Mythgard Academy

Mythgard Academy

By Mythgard InstituteEducationArtsBooks
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Mythgard Academy episodes

  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 15

    Week 15: We revisit the Baptistery of San Giovanni and notice the inversions in Dante’s destroying holy furniture to save a life while the popes destroy lives to save holy money for themselves. But what is with all the feet? And do you think Boniface saw the funny side of his little cameo, or would he be depressed in determinism like his predecessor having perverted the mechanism of forgiveness and having then no path to repentance? And here Virgil the ghost grabs Dante the flesh-man and poltergeists him back to the bridge, to the fifth ditch, the rampart of the Fortune Tellers. Where Dante cranes his own head to see the parade of backward-headed shades and sheds a tear for those who weep as their fate. And Virgil rebukes Dante, and Dante corrects Virgil, and one is ready to trust the poets again.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    1 hr 53 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 14

    Week 14: True to the nature of Fraud, the 8th circle is an artificial construct of inverted imagery split into 10 concentric pockets, with bridges that look down upon each trench. The first pocket is a gender discriminated container for pimps and seducers, a sex traffic kept moving by demons with whips. The second pocket is an egalitarian circle of very rude words (What? Would you like to sugar coat with flowery language the circle of flattery?). The third pocket is for spiritual pimps, the fraud of simony, punished in inversions of baptismal fonts with sprinklings of fire on feet. The core of these three - the pimps, the seducers, and the flatterers - is treating people as beasts for their own gain. O see what Dante did there. Then, with one mention of Dante’s guilt at breaking the Baptistry of Saint John, the session ends with an internet crash.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    1 hr 48 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 13

    Week 13: At the waterfall edge of the 7th circle Dante gives up his belt to conjure a ride. What is the truth which seems a lie? Poetic allegory of course. For Dante breaks the 4th wall to give his poem a name, Comedy, and to swear that he saw a beast swim in the air up the waterfall. Geryon is the impossible thing, but that’s ok, he’s a fraud. No, he’s The Fraud and through his depiction we see the truth. Fraud or no, the brute animal is the only way down into the 8th circle. And even with the command to be strong and daring, Dante is afraid like Phaethon and Icarus as Geryon descends.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    2 hr 6 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 12

    Dante Finds Himself Among Friends

    Week 12: There are no poor people in rings 8 and 9 of the 7th circle of Hell, but no one sees clearly either. Dante condescends to walk and talk with his old teacher Brunetto and stops to let three wealthy Florentine nobles ask for news from home. But everything about this tableau is inverted and full of oblique references.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    1 hr 52 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 11

    Violence Against God

    Session 11: Still in the Seventh Circle, in the first ring of the third ring of the Violent, where the violent objector is the landscape itself, fiery sands and flaming rain that banish all growth, we see Capaneus stuck in his railing rebellion against Jove. In the Old Man of Crete we see from the Golden Age to the crumbling of the Kingdom’s of Mankind a cracked statue weeping tears into four mythic rivers. Three of the rivers come into Hell. One confounds Dante's sense of direction, but protects his feet and quenches the fires above. And we shall forget about the fourth for the moment.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    1 hr 43 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 10

    Concerning Violence

    Session 10: Where we arrive on time to find the tormentors of the violent are themselves the violent. The symbolic Nessus, whose own blood became the instrument of the death of his enemies, is the gracious guide and ride for Dante across the field of blood and flame and into the black wood of the suicides. Where we pause and check our own souls, lest we be careless, for the Medieval mind held that to take one’s own life was to be both murderer and victim. And Dante, in pity, becomes the voice of one tree, for when you are in the seventh circle if someone up above remembers your name it’ll be ok, cheers!

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    2 hr
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 9

    Week 9: Where we stop and notice that the Medieval mind is not modern. And just as the organization of Hell was Aristotlean so too is the nature of physics and philosophy. As Virgil and Dante discuss the purpose and place of everything in the world, Prof. Corey reminds us that in their model the sun is Happy to go around the earth, and the rock is Happy to fall to the ground with a thud, and the soul is Happy to go toward the God who made it. Thus choosing to chart a different path is the essence of sin. And in the Happiness of the motion of the spheres both the zodiac and astronomy, even as seen from the pit of Hell, could be used to tell the time of night. And we are reminded that the Harrowing of Hell has had the metaphysical effect of changing the entire landscape, making a highway out of a sheer fall.

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    1 hr 39 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 8

    The Mythgard Academy resumes our discussion of Dante's Inferno. Having gotten, with some difficulty, through the Gates of Dis, it is time to enter a new sector of Hell!

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    2 hr 2 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 7

    Class 7: Where we are reminded that Dante’s frame is a vision and an allegory and not a GPS-enabled map, and even more disturbing there are no bodies in the pageant he sees except his own. Yet, when they get to Dis, the locks may be disabled but so is their confidence; and now all Dis’ demons block their way and Virgil is dismayed. And the angel is full of disdain. And we distance ourselves from Virgil. And we leave Hell in disarray.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    2 hr 12 min
  • MSA028: Inferno, Class 6

    Class Six: Where Boethius and Dante do not understand Fortune, but Virgil does. And three of the 7 deadly sins make their appearance in a swampy, messy, mud wrestling fracas, where souls struggle against Fortune on multiple levels. And someone admits to being on the game show and to seeing someone fall! Apropos!

    And then there was a tall tower, with eyes. And here Dante refuses to faint but waxes eloquently unallegorical on the fate of his RL political enemy.

    For more information about the Mythgard Academy series on Dante's Inferno, visit https://mythgard.org/academy/inferno/

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    1 hr 51 min

About Mythgard Academy

From the publisher's feed

Mythgard Academy aims to make engaging discussions of fantasy and science fiction literature free and open to everyone. The Mythgard Academy program features live discussions with Dr. Corey Olsen, The…