Karla Mallette on Purgatorio

Hosted by Chris Piuma and Suzanne Conklin Akbari with Karla Mallette

There a lot that I like about the Purgatorio. I mean, I like the fact that there’s time. Uniquely among the three canticles, the Purgatorio takes place against a backdrop of time. Time is weird—it doesn’t work the same way for the penitent souls as it does for us, you know—and it’s really clear, especially in Purgatorio and the Paradiso, that Dante is experiencing these regions of the afterworld on demo mode.

Karla Mallette is a professor of Italian and Middle East Studies at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Her work focuses on the relationship between literary traditions in the medieval Mediterranean, especially Arabic, Latin, and Romance vernaculars. Her earlier books include The Kingdom of Sicily, 1100–1250, and European Modernity and the Arab Mediterranean. Her most recent book, called Lives of the Great Languages: Arabic and Latin in the Medieval Mediterranean, will appear in 2021. She joins Chris and Suzanne to talk about all the feels in the Purgatorio, as well as what it’s like to teach the poem to a wide variety of students.

34b. Bonus: Karla Mallette on Purgatorio.

The Spouter-Inn Karla Mallette, scholar of medieval Mediterranean literature, on Dante’s Purgatorio. More episodes

0:00 / 46:49

Show Notes.

The Inferno as translated by Mark Musa [Bookshop] or Charles Singleton. Also available free online in Allen Mandelbaum’s translation (with useful notes by Teodolinda Barolini) at Digital Dante.

Jacques Le Goff: The Birth of Purgatory.

Stephen Greenblatt: Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare.

(Suzanne, tell us what you really think of Stephen Greenblatt…)

German expressionist films.

Frederic Leighton: Dante in Exile.

Boethius: The Consolation of Philosophy, book 3 metre 12.

Sandow Birk’s and Gustave Doré’s illustrations for the Divine Comedy.

If you are enjoying the show and are able to, please consider supporting us (and our network) on Patreon. Thanks.