Today, people feel Dante's Paradiso is irrelevant. It's not. It is the place of true perception and delightful knowledge, and the goal of the Divine Comedy. The question is how to follow Dante's lead and become aware of this domain of reality that is here, now as much as anywhere. In this illustrated talk, I track how Dante's perceptions expanded as, led by Beatrice, he transhumanised. I ask, too, who I might meet as guides on the way. My book, Dante's Divine Comedy: A G...
Oct 03, 2021•44 min
For further details about Dante's Divine Comedy: A Guide for the Spiritual Journey - https://www.markvernon.com/books/dantes-divine-comedy-book For further details about the Dante Society of London - https://dantesocietylondon.com/index.html 2:34 Welcome 3:23 Dante’s first 700 years 6:08 Dante Society of London 9:14 Invoking Dante today 10:33 Introducing my new book 18:08 Reading in Italian and English from the Inferno, with some thoughts 27:12 Reading in Italian and English from the Purgat...
Sep 15, 2021•1 hr 6 min
Mark Vernon talks about Dante and his new book, Dante’s Divine Comedy: A Guide for the Spiritual Journey (Angelico Press) at the Church Times podcast. This year marks 700 years since Dante’s death, and the Church Times of 10 September 2021 includes features by Robin Ward and Alexander Faludy, as well as several reviews of books published to mark the anniversary. In a Church Times review of Mark’s book, Jonathan Boardman describes it as a “detailed and immensely thoughtful commentary. . . His per...
Sep 10, 2021•24 min
To preorder Dante's Divine Comedy: A Guide for the Spiritual Journey see - https://chbookshop.hymnsam.co.uk/books/9781621387480/dantes-divine-comedy To join me and register for the online book launch on 14th September at 6pm BST see - https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/mark-vernon-on-dantes-divine-comedy-tickets-168394477415?keep_tld=1 For more details about the book and an excerpt from the introduction see - https://www.markvernon.com/books/dantes-divine-comedy-book
Sep 01, 2021•37 sec
In this 700th anniversary year, the truth of the Divine Comedy is a key issue. Modern critics may explain its spiritual veracity by putting its impact down to social construction and performativity. But Dante knew about literature as much as he knew about divine life. He is emphatically clear that he has travelled to the high heavens and seeks to write so that we may follow him too. In this talk, I use Dante's own framework of the literal, allegorical, tropological and anagogic to explore h...
Aug 22, 2021•32 min
Categories like feminine and masculine can constrain as much as illuminate. But there is no denying that men and male entities play a major, often surprising part in Dante's journey through the Divine Comedy. This talk complements my look at Dante and the Divine Feminine, now considering Dante's encounters with figures such as Belacqua and Statius, Bernard and Cacciaguida. Archetypal qualities such as the warrior, magician, lover and king assist. The talk ends with the figure of Beatri...
Jul 18, 2021•24 min
Categories like feminine and masculine can constrain as much as illuminate. But there is no denying that women and female entities play a major, often surprising part in Dante's journey through the Divine Comedy. Saints including Beatrice, Lucia and Mary, historic figures such as Piccarda, Francesca and Cunizza, and mythological entities like the sirens all figure. In this talk, I use Erich Neumann's exploration of feminine archetypes, The Great Mother, to deepen a sense of how the one...
Jul 16, 2021•16 min
The Divine Comedy aims to deepen and broaden our perception of reality, often by exploding preconceptions. Nowhere is this more true than in Dante's take on the Christian perception of the Trinity. For Dante, it is way more than a doctrine. It is a mode of seeing that reveals reality as dynamic and dancing to its depths. For further talks and details of Mark's book on Dante see - www.markvernon.com
May 30, 2021•25 min
For more on Dante do see - https://www.markvernon.com/dantes-divine-comedy Details of my book, Dante's Divine Comedy: A Guide for the Spiritual Journey, are here - https://www.markvernon.com/books/dantes-divine-comedy-book Also, use this code, “dantemv”, to get £10 off my Divine Comedy course at The Idler via this link - https://www.idler.co.uk/product/dantes-divine-comedy-in-100-images-with-mark-vernon/?wpam_id=2...
Apr 03, 2021•6 min
[This is an audio version of a talk with images, which is on my YouTube channel.] Making sense of why Dante had to travel through hell, what was going on in purgatory, and how that's all linked to the destination of heaven, comes with appreciating how, in the spiritual life, descent and ascent are profoundly linked. Dante explores the links between virtues and vices, moving beyond the literal, high places are risky places, desiring not more but it all, the cross and failures as digressions,...
