The first evil pouch. And a long podcast episode on WALKING WITH DANTE.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we walk along the rim of the first of the evil pouches in INFERNO's circle of fraud. Here, we'll see our first fraudster: a pimp.

How's a pimp guilty of fraud and not lust or even avarice. Because of metamorphosis. Because he turns women into money.

And a warning: the language is foul in this passage. Please be careful of kids or others who might be offended by it. Maybe you'll want to listen on your own later.

Here are the segments of this episode of WALKING WITH DANTE:

[01:34] My English translation of Inferno, Canto XVIII, lines 40 - 66. If you'd like to read along, you can find it on my website, markscarbrough.com, under the header for this podcast.

[03:48] A little bit more about the size, scope, and even directionality of these evil pouches in the eighth circle of hell.

[06:05] Why does our pilgrim halt--and even back up? (No full answers here--just a curious detail.)

[08:05] This damned soul tries to his face from the pilgrim Dante, unlike all the souls we've encountered in the rings above.

[09:13] Who is Venedico Caccianemico? And how can he be in hell is he's still alive up on earth?

[12:39] Venedico is steeped in a "rank braise"? A little bit about the translation of what may be a few tough words in the Florentine.

[15:33] The pilgrim's "plain speech" forces Venedico to speak. Intriguing, since Venedico uses such poetically gorgeous language to describe his own state of affairs.

[20:46] WIth Venedico, we begin our tour of the towns of central Italy that will help structure the various pouches in the eighth circle.

[22:34] Fraud is never far from money for Dante--and thus, turning women into money is the first metamorphosis in the eighth circle, a circle of hell full of changlings.

[25:57] A speculative question: why in the end is this scene in COMEDY rather unsatisfactory?

[30:16] A second speculative question: why if it doesn't really matter which sinners are first and which are second in this pit because the sins of the eighth circle are not ranked according to severity but by other means?