Letter to Can GrandeDante Alighieri

Dante's Letter to Can Grande, addressed to Can Grande della Scala of Verona as a dedication of the Paradiso, is the poet's own account of how the Divine Comedy is to be read. Meaning is multiple. Literally, the subject is the state of souls after death. Allegorically, the subject is man, who by the exercise of free choice becomes liable to rewarding or punishing justice. Dante also sets out the four senses used in sacred interpretation (literal, allegorical, moral, and anagogical) and applies them to the Psalm "When Israel came out of Egypt." The letter fixes the Comedy's aim as practical: to lead readers from a state of misery to a state of happiness. It is the tradition's primary key to Dante's method, and later readers of poetry, theology, and allegory take their bearings from the distinctions it draws.