Inferno, Cantos I-VII:  The Introduction
The first few cantos of the Inferno are extremely important for giving us clues about how to interpret the poem.  Dante sets up a lot of the parameters that he wants us to use to make sense of what he's writing.

First, he introduces the character of Virgil and develops that character to show us what we're supposed to think about the Inferno in relation to the Aeneid.  In the very first canto, Virgil appears like "one who seemed faint because of the long silence," and this awe-inspiring figure ("light and honor of all other poets") is going to be Dante's authoritative guide throughout the Inferno.  In addition, the first three cantos of the poem (and beyond) are filled with echoes of Virgil's Aeneid.  In Canto III, for example, you can compare the approach of Dante and Virgil to the river Acheron with the parallel episode in Book VI of the Aeneid.  The resemblance is incredible.  Dante is mimicking the master.  He clearly wants us to think of his poem as an imitation and extension of Virgil's master work.  Much like Virgil with Homer, Dante wants to do for 14th-century Italy what Virgil did for Augustan Rome.  He wants to follow in Virgil's footsteps.  He wants to write the defining work for his culture.

But also like Virgil with Homer, Dante doesn't think that Virgil got things quite right.  In part, Dante, as a Christian, inevitably sees Virgil's culture-defining masterpiece as flawed.  Virgil's pagan culture was unenlightened, heathen, and unsaved.  So, the master work of that pagan culture must inevitably be unenlightened, heathen, and unsaved as well.  Dante admires Virgil a great deal, but he thinks of Virgil as having missed the boat when it came to understanding cosmic reality and God.

But if Virgil were condemned to hell just for being pagan, we wouldn't think that Dante's world was very fair.  After all, how was Virgil supposed to believe in Jesus Christ, who wasn't even born yet when Virgil died in 19 B.C.?  Most medieval writers and theologians were quite clear about the fact that pagans who had never heard or known of Christ surely couldn't be damned to hell for this ignorance -- God would surely find a way to save them from their sins even though they weren't Christian.  (Note that this consideration was not offered by medieval Christians to the Moslems living in their time, since these Moslems lived late enough that they had heard about Christ but refused to believe in him.)

Dante himself clearly believed that pagans could be saved and go to heaven.  In the Pugatorio and Paradiso, there are at least three pagans who are saved -- Cato, Statius, and Ripheus.  So, Dante could easily have made Virgil, pagan or not, be saved too.  The fact that he chooses to put Virgil in hell leads me to believe that there is more going on here than meets the eye.

And that's the second crucial thing that we must learn from these early cantos.  Things are often not what they seem in hell.  The characters in hell just don't seem very bad.  Virgil, Francesca da Rimini, and many other sinners in Dante's hell seem more sympathetic and sad than wicked and evil.  But they are wicked and evil.  As we follow Dante through hell, we observe all the souls there and listen to what they say.  Some of the sinners in Dante's hell are very seductive.  But they are all evil to the core.  So, beware.  Trust no one in hell.  Always be looking for the catch or the rationalization or the lie.  Every sinner in hell is misrepresenting the truth to make themselves look good -- to rationalize away their sin.  But they always give clues in what they say and do of just how evil they are.  You have to watch very closely to see and understand those clues.

We'll focus primarily on Virgil and Francesca da Rimini in class.  As you read about these two characters in the poem, keep thinking to yourself that they are wicked.  What makes them wicked?  Wherein lies their evil?  What is wrong with them and their thinking?  Look especially at what they say.  How do their words give away the fundamental wickedness of their characters?  What is the fundamental wickedness of their characters?  Dante often puts people in hell for a concrete, visible sin (such as adultery in Francesca's case), but that concrete, outward sin is really just a symptom of a greater, deeper sin within the sinner's character.  The outward sin is almost only a pretext for putting the sinner in hell.  The deeper sin is what makes them truly evil and is the real reason for their being damned.

Finally, Dante likes to tease his readers and to give us intellectual games and puzzles to figure out.  Dante, for example, has his own character in the poem participate symbolically in all the sins that are being punished in hell.  As Dante and Virgil pass through the circles of hell, Dante symbolically commits the sin punished in each circle in some way.  Dante expects us as his readers to try to figure out in each circle how the character Dante is participating in the sin.  So, for example, in the circle of the gluttonous (people who were too focused on food and drink), the character Dante keeps asking question after question after question --  never satisfied, the way a glutton always wants more food no matter how much he or she has.  So, watch for the subtle clues of Dante's participation in each sin.  As you watch Dante interact with the sinners in each circle, is he in some way committing the same kind of sinful act as the damned souls in that circle?

To understand the episode with Farinata, you need to know a little bit about Florentine and Italian politics.  Italy was not a unified country in Dante's day.  It was divided up into city-states and small principalities, but all this division was universally perceived as a bad thing -- a source of constant conflict and inter-city war that really wasn't doing the Italians much good.  When thinking about what to do to unify Italy, Italians tended to fall into one of two camps.  Either they looked to the Holy Roman Emperor (a German prince, elected by German princes to rule an empire that nominally included Italy but in practical terms really didn't extend beyond Germany), or they looked to the Pope (the strongest local ruler, who controlled the Papal States and, in addition, had a great deal of moral authority over all Christians -- at least in theory).  Those who looked to the Holy Roman Emperor for the salvation of Italy were called Ghibellines, and those who looked to the Pope were called Guelphs.  Farinata was a Ghibelline, and Dante was a Guelph.

