The Image of Hell in Dante's Inferno

In The Inferno, sensory details help to convey the gamut of emotions Dante feels while traveling through Hell. The sounds Dante uses to convey the terrors of Hell are: the plethora of screams containing many different dialects and pitches of those who deserved “neither blame nor praise” the dead souls “teeth began to/ chatter” when they were frightened; the souls “weeping and cursing” at their faith. The details Dante uses to appeal to the sense of sight are: the runners running naked in circles and having wasps and hornets incessantly sting them to produce a constant flow of blood and pus and tears, which worms and maggots coating the grounds ate.

Charon promises to take the souls into “eternal darkness, into fire and ice”; Charon had “eyes like burning coals” ; Dante uses the images of the naked runners to also demonstrate touch and show the sin of inaction during one’s lifetime.

The punishment given to these people who remained neither good nor had was to have swarms of insects sting them, which “made their faces stream with bloody gouts of pus and tears that dribbled to their feet”.

The quotation demonstrates the punishment delivered to those who remained stagnant in their lives using diction that invokes the sense of touch. The diction of “stream” shows the abundance of blood, pus, and tears on their face and also remains a simple feeling that the reader knows the experience of, having something unsavory cover his face. Furthermore, the diction of “dribbled” provides a repugnant sense of the substances slowly falling off their faces, in a gooey fashion that the reader can easily feel himself, Dante uses the images in this fashion to repulse the reader to the punishment occurring and thus to the idea of inaction in life, of deserving neither praise nor blame, which caused this disgusting punishment.

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These senses help Dante understand the physical realities of Hell Dante dwells on the physical realities of Hell to demonstrate the punishments given to sinners in order to discourage the reader from committing similar actions. For example, by describing “these wretches never born and never dead/ ran naked in a swarm of wasps and hornets/ that goaded them the more they fled”, Dante shows the despicable and inescapable situation that the sinners trapped themselves in. The description tells of the men who must bear the incessant punishment and the pain that accompanies sin. By showing the reader the horrid imagery that accompanies such a minor sin, that of inaction, Dante points to the more demeaning punishments existing in Hell. This motivates the reader to attempt to rectify any wrongdoings in his life and attempt for beneficial deeds so that he can avoid the disgusting punishment existing in Hell. Indeed, the wasps that “goaded [the naked men] the more they fled” demonstrate the cruel and relentless punishment existing in Hell for those who do not accomplish good deeds.