
Digging back into Tom Phillips's translation and illustration (via page "treatment") of Dante's Inferno. Here are a few early pages. The image of a book concerns how the damned experience time: the past and the present become dim while the far future is lit by "the Lord's light" ("When things approach or actually take place our intellects are wholly at a loss..."). Dante is engaging with a dire political enemy from his past, with whom he nonetheless feels some shared love of Florence. They break off for a moment and Dante speaks with the father of his dear friend, Guido. Dante, the character, doesn't know it, but Dante the poet does: in the future, Dante will allow Guido to be exiled (over the same kind of political feuds that will yield his own). While in exile, Guido will die. The conversation with the father is quick, confused about what has happened when, and leaves Dante empty and uncertain.
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