Canto 11 is key to understanding how the Inferno is organized, which is to say, how Dante classifies sin. This canto explains the logic of Hell. To summarize there are three parts to Hell: 1. Upper ...

In the ancient refectory of the Franciscan monastery (now the museum) attached to the church of Santa Croce in Florence, there is a fragment of a Hell fresco (fig. 1) discovered in 1942 behind an ...

In translating the Inferno, I knew I couldn’t imagine what it was like to be Dante—I wasn’t born in the 13th century, I wasn’t male, Italian, Florentine, Catholic, and a political exile—but I am a ...

A great many college students give up on “The Divine Comedy,” usually after they’ve determined in which circle of hell they are destined to reside. (And most don’t get far, as the second circle is for ...

In the lead-up to Dante’s 700 th death anniversary next year, Eric Armusik is painting 40 panels illustrating Dante’s legendary Divine Comedy. The artist shared some of the completed panels with ...