Statius concludes his discourse on embryology by finally answering the pilgrim Dante's question about how souls can take on material attributes in the afterlife . . . and by gently correcting both Virgil's incomplete answer to the question in this canto and Virgil's larger explanation of the soul's journey after death in THE AENEID.

This passage is justifiably complicated. Dante's imaginative and intellectual powers are on full display. It's easy to be lost in the details but there are wonders afoot, including the idea that there may be an allegorical reading of the passage that concerns the afterlife of a work of art.

Join me, Mark Scarbrough, as we finish up Statius's discourse on the soul's material attributes in the afterlife before we ascend to the seventh and final terrace of Mount Purgatory.

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

[01:49] My English translation of PURGATORIO, Canto XXV, lines 79 - 108. If you'd like to read along or continue the conversation with me by dropping a comment on this episode, please find it on my website, markscarbrough.com.

[04:25] Statius fuses classical imagery (the fates) and Augustinian thought.

[10:02] The soul miraculously but of its own accord falls into the afterlife. Wait, what? And only now knows its path in the underworld?

[13:03] The formative power of the soul is intact after death.

[14:57] The afterlife soul is a fabrication of the air.

[16:52] Statius gently refines Virgil's unsatisfactory answers to the pilgrim Dante's question.

[18:28] The souls in the afterlife can enact their desires, just as they do in the world of the living.

[20:51] Statius also gently refines Virgil's discussion of souls in the afterlife in THE AENEID.

[24:24] Is this passage about the afterlife of poetry (or art), too?

[27:12] Rereading all of Statius's discourse: PURGATORIO, Canto XXV, lines 34 - 108.