Inferno Canto I-V

1) Dante “sets-up” the journey in Canto I in the first line where he writes “midway along the journey of our life.” Life is often referred to as a journey, the goal of life is to make it heaven with God, and therefore we see that this story is about the Pilgrim’s journey in life to God.
Next is landscape: this is essential to the story. The first hints are the second and third line of the story “I woke to find myself in a dark wood, for I had wandered off from the straight path,” (p. 67). Just as we had discussed with Chretien de Troyes, the “woods” usually represent fear, the unknown, and sin. And the phrase “wandered off the straight path,” is indicative of sin or trouble in the pilgrimage of life. Next, the main character finds himself at the “foot of a hill,” “I raised my head and saw the hilltop shawled in morning rays of light send from the planet that leads men straight ahead on every road,” (p. 68). But the Pilgrim is unable to take this straight path because wild beasts are obstructing it. This is setting up the “journey,” “taking the road less traveled,” “obstacles in life,” as the Pilgrim begins his “mid-life journey” to understand the true nature of sin. These three beasts could also represent sin or the three sections of hell. It is necessary to take the dark road and know the bad things in life before Dante can achieve “divinity” and see the divine light described at the top of the hill.
The Pilgrim is initially very scared and reluctant, but Virgil earns his trust as his guide and as a mentor for this journey to hell and back.


2) Canto V described the threshold of the Second Circle of Hell, which reveals those damned for lust. First the Pilgrim and Virgil are faced with Minos, who judges and dictates “how far down” sinners have to go by wrapping his tail around himself. Initially, Minos warns the Pilgrim to beware and not be fooled, where Virgil responds with a line he also said to Charon at the river, “It is so willed there where the power is for what is willed; that’s all you need to know,”(p. 92 &110). Both times this response silenced the aggressors, so I wanted to better understand why this phrase held so much power in the depths of Hell. My initial thoughts are: Charon and Minos are both creatures out of hell who are questioning and trying to stop the Pilgrim from continuing on his journey, Virgil then responds with this phrase each time and the two are allowed to pass. I think that it is a reference to the “Almighty,” or of Fate; some entity that has more power and importance than these creatures of the underworld. I also think that since the Pilgrim is on this journey to understand the true nature of sin, Virgil serves as his leader so that he may successfully complete this journey, and not be taken advantage of or captured by the slick, deceitful creatures in the underworld.
Secondly I was captured by the language and images used in Canto V. This place in hell is described as having no light where an infernal storm rages. “…Bellowing like the sea racked by a tempest, when warring winds attack it from both sides, the infernal storm, eternal in its rage, sweeps and drives the spirits with its blast: it whirls them, lashing them with punishment,” (p.110). Those damned because of their lust are constantly being lashed in this windstorm as punishment and a constant reminder of their sins, eternally. The image of birds appears three times during Canto V; “…and as the wings of starlings in the winter,” “…and just like cranes in flight,” “As doves, called by sweet desire to return,” (pps. 110-112). Birds are used to describe the wind that constantly whips the sinners, also to describe the flocks of sinners, and finally to describe Francesca and Paolo who are summoned by the Pilgrim, as sweet doves. I think the image of birds is representative of love, which the damned perverted in their lustful sins. The images of doves, starlings, and cranes, all beautifully graceful birds powerfully juxtapose the dark depths of hell.
Finally, the Pilgrim’s conversation with Francesca and Paolo, who are eternally bound together in hell for their lust, show his failure of understanding the true nature of sin. Francesca retells the story of her descent into hell and pulls and the Pilgrim’s heart strings with pity and a false allusion. Francesca references the story of Lancelot, yet claims Paolo pursued her. However, in Lancelot, Guinevere pursues King Arthur, thus she tries to twist the story in her favor to make the Pilgrim feel bad. Pilgrim does feel so badly and so much sadness that he faints. The Pilgrim does not yet understand the nature of people in the depths of hell, which is why he needs Virgil as a guide.