The Complete Danteworlds: A Reader's Guide to the Divine Comedy » (New Edition)

Guy P. Raffa is associate professor of Italian at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of Danteworlds: A Reader’s Guide to the Inferno, also published by the University of Chicago Press.

Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy has, despite its enormous popularity and importance, often stymied readers with its multitudinous characters, references, and themes. But until the publication in 2007 of Guy Raffa’s guide to the Inferno, students lacked a suitable resource to help them navigate Dante’s underworld. With this new guide to the entire Divine Comedy, Raffa provides readers—experts in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, Dante neophytes, and everyone in between—with a map of the entire poem, from the lowest circle of Hell to the highest sphere of Paradise.

Based on Raffa’s original research and his many years of teaching the poem to undergraduates, The Complete Danteworlds charts a simultaneously geographical and textual journey, canto by canto, region by region, adhering closely to the path taken by Dante himself through Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise. This invaluable reference also features study questions, illustrations of the realms, and regional summaries. Interpreting Dante’s poem and his sources, Raffa fashions detailed entries on each character encountered as well as on many significant historical, religious, and cultural allusions.

Medium Aevum

"This useful study guide, aimed at the student or non-specialist reader, provides a detailed canto-by-canto summary of the Divine Comedy, together with explanations of the many literary, mythological, historical, and political allusions throughout the poem."-Medium Aevum

Welcome to Danteworlds

Major Events in Dante’s Life  

Map of Italy in the Thirteenth Century Hell Illustration of Dante’s Hell      

Dark Wood

Periphery of Hell: Cowardice 

Circle 1: Limbo

Circle 2: Lust 

Circle 3: Gluttony 

Circle 4: Avarice and Prodigality  

Circle 5: Wrath and Sullenness 

Circle 6: Heresy

Circle 7: Violence

Circle 8, pouches 1-6: Fraud 

Circle 8, pouches 7-10: Fraud 

Circle 9: Treachery 

Changing Values?

Purgatory 

Illustration of Dante’s Purgatory      

Ante-Purgatory: Late Repentant 

Valley of Rulers 

Terrace 1: Pride 

Terrace 2: Envy   

Terrace 3: Wrath 

Terrace 4: Sloth 

Terrace 5: Avarice and Prodigality 

Terrace 6: Gluttony 

Terrace 7: Lust  

Terrestrial Paradise  

Dante Today 

Paradise

Illustration of Dante’s Paradise  

Moon: Vow-Breakers

Mercury: Fame-Seekers

Venus: Ardent Lovers 

Sun: Wise Spirits  

Mars: Holy Warriors 

Jupiter: Just Rulers 

Saturn: Contemplatives 

Fixed Stars: Church Triumphant

Primum Mobile: Angelic Orders  

Empyrean: Blessed, Angels, Holy Trinity

Dante and Interdisciplinarity                                                                         

Acknowledgments     

Note on Texts and Translations

Bibliography 

Index