We’ve already covered the first seven chapters now, doing 5-7 at once in the fifth episode, as it’s a bit slow reading with lots of local contemporary history for Dante.
And now we’re already coming to chapter 8 in the next episode – which is deeply symbolic and warming up to the Gate in chapter 9. It’s interesting how one sees different things in the Comedy depending on the speed and abstraction level one is aiming for. The Ante-Purgatory as a whole is very different from reading chapters 4-8 individually f.ex., and different things stand out. New discoveries this time was the expanding role of Sordello as a Roman Poet with the added dimension of having Faith, as a contrast or addition to the symbolism of Virgil. Little by little, element by element, Dante the Writer is changing the moods and the wider context of the story – preparing us for the final part of the trilogy, in the Paradise.