Troy Terwilliger’s Reviews > The Divine Comedy > Status Update

It’s a Renaissance haunted house!

To turn a masterpiece about accountability, personal transformation, and the fragile beauty of human growth into a weapon for condemnation is a massive disservice to the text. It takes a journey that is fundamentally about finding the light and tries to lock everyone back in the dark.

While the fraud in Malebolge was committed against ordinary strangers, the sin down here is Treachery—fraud committed against people with whom you shared a special bond of trust (family, country, friends, or benefactors).

“When I departed from Circe..” • This book is far more Greek mythology than Catholic propaganda.

Canto XXIII of Inferno. You’ve reached Ditch Six of Malebolge, where the Hypocrites are punished.

Malacoda is lying through his teeth to lure them into a trap. It's a brilliant narrative choice by Dante: the demons who guard the corrupt politicians are, naturally, completely untrustworthy liars themselves.