Purgatory, Canto 24

The Sayers Text of Purgatory Canto 24 (Open PDF)

A Prose translation of Canto 24 (by David Bruce)

Summary

FORESE Donati speaks of his sister Piccarda, now in Heaven, and names a number of his fellow penitents. Among them is Bongiunta of Lucca, who, recognizing Dante as a fellow poet, asks him about the “sweet new style” of the Florentine school of lyricists. Forese then hastens on his way, after prophesying the terrible death of his brother, Corso Donati. The Poets come to a second Tree, surrounded by other starved and tantalised shades; from the boughs a voice bids the travellers pass on without eating, and rehearses the examples which form the Bridle of Gluttony. Presently the Angel of Temperance makes his appearance; after brushing the sixth P from Dante's forehead, he pronounces the Benediction of the Cornice and speeds them upward by the Pass of Pardon.

The Prepatory Lecture

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Questions for Reflection

• This is another canto filled with poets talking about poetry. Who are Dante’s main conversation partners?
• How do we get a replay here of the garden of Limbo from Inferno 4? Has Dante grown since then?
• In lines 52-54 Dante gives an account of his poetic identity and of the nature of the poetry he writes. What are some of the key components of his description? Do you think he could have given this same description of his poetry prior to his journey through Purgatory?
• What are the two trees on the terrace of the gluttons? What function do they play? What virtue are they helping the souls cultivate?

Purgatory, Canto 24 © Jan Hearn

The Images

The Trees and the Water: The punishment of the Gluttonous closely resembles the torment allotted in the Classical Tartarus to Tantalus, who stole the food of the gods. In Homer (Od. xi. 582 sqq) he stands in water up to the chin beneath a laden fruit-tree; but when he tries to drink, the water sinks from his lips, and when he tries to reach the fruit, it is carried away by the wind. This punishment by hunger and thirst captured the imagination of the Middle Ages; it nearly always figures in popular pictures of Hell, and even in illustrations to the Inferno, in which it has no place, Dante having substituted for it the wallowing in mud and the cold rain of the Third Circle, under the teeth and claws of Cerberus (Inf. vi. passim).

On the Sixth Cornice, Dante has retained the image of the water and the tree, turning the former into a sparkling cascade (doubtless emanating from the twin-spring of Lethe and Eunoë, cf. Canto xxxiii. 112-14), and ingeniously making the latter a scion of the Tree of Knowledge, thus linking up the Sin of Gluttony with the sin of Eve and the Fall of Man (“all for an apple, an apple which he took”).

By another dexterous economy, he uses this Penance as a springboard for Statius’s discourse (in the next Canto) on the nature of the soul.

Mark Vernon's Lecture