The Divine Comedy Analysis

Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy and the Mosaic of Otranto Dante Alighieri, or Alighiero, was an Italian poet, writer, and politician. He was born in Firenze, Italy, in a quite wealthy family. Dante’s date of birth is unknown, although, it is generally indicated around the year 1265 based on some autobiographical allusions contained in Vita Nova and the canticle of Hell. The canticle of Hell starts with the verse “In the middle of the journey of our life” and here, as in other works, following a well-known tradition, a man’s half-life is considered to be 35 years, and because Dante’s imaginary journey starts in 1300, his presumed birth dates to the year 1265. Furthermore, few verses from Paradise tell us that he was born under the sign of Gemini,

Composed according to critics between 1304 and 1321, the years of his exile in Lunigiana and Romagna, the Comedy is Dante’s most famous work, as well as one of the most important examples of medieval civilization. It is known and studied all around the world and is considered to be the greatest work of literature of all time. The poem is divided into three parts called canticles: Hell, Purgatory and Paradise, and each of them consists of thirty-three songs, except the Inferno, which contains an additional proemial song. The poet tells of an imaginary journey, or an Itinerarium Mentis in Deum, through the three realms beyond this world that will lead up to the vision of the Trinity. His imaginary and allegorical to Christian afterlife representation is a culmination of the medieval vision of the world that developed in the Catholic

Paradise is composed of nine concentric circles, whose center is the Earth. In each of these heavens are the blessed, who are closer to God according to their degree of bliss. But the souls of Paradise are not better or worse, and no one wants a better condition that it has, for charity does not allow to desire nothing but what you already possess. God, at birth, has donated to each soul a certain amount of grace, and it is in proportion of this that they enjoy different levels of bliss. Before reaching the first heaven, Dante and Beatrice cross the Sphere of Fire. There are nine heavens in Dante’s Divine Comedy: the first one is the heaven of the Moon, the second the heaven of Mercury, third the heaven of Venus, fourth the heaven of the Sun, fifth the heaven of Mars, sixth the heaven of Jupiter, seventh that of Saturn, eight that of the Fixed Stars, and the last one that of the Crystalline Sky. From the last heaven, Dante finally observes the light of God and he concludes the Comedy with a famous and important line: “love that moves the sun and other