Episode 88. Art, Realism, And Dante's Sheer Audacity: PURGATORIO, Canto XII, lines 13 - 24

The opening of PURGATORIO, Canto XII, becomes even stranger as the poet Dante claims that the art he’s about to see beneath his feet is even clearer than the actual events when they happened.

All well and good, until we remember this isn’t God’s art, as Dante wants us to believe. It’s Dante’s. And audacious.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore the second half of the opening twenty-four lines of PURGATORIO, Canto XII.

Here are the segments for this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:

[01:29] My English translation of the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto XII, lines 13 - 24. If you'd like to read along or continue the conversation with me, please scroll down this page.

[02:37] Virgil's call back to realism (or mimesis).

[04:30] Tombs and their signs (or symbolic language).

[09:56] Artifice as "realer" than real.

[21:00] Rereading the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto XII, lines 13 - 24.

And here’s my English translation of Purgatorio, Canto XII, Lines 13 - 24

[Virgil] said to me, “Turn your eyes down below.

It’ll be good for you. It’ll smooth out our path

To see the road bed beneath the soles of our feet.”

As tombs in the ground are full of signs

To explain what the dead once were

And make their memory present again,

Making us grieve once more, full of tears,

At the prodding of remembrance,

Its spurs driven into the sides of the sorrowing,

So I saw these figures carved here,

Better in their appearance thanks to the craft,

Along that path made into the side of the mountain.