Commentary Inf XXXIV 97-120

Even though the travelers have to traverse an enormous distance in seventy lines, thirty-nine of them (88-126) are devoted to their new situation, Dante's three questions, and Virgil's responses. The setting is a space on the convex side of the ice of Cocytus, i.e., on its far side. The only remaining evidence of the infernal core is offered by the legs of Lucifer, sticking up through the crust of the area that contains the rest of him. We are on the other side of the ice, and there is nothing more by way of constructed space to catch our eye.

Dante wants to know why he no longer sees the ice, why Lucifer is 'upside down,' and how it can already be morning. Some of Virgil's explanations have already been adverted to. He also explains that they are now under the southern hemisphere of the world above, not the northern, where Christ was put to death and whence they had begun their descent.