The exercise eventually convinced him that Dante’s fantasy could never be structurally achieved, taking an important first step, some say, toward theoretical physics.ĭante’s pilgrimage adds a third dimension: It is both an ascent, from the bowels of hell to the airy kingdom of heaven, and an inner journey, as Dante (and the reader) get closer and closer to meeting God. “The world, the universe, humanity, the angels and demons - everything is in perfect balance,” says Rubenstein, who is director of USC Dornsife’s Center for the Premodern World.ĭante’s structure was so compelling that in 1588, a young Galileo Galilei attempted to map out the dimensions of hell as described by Dante. The nine rings of heaven correspond with the planets and stars. The book is divided into 100 sections, or “cantos.” One canto serves as an introduction, and the remaining 99 are evenly divided among three books: Inferno (hell) Purgatorio (purgatory) and Paradiso (paradise).Įach of these realms is composed of nine rings, into which the dead are divvied up after their demise. His studious organizing starts with the structure of the poem itself. Dante takes the chaos and uncertainty of the afterlife and the universe and turns it all into a precisely structured map.

The Divine Comedy might be deeply religious - Dante himself wanted people to interpret it with the same rigor as people approached the Bible - but it endures in secular times partly for how thoroughly and imaginatively it organizes the cosmos. Italian artist Michelangelo Caetani’s series of engravings depict Dante’s elaborate vision of the afterlife. USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute

Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture Max Kade Institute for Austrian-German-Swiss Studies

Huntington-USC Institute on California and The West Casden Institute for the Study of the Jewish Role in American LifeĬenter for Islamic Thought, Culture and PracticeĬenter for Latin American and Latinx Studies

The divine comedy dante book