they saw sinners trapped under a glassy sea of ice. Half buried in that sea was Lucifer, a three-headed beast, a different sinner in each of his three mouths.

In order to get out of Hell, Virgil and Dante climb Lucifer, ending up coming out of the subterranean horror world and onto the southern hemisphere of the earth, where they come to the mountain of Purgatory.

The Story of Purgatorio

Purgatoria picked up right where Inferno left off—Dante and Virgil on the southern hemisphere, standing at the base Mount Purgatory, which was also on an island. The first area the visited was called ante-Purgatory. Dante and Virgil saw the Valley of the Rulers, where a bunch of dead kings resided. A shadowy serpent appeared at dusk, but it was driven away by two angels.

No one could travel in Purgatory at night. So each time the sun went down, Dante and Virgil had to stop and rest until sunrise. Dante slept this first night, only to wake up at the gates of Purgatory. St. Lucia had carried him there through the night.

They climbed the three steps to the gate, and the angel and the entrance marked seven P’s on Dante’s forehead.

The first terrace was for the Prideful. Large sculptures showed examples of humility. The prideful penitents had climb with giant, heavy weights on top of them. Because these souls were always bent over, Dante bent himself over to talk to them. He felt such compassion for them that he walked hunched down all the way to the gate of the second terrace.

This terrace was dedicated to the Envious, where voices called out examples of love. The envious penitents were punished by having their eyes sewn shut with wire. As the travelers moved on to the next terrace, an angel removed one of the P’s from Dante’s forehead.

The third terrace was the home of the Wrathful. Dante had a vision of examples of gentleness. The wrathful were being punished by being constantly covered in black smoke. Dante and Virgil found the angel, who then removed another P from Dante’s forehead, allowing him to climb to the next terrace.

The Slothful were punished in the fourth terrace. There, Virgil lectured Dante on the structure of Purgatory, Love, and Free Will. The slothful shouted examples of zeal while they ran around in circles without any rest.

Dante and Virgil ascended to the fifth terrace after passing an angel that removed another P from Dante’s forehead. Here, the Avaricious (Greedy) and the Prodigal (Wasteful) were being punished. They shouted examples of poverty and generosity while being chained to the ground, facing down. Mount Purgatory trembled, and Dante discoverd that each quake meant another soul had finished his/her punishment and was now cleared to go up to Heaven. Dante and Virgil met this soul, an epic poet named Statius. He joined the travelers on their journey up the mountain to Heaven. They crossed to the next terrace, Dante losing another P.

The Gluttonous were starved on the sixth terrace, where there were beautiful trees heavy with sweet-smelling fruit, but no soul could climb up and get a taste. Dante lost yet another P, his sixth, upon crossing to the next terrace.

The seventh terrace was the home of the Lustful. Dante, thinking back to the thin and starved souls on the previous terrace, asked how a shade can need food. Statius explained how a shade forms and how they live. Basically, a shade is just like a physical body, also needing food and drink. Here, the Lustful, had to walk in flames, constantly hugging their fellow penitents. When the trio of travelers wanted to climb the stairs out of this terrace, the angel at the gate said they had to cross through the fire as well. They walked through the flames, and they got caught by the sunset halfway up the stairs, so they had to stop and sleep the night before continuing.

Finally, in the Earthly Paradise. Dante met a woman at a stream, named Matilda. She explained some things about purgatory and guided Dante to where he’d meet Beatrice. When the stream they were following curved, they stopped to see a glorious procession of dancers, elders, angels, and a chariot pulled by a griffin.

Out of the chariot, Beatrice appeared. She scolded Dante for his sins. Dante was then dunked into the river Lethe and forced to drink. After that. He joined the procession, which stopped at the Tree of Knowledge, where Dante fell asleep.

When he woke up, Beatrice had a job for him—to observe and write down everything he would see here. Then, Dante saw the chariot attacked by an eagle, a fox, and a dragon. The chariot transformed into a three-headed beast, a whore, and a giant. Beatrice promised that God would exact vengeance on those that attacked the chariot.

Finally, Dante drank of the water from the river Eunoe. Now he was ready to move on to Heaven, with Statius and Beatrice continuing as his guides.