Mar 27, 2021•25 min
The word transhumanism was coined by Dante to capture his realisation of divine life in paradise. It has been colonised today by technologists dreaming of utopias. I explore 7 key differences to recover Dante’s vision from the Divine Comedy, in the 700th anniversary year of the great poet’s death, which is also to explore the richness of true transhumanizing. 1. Purge what stops you wanting not what you don’t want. 2. Understand that death is your friend not your enemy. 3. Know your body as expe...
Mar 14, 2021•27 min
Dante’s journey is all about erotic love, through ugly possessiveness, and powerful passions, to the realisation that love is usually experienced as an ignorance about what we desire, to which he awakens. The Divine Comedy is, therefore, a crucial resource for understanding this energy that surges through us. The poem is rare in the western Christian tradition in embracing eros, not trying to cajole or chasten it. Love leads Dante to the truth that was there all along, and calls to us as well, s...
Feb 07, 2021•35 min
This is a recording of a talk I gave online as part of St Albans Cathedral's online adult education programme. The talk with images is online here - https://youtu.be/MiiG-isCCA0 For more on Dante, including details of my forthcoming book - https://www.markvernon.com/dantes-divine-comedy
Jan 13, 2021•1 hr 1 min
We will learn a lot about Dante’s language, love, politics and humanism in 2021, the 700th anniversary of his death. But perhaps not so much about the spiritual insights he felt charged by heaven to communicate in his Divine Comedy. My top 10 spiritual insights are: 10. Comedy transcends, not excludes tragedy 9. Morality gets you nowhere, insight leads everywhere 8. Descent and ascent are the same path 7. Life is not a hero’s journey but a lover’s journey 6. Light is intelligent 5. Intelligence ...
Jan 05, 2021•13 min
Dante reaches the end of his journey, which is also the origin and moment of complete reception of divine life and light.
Nov 08, 2020•28 min•Season 3Ep. 33
Bernard takes Dante on a tour of paradise, which is also a gathering together of all he has experienced.
Nov 07, 2020•20 min•Season 3Ep. 32
Dante sees paradise as a white rose of beauty and heavenly amphitheatre of life, shining like the sun.
Nov 07, 2020•20 min•Season 3Ep. 31
Dante enters the Empyrean conveying, in visions, the direct experience of divine, living light.
Oct 25, 2020•31 min•Season 3Ep. 30
The unity of the eternal and temporal, as interpenetrating expressions of the divine, is unpacked by Beatrice.
Oct 24, 2020•27 min•Season 3Ep. 29
Dante gains inner sight of the still centre of all things, the spark of being and ever present origin.
Oct 18, 2020•32 min•Season 3Ep. 28
Dante is full of the superabundance of heaven, when the lights around him turn red and Peter condemns the church.
Oct 17, 2020•24 min•Season 3Ep. 27
A blinded Dante realigns his desire to the heavens, and is confronted by the unexpected light of Adam.
Oct 11, 2020•34 min•Season 3Ep. 26
The light of hope, James, joins Dante and Beatrice. They shine with this virtue, before the heavens fall silent.
Oct 10, 2020•31 min•Season 3Ep. 25
Dante must delight Saint Peter with insights on faith. He finds words to express his awareness and love.
Oct 04, 2020•32 min•Season 3Ep. 24
In a series of shattering visions, Beatrice helps Dante steady himself and become capable of the light.
Oct 03, 2020•19 min•Season 3Ep. 23
Beatrice helps Dante tolerate the tremendous vision in Saturn, as Benedict descends the ladder.
Sep 27, 2020•32 min•Season 3Ep. 22
Dante is in the heaven of Saturn, though its glory must be shown gradually, lest he be blasted by the light.
Sep 13, 2020•26 min•Season 3Ep. 21
Souls Dante never expected to see are encountered in Jupiter, and Dante learns of new heavenly dynamics.
Sep 12, 2020•17 min•Season 3Ep. 20
The heaven of Jupiter shows the divine plenitude. Accepting human finitude readies Dante for more.
Sep 09, 2020•20 min•Season 3Ep. 19
A deeper symmetry in life appears to Dante as, guided by Beatrice, he moves to the heaven of Jupiter.
Sep 06, 2020•25 min•Season 3Ep. 18
