Dante Alighieri, Inferno; A downwards spiral

So I landed myself a new job! I will soon be a call center operator part time, which will be really cool. I don't start until the 18th of March, which is a few weeks away, at the moment.

The Story
Inferno is the story of Dante as he is being lead through Hell by the spirit of Virgil and progresses down in a spiral. Dante starts in a dark forest, which he cannot seem to escape as his way is blocked by three vicious creatures. Here he meets Virgil who agrees to take him through hell and out the other side as the only escape. They the proceed through the nine circles of hell: Limbo, Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Wrath, Heresy, and Violence which is broken into three rings, Fraud which is broken into 10 Bolgia and Treachery which is broken into four rounds. Dante then proceeds to the center of hell and climbs the devil, himself, to escape. As he progresses down through the circles, he stops and talks to many shades of note, mainly Greek or Roman including Homer and Ovid. All those that are named are references to history and older epics.

Reflections
As simple as the above description is, the text is not that straight forward. It is more a meandering through of different parts, without clear distinctions between circles or their sub-portions. I did not always recognize the named shades that Dante meet but I think I will come across them as I continue through my BC list.
Dante at first seems to be working from a Christian perspective but this quickly falls away as he uses many other descriptions of the afterlife from many different cultures and sources, with the rives Styx needing to be crossed and with demons and principalities drawn from the Greek and Roman gods and famous people. Dante also presents the poem as a recounting of a vision that happened to him, which it could have been but it does not line up with the Christian scriptures but rather is a large part of Christian mysticism.
I had thought that this was the origin of the seven deadly sins and it is a part of it's propagation; but, it is more accurately a doctrine of the Catholic Church as part of their doctrine of carnal and venal sins. I do not believe, from my research, that it is still an active doctrine and it is not biblical.

Comparisons
The crossing of the river Styx is straight out of Greek mythology and we also see the crossing of the river of the dead in the Gilgamesh epic. The difference being them, is that in both Greek mythology and the Gilgamesh epic, the river was something that separated the world of the living from the world of the dead and that all the dead had to make the crossing. In the Inferno, it is one of the punishments for the damned and is part way though the circles, so not all the dead cross it, only those going to deeper circles.

Have you read Inferno? If so what did you think of it?

Want to read Inferno but haven't? Hopefully this inspires you to take the time to do so.
Get a copy of Inferno.