Dante’s Dream

Archetypal images, Carl Jung believed, when elaborated in tales and ceremonies, shape culture’s imagination and behavior. Unfortunately, such cultural images can become stale and lose their power over the mind. But an artist or mystic can refresh and revive a culture’s imagination by exploring his personal dream-images and connecting them to the past. Dante Alighieri presents his Divine Comedy as a dream-vision, carefully establishing the date at which it came to him (Good Friday, 1300), and mai