hBjcDQfnMguRXVnjTNgM Mark Scarbrough's WALKING WITH DANTE: Reading The Comedy Without Believing The Comedy - Walking With Dante

Episode 140

Reading The Comedy Without Believing The Comedy

Published on: 13th March, 2022

Hi, I'm Mark Scarbrough and this is the podcast WALKING WITH DANTE. In most episodes of this podcast, we slow-walk passage by passage through Dante's masterwork, COMEDY. But this is an interpolated episode, brought about because of several conversations I've had online with people recently.

The question is this: How can I, an atheist, read Dante's COMEDY? I thought I'd answer that problem as well as I can.

Here are the segments of this episode of the podcast:

[01:24] My backstory with Christianity.

[03:20] Inferno is the easy part!

[05:01] All art exists in a frame--and you cannot get rid of the frame without ruining the art.

[10:31] I don't have to save Dante from Christianity.

[14:11] The Comedy is not a mirror to see myself better.

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About the Podcast

Walking With Dante
A passage-by-passage stroll through Dante’s DIVINE COMEDY with Mark Scarbrough
Ever wanted to read Dante's Divine Comedy? Come along with us! We're not lost in the scholarly weeds. (Mostly.) We're strolling through the greatest work (to date) of Western literature. Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as I take on this masterpiece passage by passage. I'll give you my rough English translation, show you some of the interpretive knots in the lines, let you in on the 700 years of commentary, and connect Dante's work to our modern world. The pilgrim comes awake in a dark wood, then walks across the known universe. New episodes every Sunday and Wednesday.
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Mark Scarbrough

Former lit professor, current cookbook writer, creator of two podcasts, writer of thirty-five (and counting) cookbooks, author of one memoir (coming soon!), married to a chef (my cookbook co-writer, Bruce Weinstein), and with him, the owner of two collies, all in a very rural spot in New England. My life's full and I'm up for more challenges!