PURGATORIO, Episode 62. Misogyny Rears Its Head: PURGATORIO, Canto VIII, Lines 64 - 84

After Dante shocks Judge Nino and the poet Sordello with the revelation of the pilgrim's own corporeality, Judge Nino launches into a disgusting diatribe about his "unfaithful wife," a pernicious bit of misogyny that threatens to derail COMEDY . . . or at least our appreciation of it.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we explore this difficult passage in PURGATORIO, one that must be addressed but leaves us with no good answers about works of art from the past.

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

[01:53] My English translation of the passage: PURGATORIO, Canto VIII, lines 64 - 84. If you'd like to read along or drop a comment about this passage to continue this difficult conversation with me, please scroll down this page.

[03:52] Dante's increasingly original language in COMEDY.

[07:06] Giovanna and Beatrice, Judge Nino's earthly family: the center of his rage and a node of disgusting misogyny in COMEDY.

[14:09] Judge Nino and the imagined death of his allegedly "unfaithful" wife.

[15:37] Judge Nino's moderating anger and the emotional landscape of PURGATORIO, Canto VIII.

[17:49] The problem with misogyny in a great poem.

[24:03] Rereading PURGATORIO, Canto VIII, lines 64 - 84.

And here’s my English translation of PURGATORIO, Canto VIII, Lines 64 – 84

One of them turned to Virgil and the other turned

Toward someone seated above, saying, “Get up, Currado!

Come and see what God wills through his grace!”

Then that one turned to me [and said], “Because of the particular gratitude

You owe the one who obscures his originary because

In such a way that no one can ford it,

“When you are far away from these expansive waters,

Tell my Giovanna to call out prayers for me

In a spot where the innocents have their prayers answered.

“I don’t believe her mother loves me anymore

Because she stopped wearing the white bands on her head.

But in her misery, she’ll long for them again!

“Because of her, it’s easy to understand

Just how long love’s fire can endure in a woman

If the eyes and the sense of touch don’t often rekindle it.

“The viper on the banner of the Milanese encampments

Won’t make her tomb look as beautiful

As the rooster of Gallura would have.”

As he said all this, his face was embossed

With a look that showed the proper intensity that

The fire of indignation can burn in a heart.