In Florence, after Farinata's death and while Dante was still a young man, the Guelphs succeeded in defeating and exiling the Ghibellines (and so, Dante taunts Farinata with his party's ultimate defeat and exile), but the Guelphs themselves then divided into two camps -- one allied to the Pope and the other, irony of ironies, allied to the Holy Roman Emperor.  Dante fell into the latter camp (so that he, like a Ghibelline, came to look to the Emperor to save Italy from all its division and bloodshed).  So, how does Dante's behavior with Farinata constitute a participation in the sin of violence?  In what respect is Farinata violent?  Exactly how does his behavior and beliefs constitute violence?  How does Dante mirror or complement Farinata's violence?  Farinata is condemned to the place where he is for atheism, but atheism seems only the tip of the iceberg.  What is really wrong with Farinata's thinking and behavior?  Atheism is just a symptom of a deeper wrong in Farinata.  What is that deeper wrong?

To understand the episode with Pier della Vigna, you don't really need much in terms of background (other than the knowledge that Pier della Vigna was a secretary and poet at the court of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II and that he was eventually discredited politically and committed suicide as a result).  So, instead of focusing on background, look closely at what Pier della Vigna actually says.  How is his thinking violent?  What is wrong with the way that he approaches things?  What is wrong with the way he interacts with people?  As with all the sinners in Dante's hell, he is condemned to a circle for a concrete act (suicide), but that concrete act is really just symbolic and symptomatic of something deeper and more pervasive.  What underlies and explains Pier della Vigna's suicide?  I don't mean what actually triggers it, but what in Pier della Vigna's very being would lead him to commit suicide?  What fundamental flaw in his thinking condemns him to hell among the Violent?  How does Dante participate in his sin?

To understand the episode with Brunetto Latini, you need to know two things.  First, Brunetto Latini is gay (that is, a sodomite).  Second, Brunetto Latini was Dante's beloved teacher when he was a young man.  Brunetto Latini manifests every gay stereotype of Dante's culture (and ours).  He's cruising the sandy beach, looking at men's bodies, even in hell.  He's effeminate and talks like a queen.  Dante participates in his sin in some rather obvious and interesting ways too.  But as with every other sinner in Dante's hell, Brunetto Latini's concrete, outward sin (sodomy) is really only symbolic and symptomatic of a deeper, more fundamental sin.  So, what deeper sin underlies Brunetto Latini's homosexuality?  What causes Brunetto Latini to be gay?  What in Brunetto Latini's very being leads him to prefer men to women for intimacy?  What does Brunetto Latini value in people?  How is his thinking and his behavior violent to other people?  Why are some men okay in Brunetto Latini's book?  What is wrong with his thinking in that way?  (By the way, just so that you don't get the wrong impression, Dante was not really homophobic; several openly gay men, including Guido Guinizelli, are in Dante's purgatory on their way to heaven -- so homosexuality by itself isn't cause for damnation in Dante's eyes.)

In terms of the Barrators, I'd like you to focus primarily on what Dante and Virgil have learned (or not learned) in the course of the Inferno.  How does Dante's behavior in the encounter with the Malebranche (the demons who guard the Barrators) compare to his behavior in Cantos VIII-IX (the encounter at the walls of Dis)?  What about Virgil's behavior?  Has Dante learned anything?  Has Virgil learned anything?  If Dante and/or Virgil has learned something, what is it?  Is Dante becoming a better person for having had these experiences in hell?  Is he any closer to salvation than he was in Cantos VIII and IX?  What progress (if any) has he made?

In terms of Ulysses, Dante may not have known Homer's Odyssey, but he knew all sorts of legends about Odysseus (spelled "Ulysses" by the Romans).  How does Dante's character Ulysses compare to Homer's Odysseus?  Is he at all the same?  Is he totally different?  Is he the same in some ways but different in others?

Why is Ulysses in hell?  What sin has he committed?  On the surface, he's among the fraudulent counselors, but as we know from other episodes in the Inferno, people are usually in hell for something deeper and more evil than the surface sin they are being punished for committing.  What is Ulysses's fundamental sin?  How does Dante participate in it?  Dante is particularly fascinated with Ulysses and this particular bolgia.  Why?

In terms of Bertran de Born, has Dante successfully captured the wickedness of Bertran de Born?  Does Bertran de Born deserve the fate that Dante assigns him?  What does Dante's condemnation of Bertran de Born tell us about how medieval society has changed since Bertran de Born's time?

First, what is Ugolino's sin?  He tells a heart-wrenching story about his own death by starvation with his sons, but there is something fundamentally wrong with his story.  Like so many sinners in Dante's hell, Ugolino unwittingly reveals his own sinfulness and evil as he tries to justify himself and his actions.  What does Ugolino do while starving in that horrible prison that is fundamentally wrong and evil?  How is his thinking fundamentally flawed?  Ugolino is in the circle of the traitors.  How is he a traitor in the story he tells?  Is Ugolino's story a good culmination of the entire Inferno?  He's the last major sinner that we'll meet.  Is he a fit conclusion to Dante's experiences in hell?  How does Dante participate in his sin?  Are you shocked by Dante's behavior in Canto XXXIII?

Second, is Satan an anticlimax after Ugolino?  Is the last canto of Dante's poem a disappointment?  If so, what might Dante be saying about the nature of sin and Lucifer by ending his poem this way?