Blake, Annotations to Dante illustrations (1825-27)

In the Divine Comedy (Divina Commedia) Dante narrates the story of his journey out of the dark forest where he found himself in the middle of his life. With the Roman poet Virgil as guide he travels through Hell (Inferno) and Purgatory before finally reaching Paradise. The Inferno is described as a conical structure with successive circles, each reserved for particular categories of sinners. Purgatory is a mountain, on top of which is the Earthly Paradise where Dante finally meets his beloved Beatrice. Dante completed the Divine Comedy shortly before his death in 1321. It is one of the great texts of European culture and continues to inspire artists.

Blake's watercolour illustrations were commissioned in 1824 by John Linnell, friend and patron of his last years. They were executed at a time when Dante's masterpiece was being made more widely known through translation and critical re-evaluation. Henry Cary's first complete translation was published in 1814 and Blake owned a copy of it. He also taught himself Italian in order to be able to read the original. In the late 18th century the sublime and terrible passages of the Inferno were illustrated and singled out for praise, however, by the 1820s a new appreciation of the beauties of Purgatory, and especially Paradise, had emerged. Blake's originality as an illustrator of the Divine Comedy lies in his literary and visionary approach to the text. One of the ways he maintains a continuity of narrative throughout the series is by consistently showing Dante dressed in red (denoting experience) and Virgil in blue (denoting the spirit). Between 1824 and 1827, when he died, Blake completed 102 watercolours which survive in varying stages of completion. He intended to engrave the series - as Flaxman had done with his illustrations in the early 1800s - but managed to partially complete only seven plates.