The building of time in The Divine Comedy

Abstract

This article establishes a relationship between the way time was built in three transcendental spaces in The Divine Comedy – Hell, Purgatory and Heaven – and the philosophical speculation on the subject held by Plato, Aristotle and St. Augustine, thinkers whose works were read by Dante Alighieri and probably affected his own. The aim is to provoke some thoughts on questions that may seem confusing at first glance, as the coexistency of time and eternity in the transcendental space and the conservation, by the soul, of the characteristics of the body and the consequent subjection to the passage of time, especially where there is definite or transitory punishment. Interpretations to these questions will be presented and may be stimulating to the reading of the work.