The poem follows a pilgrim’s visionary passage through three ordered realms of the afterlife—Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso—arranged in canticles and cantos. Guided first by a revered classical mentor and later by a celestial companion, the narrator observes vivid punishments, stages of purification, and harmonious blessedness, encountering a gallery of historical and symbolic souls. The work maps a moral cosmos while examining sin, repentance, divine justice, and love, and culminates in a transcendent ascent that seeks union with the ultimate divine light.