INFERNO, Episode 88. My Interview With Kristen Hook, A Dantista Working On Inferno, Canto X

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, for this special episode of the podcast WALKING WITH DANTE. Here’s my conversation with Kristen Hook, a Dantista writing her PhD dissertation on INFERNO, Canto X.

It’s the Farinata episode among the tombs of the heretics. But Hook isn’t interested in the Ghibelline leader. She’s interested in Guido Cavalcanti, Dante’s friend and rival poet. Guido’s father puts his chin up over the edge of the tomb to ask where his son is as the Greco-Roman statue of Farinata tries to one-up our pilgrim.

Guido becomes an empty space in Dante’s poem. Hook is here to tell us more—and how that empty space opens up levels of interpretation we might not have imagined.

No translated passage for this episode. Instead, sit back and get ready to get out of your depths. Sometimes, it’s nice to swim in the deep end of the pool