Where to Start with Dante Alighieri: A Reading Guide

Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) was the Florentine poet whose Divine Comedy — written in vernacular Italian rather than Latin, in the early fourteenth century — is generally considered the greatest work of Italian literature and one of the supreme achievements of world poetry. T.S. Eliot wrote that Dante and Shakespeare divided the world between them, and there is no third. The Comedy consists of three canticles — Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso — totalling one hundred cantos of interlocking terza rima verse, following Dante through the entire realm of the afterlife.

Where to Start: Inferno (c. 1314)

The only starting point — the first canticle of the Divine Comedy and the one that most readers encounter first. On the night before Good Friday in the year 1300, Dante finds himself lost in a dark wood — the allegory is immediate and explicit: he is lost in sin and error in the middle of his life. Virgil, the great Roman poet, appears as his guide. They descend together into Hell.

Hell’s structure is one of the great intellectual achievements in literature: a nine-circle system in which sinners are assigned punishments that reflect, with theological precision and poetic invention, the nature of their sins. The lustful are blown about by winds (as passion blew them). The gluttonous lie in filth (as gluttony debased them). The violent are submerged in rivers of boiling blood. The fraudulent are trapped in pits of pitch. The traitors are frozen in ice at the bottom, closest to Satan, who is frozen at Hell’s centre, endlessly beating his wings in a wind that keeps the ice perpetually frozen — and who turns out to be not monstrous but simply stupid, his power inverted into helplessness.

Inferno is gripping because Dante peoples it with his contemporaries: enemies, friends, heroes, popes, and politicians who the fourteenth-century reader would have recognised immediately. The poem is at once theological, political, and deeply personal.

Read Inferno first; then Purgatorio — lighter, more hopeful, many scholars’ favourite canticle — and finally Paradiso, the most difficult and the most sublime.

Purgatorio (c. 1315)

The second canticle — the souls of the saved working through their remaining attachment to sin on the mountain of Purgatory, with Dante and Virgil climbing toward the Earthly Paradise at the summit. More lyrical and more hopeful than Inferno; the canticle where Dante’s encounter with art and poetry is most explicit.

Paradiso (c. 1320)

The third canticle — Dante’s ascent through the spheres of Heaven, guided by Beatrice, ending in the vision of God. The most difficult of the three and, for many readers who reach it, the most extraordinary. Not a starting point; requires Inferno and Purgatorio first.

Why Inferno Is the Place to Begin

For a reader new to Dante Alighieri, Inferno is the place to begin, for it is the first canticle of his great Divine Comedy and the natural and most gripping entry into one of the supreme achievements of world poetry. Inferno follows Dante, guided by the poet Virgil, on a journey down through the circles of Hell, encountering the damned and the punishments that fit their sins, in a vision at once theological, political, and deeply personal. As an entry point, it is the natural beginning, for the Divine Comedy is a single continuous poem to be read in sequence, and Inferno is both its starting point and its most immediately gripping and widely read part. It welcomes the newcomer with its dramatic journey, its vivid and unforgettable scenes, and its compelling encounters, drawing the reader into Dante’s vast vision of the afterlife. It is the first canticle and the natural and most accessible place to begin, so that the new reader enters the Divine Comedy where it begins and where it most grips. For the newcomer, then, Inferno is the natural and ideal starting point.

What to Expect as a New Reader

As a new reader, you can expect Inferno to be a gripping, vivid, and profound poem, the first part of Dante’s vast vision of the afterlife. You can expect a dramatic journey, for the poem follows Dante, guided by Virgil, on a descent through the circles of Hell, encountering the damned and the punishments that fit their sins. You can expect vivid and unforgettable scenes, for Inferno is full of dramatic encounters, striking imagery, and memorable figures, including the historical and contemporary persons Dante places in Hell. You can expect a work that is at once theological, political, and deeply personal, engaging the great questions of sin, justice, and the moral order while reflecting Dante’s own world and concerns. You can expect to read in translation, and a good modern translation with notes will make the poem accessible and illuminate its references. You can expect the gripping and accessible beginning of one of the supreme achievements of world poetry. Expect, in short, a gripping, vivid, and profound poem, a compelling introduction to Dante’s Divine Comedy.

Going Deeper After Your First Book

Once Inferno has drawn you into Dante’s vision, the natural next step is to continue the Divine Comedy through its remaining canticles, for the poem is a single continuous work to be read in sequence. Purgatorio, the second canticle, follows Dante’s ascent of the mountain of Purgatory, lighter and more hopeful than Inferno and a favourite of many scholars, while Paradiso, the third, ascends through the heavens toward the vision of God, the most difficult and the most sublime of the three. Reading the Comedy in sequence allows Dante’s vast journey, from Hell through Purgatory to Paradise, to reach its full and overwhelming completion. The reader who has been gripped by Inferno will find the journey deepen and transform across the canticles, culminating in one of the most audacious endings in all literature. Building your reading journey through Dante is a matter of continuing the Divine Comedy from Inferno through Purgatorio to Paradiso. The reader who begins with Inferno and continues through the whole poem will have encountered one of the supreme achievements of world poetry.

Reading Dante Alighieri

The Divine Comedy must be read in order: Inferno, then Purgatorio, then Paradiso. Each canticle builds on the previous; the poem’s meaning is cumulative. Read with a good translation and do not skip the notes — Dante’s references to fourteenth-century Italian politics and theology benefit from explanation.

For the full Dante Alighieri bibliography, reviews, and biography, visit the Dante Alighieri author page on Editors Reads.

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